Jenni Rivera was born to a pair of Mexican parents in Long Beach, California, where she would grow up to absorb all the lessons that came with being raised a Latina in the United States. She was a hardworking and outspoken little girl that ultimately shaped into one of Mexico’s greatest musical exports.
At the time of her death, Rivera, 43, was the single most successful woman on the Billboard Latin charts, a fact made evident following her shocking death in a plane crash in Mexico on December 9, 2012.
She was a wife, sister, mother and successful business woman on the verge of a major crossover. In the months and years that followed her untimely demise, the world learned through familial testimonies, autobiographical volumes and media publications that Jenni was as complicated a human as she was musically gifted.
Here five of the most shocking secrets revealed in the aftermath of Jenni Rivera’s death:
She was raped.
After filming her first music video for “La Chacalosa,” the singer was raped off a California highway by a man whose advances she rejected earlier that evening. This is revealed for the first time in her autobiography, Unbreakable: My Story, My Way.
She had some family trauma.
We also eventually learned that Jenni’s sister Rosie and her eldest daughter Chiquis Rivera were also victims of repeated sexual molestation at the hands of the singer’s ex-husband Jose Marin, who was sentenced to 30 years in prison without parole in 2006 for his heinous acts.
She attempted ?suicide.
In addition to the sexual assault, Rivera also wrote about how she attempted suicide due to her abusive relationship Marin.
She had a long-lost love.
In the same book, Jenni revealed her one true love, Fernando known as “El Corredor,” who used to promote for the ‘Que Buena de Los Angeles’ radio station. Because he was addicted to drugs, the pair ultimately could not form a healthy union. Jenni went on to marry baseball star Esteban Loaiza.
She was a strict mother.
According to Chiquis, Jenni was severely disciplinary as a parent, admitting in her own memoir, Forgiveness, that Jenni would exercise tactics that were both harsh and humiliating.
“You want me to whoop your ass, or do you want a different punishment?” Chiquis recounts about the one time she cut class and as a result received a haircut of sorts from her mother. “The longest strand I had left among the patchy and raggedy hatchet job was two inches!”
“Now put on some shoes and get out of my house, bitch,” Jenni later yelled to her daughter.