Cassie’s Devastating, Stomach-Turning Testimony Might Have One Fatal Flaw
Glove up, because so far, the first week of the Diddy trial has been a boxing ring. People are fighting left and right: The prosecution and defense argued with the press about the media’s right to witness sexually explicit evidence, the defense tried to ban the star witness’s husband from sitting in during her testimony, and there were even fights at the head of the long lines to get into the courthouse the first two mornings. (“Official” line-holder companies had beef with independent line holders trying to scalp their places in line to people in the back for hundreds of dollars.)
The court proceedings haven’t felt much calmer than the many squabbles surrounding them. On Monday, the lengthy opening statements presented the crux of the case—whether a jury will decide that Combs participated in federally illegal acts including kidnapping, bribery, trafficking, and obstruction, or whether his sexual activities were illegal but not federally so. For example, the defense acknowledged that Combs has been a perpetrator of domestic violence—“one of the many things” that the defense said they’re “going to own” in this trial—but they asserted that “violence is not part of any RICO,” meaning the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, a highly controversial federal law designed to prosecute organized crime rings that is one sticking point in this trial. At one point, lawyer Teny Geragos asked: “His love of baby oil, is that a federal crime?” He got laughs in the overflow room where I was sitting for that, but it was also a signal of the testimony we were about to hear that would include hours of disturbing descriptions of Combs’ obsession with holding “freak-offs,” in which his sexual partners claimed they were often coerced into having sex with strangers while on various drugs, sometimes in successive sessions lasting multiple days.
The first witness called by the prosecution was Israel Florez, a former security guard who responded to a domestic violence incident that has become widely known after being depicted in a security video that was leaked to CNN. The video appears to show Combs throwing his longtime girlfriend and the case’s star witness, Cassie Ventura, to the ground and kicking her for allegedly attempting to leave a freak-off. Florez, who arrived on the scene to witness the aftermath and later saw the video, testified that Combs tried to bribe him with cash to not speak about what he walked into, which he reportedly refused. The defense threw some skepticism onto his testimony by comparing it to an internal incident report Florez filed at the time that is lacking in many of his purported specifics. The second witness, Daniel Phillips, was an escort who was allegedly paid to participate in the freak-offs Combs routinely hosted. Phillips testified that Combs would always direct him and Cassie in their sexual encounters to rub baby oil on each other, role-play, and for Phillips to refrain from ejaculating until Combs said to. Phillips claimed that the experiences soured when, on a couple of occasions, he witnessed Combs physically abuse Cassie, giving him erectile dysfunction when he tried to perform. Phillips asserted that when he couldn’t perform, he wouldn’t get paid. In a moment that got a laugh from the overflow room I was situated in, Phillips testified that when he first met Combs, Combs was wearing a disguise and claimed he worked in “importing and exporting.” Though it sounded funny in the moment, the irony wasn’t lost on me that he is, technically, on trial for importing and exporting sexual labor.
Then, on Tuesday, Cassie took the stand to testify to many details of her decade-long relationship with Combs, which lasted from from 2007 to 2018. Visibly pregnant in a bodycon dress and trench-length blazer, she testified to alleged arguments Combs would initiate that would purportedly result in him physically abusing her, often unpredictably, saying she might “make a wrong face” and the “next thing I knew I was getting hit in the face.” Mainly, though, Cassie testified to the “freak-offs”—hours- to days-long sexual experiences, which Cassie said happened weekly, in which Combs would allegedly direct, down to the detail of the room’s temperature, sexual encounters (sometimes with multiple sessions) between herself and male escorts—and the use of various drugs like MDMA, molly, GHB, cocaine, marijuana, and mushrooms she would take during them. Arranging these freak-offs allegedly “eventually became a job” for Cassie, though she strongly denied ever enjoying or desiring the freak-offs. The freak-offs are relevant to the charges of federal sex trafficking, though the government is trying to prove Combs conspired with a “trusted inner circle” (as Assistant U.S. Attorney Emily Johnson referred to it in her opening) to pull them off, which is the behavior that must be confirmed for the federal racketeering charge. So far, Cassie’s testimony has been weak in providing details on a larger “criminal enterprise” that would be federally illegal.
