NEW YORK (AP) — The R&B singer Cassie could testify as soon as Tuesday in Sean “Diddy” Combs' sex trafficking trial, as the Bad Boy Records founder faces charges that he orchestrated a deviant empire of exploitation that forced women into drugged-up sex parties called “freak-offs.”
Testimony in the trial began Monday. Prosecutors told jurors that, for years, Combs used his status as a powerful executive to coerce women into abusive sexual encounters and became violent if they refused.
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Testimony will continue with the cross examination of a male stripper who says he was hired by Combs and his girlfriend — R&B singer Cassie — to have sex with Cassie while Combs watched and sometimes directed what should happen.
A defense lawyer said he expects to question the witness, Daniel Phillip, for about an hour.
Daniel Phillip is set to retake the stand when court reconvenes on Tuesday.
Phillip told jurors that Combs was coy about his identity when they first met in 2012 at a Manhattan hotel.
The rap star wore a ball cap, obscured his face with a bandana and claimed to be in the importing and exporting industry, Phillip said.
The witness testified that it wasn’t until a subsequent encounter at a different hotel when Combs revealed who he was, answering the door in a suit and peacoat.
The judge presiding over the racketeering and sex trafficking trial of hip-hop mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs said last week there was no evidence to back up his lawyers’ claim he was treated differently because of his race.
Judge Arun Subramanian said Combs had shown no evidence of discriminatory effect or intent based on his race, when his lawyers made their arguments in Manhattan federal court in February. In a separate written opinion, the judge also refused to suppress evidence in the case.
The lawyers had written that the prosecution was unprecedented because, “most disturbingly, no white person has ever been the target of a remotely similar prosecution.”
The judge agreed with arguments by prosecutors that the extent of criminal conduct by Combs from 2004 to 2024 — when he was alleged to have overseen a racketeering enterprise that enabled him to sexually abuse women — was enough to separate the case against him from other prosecutions.
“It’s the severity of what Combs allegedly did — not his race — that mattered,” the judge wrote.
▶ Read more about the judge’s ruling
Another possible topic for discussion between attorneys and the judge this morning could arise over an argument by media organizations that some recordings to be shown to the jury involving sexual activity should not be sealed.
The media outlets include ABC, CBS, NBC, The Associated Press, Business Insider, National Public Radio, Newsday, The New York Times, the New York Post, Reuters, New York Magazine and The Washington Post. The plan was for the jury to view the recordings, but not the public.
The media outlets say a viewing of the recordings is necessary because they could play a “central role” in determining the guilt or innocence of Combs. Lawyers for him say the sexual activity is a glimpse into the swingers lifestyle and not evidence of crimes.
A lawyer for R&B singer Cassie, who’s expected to testify Tuesday, opposed the media request, saying the news organizations cited no legal precedent for unsealing “videos depicting coercive sex acts.”
Lawyers for the three-time Grammy winner say prosecutors are wrongly trying to make a crime out of a party-loving lifestyle that may have been indulgent, but not illegal.
Prosecutors say Combs coerced women into drugged-up group sexual encounters he called “freak-offs,” “wild king nights” or “hotel nights,” then kept them in line by choking, hitting, kicking and dragging them, often by the hair.
The prosecutor said Combs last year brutally beat another woman — identified only as Jane — when she confronted him about enduring years of freak-offs in dark hotel rooms while he took other paramours on date nights and trips around the globe.
The sex parties are central to Combs’ sexual abuse, prosecutors say. Combs’ company paid for the parties, held in hotel rooms across the U.S. and overseas, and his employees staged the rooms with his preferred lighting, extra linens and lubricant, Johnson said. Combs compelled women, including Cassie, to take drugs and engage in sexual activity with male escorts while he gratified himself and sometimes recorded them, Johnson said.
▶ Read more about the allegations
But the lawyers are supposed to meet a half hour earlier to resolve any last-minute legal issues in advance of testimony from the government’s star witness: R&B singer Cassie.
She’s likely to begin testifying by midday. Cassie, whose legal name is Casandra Ventura, was intertwined with the hip-hop power broker for 11 years. Her lawsuit and allegations of sexual abuse in 2023 ignited the scrutiny that led to federal charges.
The public knew Combs as a larger-than-life music and business mogul, but in private, he used violence and threats to coerce women into drug-fueled sexual encounters that he recorded, a prosecutor said Monday in opening statements at Combs’ sex trafficking trial.
”During this trial you are going to hear about 20 years of the defendant’s crimes,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Emily Johnson told the jury.
Those crimes, she said, included kidnapping, arson, drugs, sex crimes, bribery and obstruction.
Combs’ lawyer Teny Geragos, though, described the closely watched trial as a misguided overreach by prosecutors, saying that although her client could be violent, the government was trying to turn sex between consenting adults into a prostitution and sex trafficking case.
Geragos conceded that Combs’ violent outbursts, often fueled by alcohol, jealousy and drugs, might have warranted domestic violence charges, but not sex trafficking and racketeering counts.
▶ Read more about the first day of the trial
Witnesses began testifying this week in the trial for one of the biggest music moguls and cultural figures of the past four decades.
The trial is expected to last at least eight weeks in all. Here’s a look at some of the details:
1. The witnesses:
2. The trial’s first witness, Israel Florez, who was working hotel security at the time, testified about responding to a report of a woman in distress and witnessing Combs tell Cassie:, “You’re not going to leave.”
3. Jurors also heard from Daniel Phillip, who said he was a professional stripper who was paid to have sex with Cassie while Combs watched and gave instructions. He testified that he once saw Combs drag her by her hair as she screamed.
4. The trial’s main players
5. The trial is in the courtroom of U.S. DistrictJudge Arun Subramanian.
6. The prosecutionteam consists of eight assistant U.S. attorneys, seven of them women.
7. Combs’ team of seven defense attorneys is led by New York lawyer Marc Agnifilo, who, along with his wife Karen Friedman Agnifilo is also defending Luigi Mangione.
The R&B singer Cassie could testify as soon as Tuesday in Combs sex trafficking trial, as the Bad Boy Records founder faces charges that he orchestrated a deviant empire of exploitation that forced women into drugged-up sex parties called “freak-offs.”
Cassie, whose legal name is Casandra Ventura, has been at the center of Combs’ stunning downfall. She sued him in 2023, alleging years of abuse. A surveillance video made public last year showed Combs beating her at a Los Angeles hotel in 2016. CNN aired the video last year, leading Combs to apologize.
The video, which was played for jurors, shows Combs wearing only a white towel, punching, kicking and dragging Cassie in a hotel hallway.
Israel Florez, a former security officer at the hotel, testified Monday that he came across Combs while responding to a call about a woman in distress, and found Combs sitting in a chair with “a devilish stare.” Florez said Combs offered him a stack of money and said “Don’t tell nobody.”
▶ Read more about the trial so far and Cassie’s expected testimony
