Second Alleged Sean Combs Sex Trafficking Victim Begins Testimony
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The second woman allegedly sex trafficked by Sean Combs took the witness stand at the hip-hop mogul's criminal trial Thursday, just months after she first started speaking with prosecutors but more than a year after she purportedly told Combs that reading Casandra 'Cassie' Ventura's graphic lawsuit was like reading her own 'sexual trauma.'
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The woman, testifying under the pseudonym Jane, is listed as Victim-2 in the Southern District of New York's sex trafficking and racketeering case against Combs. Prosecutors previously kept much of Jane's story under wraps, but they allege Combs fed her drugs and coerced her into highly choreographed 'freak-offs' with male escorts between 2021 and 2024.
In the courtroom in lower Manhattan, Jane told jurors she first met Combs in 2020, while he was dating one of her friend. She said he paid for their trip to Miami, hosted them at his home and quickly made it clear he was interested in her.
'He was really charming, really nice, and I was already drawn to him pretty instantly,' she testified, according to CNN. 'There was a little bit of flirting going on.'
Jane said Combs pursued her after that. She held him at bay at first, at least until her friend got engaged to someone else, she testified. Jane said Combs invited her back to Miami in early 2021, and their first date lasted five days. She said they developed pet names. She called Combs 'Ernie,' and he called her 'Bert,' a reference to the Muppet characters. (Combs previously appeared in Disney's 2014 movie Muppets Most Wanted.) Jane said Combs took her out to a restaurant and walked with her on the beach.
'I was head over heels,' Jane reportedly testified. She later traveled with him on a two-week trip to Turks and Caicos and the Bahamas.
Prosecutors say Combs used manipulation, threats and physical violence to get what he wanted from Jane, busting down doors, dragging Jane, by her hair and kicking Jane while she was curled up in a ball on the ground. (Ventura previously testified that Combs coerced her into hundreds of freak-offs during their 11-year relationship that ended for good in 2018.)
Prosecutors have indicated they only began speaking to Jane in January, after they uncovered text messages she sent Combs in the days after Ventura's lawsuit was first filed in November 2023. 'It makes me sick how three solid pages, word for word, is exactly my experiences and my anguish,' she texted Combs. After Combs allegedly fed Jane a 'false narrative' and made a vague reference to supporting her financially, Jane continued dating Combs into 2024, prosecutors said.
In her opening statement, Assistant U.S. Attorney Emily Johnson told jurors they would hear recordings of phone calls in which Combs called Jane after Ventura filed her lawsuit. 'You will hear him try to manipulate Jane into saying she wanted to have freak-offs. You will hear him interrupt Jane when she pushes back,' Johnson said.
Johnson described Jane as a single mom who started spending time with Combs in 2020 and 'fell in love with him quickly.' Johnson said Jane was not seeing other men, but Combs was dating other women and kept his relationship with Jane out of the public eye. Johnson said Combs lured Jane into her first freak-off with little warning or notice. The two already had taken drugs together and been intimate, and Jane complied with the surprise request in an effort to please Combs, Johnson said. Within a matter of hours, Jane found herself in a hotel room, having sex with a stranger while Combs directed her step by step, Johnson told the jury.
'The defendant continued asking Jane to have freak-offs and promising that if she did, they would spend quality time together, they would go on dates together, they would go on trips,' Johnson said on the first day of Combs' trial last month. 'That was what Jane wanted more than anything, a real relationship … But even though the defendant promised her quality time and trips, he never delivered. Those were just lies he told her to get more nights in dark hotel rooms with escorts.'
According to prosecutors, Combs took steps to control Jane financially, discouraging her from working so that she could be available to him on a moment's notice. Although Jane repeatedly told Combs that she didn't like 'freak-offs' and only wanted to be alone with him, Combs dismissed the request. He also allegedly ignored Jane's pleas for the male escorts to wear condoms.
Combs is accused of threatening to release explicit videos of Jane, supplying her with narcotics to keep her awake and compliant, and using physical violence to trap Jane in his abusive dynamic. During one purported incident, Combs allegedly kicked down four of Jane's doors and lifted her off the ground in a chokehold. Later that night, Combs allegedly beat Jane again, punching her in the face, kicking her on the ground, and dragging her by her hair before forcing her to have a freak-off.
