R&B artist Cassie Ventura’s film premiere was days away in March 2016 when her then-boyfriend Sean “Diddy” Combs texted her asking what she was doing.
She already felt “trapped” in a cycle of bodily and sexual abuse by him, she advised a New York federal jury this week, outlining 11 years of alleged beatings, sexual blackmail and a rape.
She claimed Combs threatened to leak movies of her sexual encounters with quite a few male intercourse staff whereas drug-intoxicated and glistening with child oil as he watched and orchestrated the occasions, generally known as freak-offs.
“If I pleased him with a freak-off, then my premiere would run smoothly,” she mentioned, based on reporting from contained in the Manhattan courtroom from the Related Press.
What occurred subsequent may find yourself being the start of the top of Combs’ public life.
Video footage from that March 2016 evening exhibits Combs punching and kicking Ventura as she cowers and tries to guard herself in entrance of an L.A. lodge elevator financial institution. He then drags her down the corridor by her hooded sweatshirt towards their lodge room. A second angle from one other digicam captures Combs throwing a vase towards her. She suffered bruising to her eye, a fats lip, and a bruise that prosecutors confirmed was nonetheless seen throughout the film premiere two days later. She donned sun shades and heavy make-up on the pink carpet.
Ventura’s testimony is on the heart of the federal trial accusing Combs of racketeering conspiracy, intercourse trafficking, and transportation for prostitution.
Sweeping allegations
The federal indictment alleges that Combs and his associates lured feminine victims, typically below the pretense of a romantic relationship. Combs then allegedly used pressure, threats of pressure, coercion and managed substances to get ladies to have interaction in intercourse acts with male prostitutes whereas he often watched in gatherings that Combs known as “freak-offs.” Combs gave the ladies ketamine, ecstasy and GHB to “keep them obedient and compliant” throughout the performances.
The freak-offs, which prosecutors say generally lasted for days, have been elaborately produced intercourse performances that Combs organized, directed, masturbated throughout, and sometimes recorded, based on the indictment. Prosecutors allege in a detention memo filed in courtroom that the freak-offs occurred commonly from at the least 2009 by 2023 and that the lodge rooms the place they have been staged typically sustained vital injury.
Combs’ alleged “criminal enterprise” threatened and abused ladies and utilized members of his enterprise to have interaction in intercourse trafficking, pressured labor, interstate transportation for functions of prostitution, coercion and enticement to have interaction in prostitution, narcotics offenses, kidnapping, arson, bribery and obstruction of justice, prosecutors mentioned. In bringing so-called RICO expenses, prosecutors in opening statements mentioned Combs was helped by cadre of firm staff, safety workers and aides. They allegedly helped set up the crime and “freak-offs” after which coated up the incidents. Up to now, Combs is the one one dealing with felony expenses associated to the investigation.
Combs’ legal professional this week mentioned her shopper was removed from excellent however that the fees have been overblown.
“Sean Combs is a complicated man. But this is not a complicated case. This case is about love, jealousy, infidelity and money,” Combs’ lawyer Teny Geragos advised jurors. “There has been a tremendous amount of noise around this case over the past year. It is time to cancel that noise.”
How Ventura and Combs met
Jurors heard that Ventura was 19 when she met the 37-year-old Combs in 2005, and she or he signed a 10-year contract together with his Unhealthy Boy Data label. About two years later, he had Britney Spears come to her twenty first birthday celebration, the place Ventura and Combs kissed and their relationship started, she mentioned. She testified that the freak-offs grew to become a lifestyle, and she or he even stepped away from her personal birthday celebration for one.
Cassie Ventura, left, and Sean “Diddy” Combs arrive on the Los Angeles premiere of “Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop: A Bad Boy Story” on the Writers Guild Theater on June 21, 2017, in Beverly Hills.
(Chris Pizzello / Invision / AP)
Combs, she advised jurors, required her to let a male intercourse employee urinate in her mouth. That man and others have been paid 1000’s of {dollars} to have intercourse repeatedly for 36 to 48 hours, she advised the jury.
On the stand, Ventura recognized 13 male intercourse staff by images offered by prosecutors that she mentioned Combs’ had her recruit for the freak-offs. Hers and Combs’ relationship would finish on a day in 2018 when she met him for dinner and he raped her on her lounge ground, she testified.
Violence
Throughout 4 days of testimony, Ventura, who’s eight and a half months pregnant, described being raped, overwhelmed at the least six instances, most severely in 2009.
Within the 2009 assault, she testified that Combs was “stomping” on her face after he found she was relationship rapper Child Cudi. Child Cudi, whose actual title is Scott Mescudi, had his automobile torched a short while afterward. Prosecutors allege in courtroom papers that Combs ordered it.
