R&B singer Cassie was pressured beneath cross-examination Thursday to learn aloud specific messages along with her former boyfriend Sean “Diddy” Combs, a few of which expressed enthusiasm for intercourse with different males at Combs’ behest that she beforehand testified she “hated doing.”
Lawyers for Combs are in search of to indicate the jury that Cassie was a prepared participant in his sexual life-style and say that, whereas he might be violent, nothing he did amounted to a prison enterprise. Combs has pleaded not responsible to federal intercourse trafficking and racketeering fees.
Prosecutors say he exploited his standing as a robust music govt to violently pressure Cassie and different girls to participate in these drug-fueled encounters with intercourse staff, referred to as “freak-offs,” which typically lasted days. He’s additionally accused of utilizing his entourage and workers to facilitate unlawful actions, together with prostitution-related transportation and coercion, which is a key component of the federal fees.
Messages between Combs and Cassie — each romantic and lurid — had been the main focus of the fourth day of testimony in entrance of a Manhattan courtroom. Defense legal professional Anna Estevao learn what Combs wrote, whereas Cassie recited her personal messages.
Cassie, whose authorized title is Casandra Ventura, learn messages to Combs containing graphic particulars about what she wished to do in the course of the freak-offs. At one level, she requested for a brief break from the readings, which Judge Arun Subramanian granted.
In August 2009, Combs requested when she wished the following encounter to be, and he or she replied “I’m always ready to freak off.” Two days later, Cassie despatched an specific message and he replied in keen anticipation. She responded: “Me Too, I just want it to be uncontrollable.” Combs’ legal professionals have insisted that each one the intercourse on the freak-offs was consensual.
Later that 12 months, nevertheless, she additionally despatched Combs messages that she was annoyed with the state of their relationship and wanted one thing extra from him than intercourse.
While studying their extra affectionate conversations, Cassie testified that Combs was charismatic, a larger-than-life persona.
“I had fallen in love with him and cared about him very much,” Cassie mentioned. Estevao spoke gently in the course of the cross-examination, which had such a pleasant tone at occasions that the lawyer and witness appeared like two buddies chatting.
Cassie, nevertheless, did complain as soon as that jurors weren’t listening to the complete context of the messages the protection was highlighting, saying, “There’s a lot we skipped over.”
As the messages had been learn, Combs appeared relaxed on the protection desk, sitting again along with his fingers folded and his legs crossed. The courtroom was full of household and buddies of Combs, journalists, and a row of spectator seats occupied by Cassie’s supporters together with her husband.
The 38-year-old Cassie — who’s within the third trimester of being pregnant along with her third baby — has held up properly on the witness stand. She cried a number of occasions in the course of the earlier two days of questions by the prosecution, however for essentially the most half has remained composed and matter-of-fact as she spoke about essentially the most delicate topics.
The Associated Press doesn’t sometimes title individuals who say they’ve been sexually abused until they arrive ahead publicly, as Cassie has.
During a break, Combs stood on the protection desk, huddling along with his legal professionals, holding a pack of Post-It notes in a single hand and a pen within the different. At one level, he turned to the gallery and acknowledged just a few reporters who had been learning his demeanor. “How you doing?” he requested.
Combs’ daughters weren’t within the courtroom Thursday as the express messages had been learn and proven to the jury.
Jurors leaned ahead of their seats to comply with alongside because the messages had been displayed on displays in entrance of them within the jury field. One lady shook her head as a very specific message was proven. A person stared intently on the display screen, urgent his thumb to his chin. Other jurors appeared curious and quizzical, some Cassie or jotting notes.
Cassie’s testimony on cross-examination was in distinction to Wednesday, when she described the violence and disgrace that accompanied her “hundreds” of encounters with male intercourse staff throughout her relationship with Combs, which lasted from 2007 to 2018.
While prosecutors have targeted on Combs’ need to see Cassie having intercourse with different males, she testified that she typically watched Combs have intercourse with different girls. She mentioned Combs described it as a part of a “swingers lifestyle.”
Estevao requested Cassie straight whether or not she thought freak-offs had been associated to that life-style.
“In a sexual way,” Cassie responded, earlier than including: “They’re very different.”
Cassie mentioned Tuesday that Combs was obsessive about a type of voyeurism the place “he was controlling the whole situation.” The freak-offs came about in non-public, typically in darkish lodge rooms, not like Combs’ very public events that attracted A-list celebrities.
She testified she typically took IV fluids to get well from the encounters, and ultimately developed an opioid dependancy as a result of it made her “feel numb” afterward.
When questioned by Estevao, Cassie agreed that Combs as soon as communicated to drug sellers in Los Angeles to cease delivering medicine to her, and he instructed she get therapy. Cassie mentioned Combs solely wished her to do medicine with him, not buddies.
Cassie testified Wednesday that Combs raped her when she broke up with him in 2018, and had locked in a lifetime of abuse by threatening to launch movies of her in the course of the freak-offs.
She sued Combs in 2023, accusing him of years of bodily and sexual abuse. Within hours, the swimsuit was settled for $20 million — a determine Cassie disclosed for the primary time Wednesday — however dozens of comparable authorized claims adopted from different girls. It additionally touched off a regulation enforcement investigation into Combs that has culminated on this month’s trial.
Combs, 55, has been jailed since September. He faces no less than 15 years in jail if convicted.
Associated Press journalists Julie Walker in New York and Dave Collins in Hartford, Connecticut, contributed to this report.
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