Instead, Cassie’s testimony was more intimate—she testified that she participated because she was afraid of the abuse she would suffer at Combs’ hands if she refused and because of the “blackmail materials” he “hung over her head,” that reportedly consisted of recordings of the freak-offs that Combs would allegedly demand be taken. She gave all sorts of graphic details about that time: She said she was expected to conduct them while on her menstrual cycle, and, in one instance, she choked from having too much urine in her mouth. Cassie also testified that Combs prevented her from fulfilling a shocking 10-album deal that she signed with Combs’ label when she was just 19 years old, rendering her financially dependent on him (she is also 17 years his junior). Per Cassie, “control was everything from the way that I looked to what I was working on that day, who I was speaking to.” Cassie also told of an instance involving possession of firearms, in which Combs and his security team allegedly armed themselves with guns from one of Combs’ personal safes before leaving to see about a tipoff that Combs’ famous rival, Suge Knight, was in his vicinity.
The harshest revelations came on the second day of Cassie’s testimony, though. While the jury and parties were shown sequestered photo stills from alleged freak-off videos, photo evidence was shown of all of the physical injuries—black eyes, bruises, a gash that left a permanent scar on her forehead—that Cassie allegedly sustained from Combs’ domestic abuse. Cassie testified to the more personal issues she experienced from her time with Combs, ranging from gastrointestinal issues from the constant drug use to frequent, recurring urinary tract infections Cassie allegedly had, though she reportedly would still be expected to conduct freak-offs during this. Additionally, plenty of text messages were shown to the court that detailed the volatile dynamic of Cassie and Combs’ relationship, and of how they communicated about and arranged freak-offs, including a text in which Combs allegedly offers to fly an escort, Dave, in for a freak-off. Cassie also testified to seeing Combs physically abuse her friends and other employees, including a former employee, Mia, who is expected to testify.
Cassie’s testimony is directly applicable to one of the two charges of sex trafficking and one of the two charges of transportation for prostitution, the latter being the aforementioned text allegedly showing Combs offering to fly an escort (presumably interstate) for the sexual encounter. However, it has not yet seemed to establish the basis for the federal racketeering case—which can be notoriously difficult to prove in court as you must establish a pattern of racketeering activity, the existence of the enterprise that it is tied to, and the impact of the racketeering on interstate commerce. Traditionally, RICO cases involve mountains of evidence (think: wiretaps and plea deals from key insiders used to bring organized crime rings down). Though more testimony is to come, Cassie’s testimony was fuzzy on establishing a structure or hierarchy of individuals that worked together for a common purpose, let alone showing evidence that anyone had knowingly engaged in racketeering as a part of or to benefit the enterprise. (It didn’t help that Cassie’s direct examination detailed many events out of chronological order, and some without clear time periods at all.)
The singer’s most emotional moments on the stand were more existential. Cassie testified to developing her own addiction to opiates and going through “PTSD episodes” during the final year of her and Combs’ relationship, which she finally sought to end after finding out Combs had been seeing another woman for a long time. Cassie began to date her now-husband Alex Fine thereafter, but alleged that Combs raped her in her living room—despite her “crying and saying ‘No’ ”—around this time after what she thought was “kind of a closure conversation” over dinner to say goodbye. (Cassie also testified to being intimate with Combs one more time after this incident by choice.)
In early 2023, Cassie claims she was “spinning out.” Through tears, she explained that her trauma had led to suicidal ideation that would have amounted to a suicide attempt if it weren’t for the intervention of her husband. Cassie stated that she then went to rehab and trauma therapy, which is where she began to write the rumored book that she explained she wanted Combs to read because she didn’t think he understood “the pain he put [her] through,” pain she detailed as his “own personal shame,” which left her having to “carry the things that were shameful to him.” Cassie testified that she initially asked for $30 million from Combs, but when she wasn’t taken her seriously, she sued him and settled within 24 hours for $20 million (an amount that was undisclosed until this testimony). When asked why she was still testifying given the compensation she received, Cassie said: “I can’t carry this anymore, the shame, the guilt, the way I was guided to treat people like they were disposable. What’s right is right, what’s wrong is wrong. I’m here to do the right thing.” Cassie’s cross-examination will begin on Thursday.
Slate