Authorized evaluation
Authorized consultants say the testimony is designed to construct the federal case towards Combs, even when on the floor it doesn’t seem immediately associated to the fees he’s dealing with.
“Why is the government talking about rape and assault when the charges are RICO and sex trafficking?” mentioned former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani. Effectively, he mentioned, “what separates sex trafficking from consensual sex between adults — which the defense is arguing — is force, fraud or coercion.”
“Ventura’s testimony that she was given drugs to the point of throwing up … and forced to have sex when she was menstruating or had a UTI is evidence of coercion,” he mentioned.
Rahmani mentioned that Ventura’s portrayal of Combs as a gun-brandishing mogul who beat her on a number of events, tracked her actions and despatched a safety crew to seek out her is proof of pressure.
Then there have been the alleged threats. She recounted that in a business flight in 2013, Combs pulled out his laptop computer and commenced enjoying a freak-off recording as they sat collectively. She mentioned Combs advised her that he was going to embarrass her and launch them.
“I feared for my career. I feared for my family. It’s just embarrassing. It’s horrible and disgusting. No one should do that to anyone,” Ventura mentioned.
Authorities raid Sean “Diddy” Combs’ Los Angeles residence as a part of an ongoing intercourse trafficking investigation
(Eric Thayer / Related Press)
Rahmani mentioned the racketeering cost towards Combs requires prosecutors to show the existence of a felony enterprise.
“People typically think of the mob, street gangs, or drug cartels, but any loose association of two or more people is enough like Combs’ entourage,” the previous federal prosecutor mentioned. They need to present two or extra predicate acts over 10 years.
“That is why the evidence of bribery, kidnapping, obstruction, witness tampering and prostitution is important,” he mentioned.
LAPD officer testimony
Israel Florez, a lodge safety guard who confronted Combs in 2016, now a Los Angeles Police officer, testified Combs flashed a bundle of money at him — one thing he believed was an tried bribe. He rejected it, he mentioned.
Combs’ protection is looking for to color Ventura as collaborating within the habits, recruiting and paying intercourse companions, buying narcotics and texting to push for freak-offs that have been a part of a swingers’ way of life. She is considered one of 4 alleged victims within the case, with jurors anticipated to listen to from at the least three of them.
On Thursday, protection legal professional Anne Estevao had Ventura learn a collection of loving texts to Combs and received Ventura to testify she’d watched Combs have intercourse with one other lady on a number of events. To help the swingers’ protection, the lawyer produced a 2009 textual content the place the singer declared, “I’m always ready to freak off.”
Ventura sued Combs within the fall of 2023, accusing him of years of bodily and sexual abuse, triggering a cascade of lawsuits and allegations by others who say they’re victims of Combs and finally, a raid by Homeland Safety on his L.A. and Miami houses and his arrest. Ventura acknowledged Wednesday that she received a $20-million settlement inside days of submitting her lawsuit.
Combs legal professional pushes again
Throughout opening statements in a Manhattan federal courtroom, Geragos, considered one of Combs’ protection attorneys, drew a distinction for jurors between the violence they’d hear testimony about and the fees Combs was dealing with, saying “domestic violence is not sex trafficking.”
She mentioned the video of Ventura’s assault within the lodge was indefensible, however that the singer “made a choice” to stick with Combs for 11 years.
After the assault, a buddy referred to as police to Ventura’s residence, she testified. However when officers arrived, she didn’t determine Combs because the wrongdoer.
The prosecutor requested her why she didn’t discuss. “In that moment, I didn’t want to hurt him that way. I wasn’t ready,” she replied.
On Thursday, the protection cross-examining Ventura sought to vary the narrative utilizing dozens of textual content messages between Combs and Ventura. In a July 2013 textual content message trade, Comb’s protection lawyer famous that Cassie raised the thought of getting a “freak-off,” writing to Combs: “Wish we could’ve FO’d before you left.”
Utilizing the textual content message exchanges, the protection lawyer highlighted Ventura’s admitted jealousy over the eye he gave different ladies.
“You’re making me look like a side piece and that is not what I thought I was,” Cassie advised Combs in a 2013 textual content message.
Estevao tried to recast the lodge incident as the results of the 2 taking a “bad batch” of the psychedelic stimulant MDMA throughout a “freak-off” earlier than the lodge beating.
Throughout her testimony this week, Ventura testified that Combs allegedly overdosed on opioids whereas partying on the Playboy Mansion in 2012. Whereas she wasn’t there, she mentioned, he advised her about it.
Ventura’s testimony ended on Friday.
The Related Press contributed courtroom testimony for this evaluation.
