Cassie, known professionally as Cassie, offered powerful testimony on Wednesday during the third day of the federal sex trafficking trial against hip-hop mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs. The singer told the jury that her ex-partner blackmailed her for years with explicit videos of so-called freak offs, sex parties hosted by the artist, and that she was the victim of physical, psychological, and sexual abuse for more than a decade. “He said he would ruin everything I had worked for, that he would make me look like a whore. That he would embarrass me,” Ventura declared through tears, according to REUTERS.
“No one should do that to anyone,” she added. According to Diddy's ex-girlfriend, he “maintained a cycle of abuse and exploitation by threatening to release videos of me having sex with male sex workers he hired.” She claimed that she agreed to participate in the parties, despite feeling “disgusted and humiliated,” out of fear that the musician would destroy her career and personal life. The jury heard text messages exchanged between the two, including one from 2013 in which Combs claimed he had deleted the videos. However, Ventura said he viewed them repeatedly on the artist's devices. "I was afraid for my career. I was afraid for my family. It's just embarrassing.
It's horrible and disgusting," he testified. Prosecutors indicated that some of those videos could be presented as evidence during the trial. Although they will not be shown to the public, the jury will view them with headphones in court. Raw Accounts of Physical Violence At Wednesday's hearing, Ventura continued her account of the pattern of physical violence in her relationship with Combs, who is charged with five federal charges.
On Tuesday, the full footage of an assault that occurred in 2016 during her stay at a Los Angeles hotel was shown.In the footage, the rapper is seen throwing Ventura to the floor while she was wearing only a towel, then repeatedly kicking her and trying to drag her back to the room. According to the AP, Cassie explained that the attack occurred after a freak-out and left her with a black eye, a swollen lip, and other bruises. Upon leaving the hotel, a friend called the police, but when officers arrived, Ventura refused to reveal who had attacked her.
"At that moment, I didn't want to hurt him like that. I wasn't ready," she told the jury. Messages from after the incident were also presented, in which Combs asked her to come back because "the police were coming." She refused, responding: "I won't be coming back because I have a black eye, a swollen lip, and tomorrow I have a movie premiere that I need to rest for." In another message, he wrote: "You're sick for thinking what you did was acceptable.
Please stay away from me." Photos of Cassie at that premiere were also shown in court, where she testified that she used makeup and costume adjustments to hide the marks from the beating. Behind the Sex Parties According to Ventura's testimony, Combs organized the freak-offs—private sex parties with drug use—for at least ten years, until approximately 2017 or 2018. These gatherings, often held in darkened hotel rooms in cities like Las Vegas, Miami, and Los Angeles, involved sex workers Cassie recruited on Combs' orders.