'You're not going to fuck up my night,' Combs allegedly told Jane, according to the government's opening statement.
When Ventura filed her stunning complaint and Jane worked up the courage to confront Combs, the Bad Boy Records founder allegedly tried to feed her a 'false narrative' over the phone, prosecutors allege. Combs attempted to convince her 'that she had willingly engaged in sex acts with him,' prosecutors said at Combs' bail hearing last September. 'In this call, the defendant ensures the victim that if she continues to be on his side and provide support and friendship, that she doesn't have to worry about anything else, which is just a thinly-veiled reference to continuing that financial support,' a prosecutor told the court.
In the defense's dueling opening statement, Combs' lawyer, Teny Geragos, sought to set Jane apart from Ventura. She told jurors that by the time Combs started seeing Jane, 'he was more upfront about his dating life,' including the fact that he was dating multiple women. She said Jane also was older and more mature than Ventura, 'living her own life in a different state raising her child.'
Geragos said that after Jane's first experience with a freak-off, 'she began to do everything possible to make these nights incredible for Combs.' Geragos suggested Jane 'made the choice' to engage in freak-offs 'out of love.'
'She was desperate to spend time with him, to be with him, and ultimately, to give him something none of the other girlfriends that he was dating at the time were giving him. She will tell you that she tried many times to change the tenor of the relationship from one of a purely sexual nature to something maybe deeper or more meaningful,' Geragos said. She blamed the alleged violence in the couple's 'toxic and dysfunctional' relationship on Jane's 'jealousy.'
In her opening, Geragos said Combs was interested in a 'swingers lifestyle,' which she described as a predilection for consensual 'threesomes by adults.' She told jurors it was not their job 'to judge him for his sexual preferences.' She said the government had the burden to prove Combs coerced the women, and that the evidence would show the women willingly stayed with Combs out of love and because he was a 'wealthy rapper' who gave them generous financial support.
Geragos acknowledged that Combs was violent in the video showing him kicking and dragging Ventura in a hotel hallway in 2016, but she said 'domestic violence is not sex trafficking.'
Jane's time on the stand is expected to stretch well into next week. More than two dozen witnesses already have testified at Combs' trial, which is now in its fourth week. Prosecutors have called multiple former assistants, alleged male escorts, and even Scott Mescudi, the musician and actor known as Kid Cudi, to support their allegations Combs used his wealth, influence, and inner circle to carry out crimes aimed at fulfilling his sexual desires and protecting his reputation.
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San Francisco Chronicle
an hour ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
Key moments from the closing arguments at Sean 'Diddy' Combs' sex trafficking trial
NEW YORK (AP) — A jury will begin deliberations on Monday over the fate of Sean 'Diddy' Combs after hearing wildly differing views from prosecutors and a defense lawyer over whether he engaged in sex trafficking for two decades. Two prosecutors insisted that he had coerced, threatened and sometimes viciously forced two ex-girlfriends to have sex with male sex workers to satisfy his sexual pleasure. They cited multiple acts of violence he carried out against them as proof that they had no say. A defense lawyer then mocked the government's closing argument and warned that prosecutors were employing a novel approach to sex crimes that risked turning the swinger lifestyle that Combs and his girlfriends enjoyed into potential crimes for all Americans. Combs, 55, the founder of Bad Boy Entertainment, has pleaded not guilty to sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy charges in the trial, which continues Monday when the judge will read instructions on the law to jurors before they begin deliberations. Here are key moments from closing argument on Thursday and Friday: Prosecutors showed they weren't withdrawing claims against Combs Prosecutors triggered headlines last week that they had backed off or eliminated claims of arson and kidnapping against Combs when they said they were removing instructions on the law regarding them to be given jurors on Monday in response to the judge's request to streamline the case for the jury. 'The Government is no longer planning to proceed on these theories of liability so instructions are no longer necessary,' prosecutors wrote in a letter to the judge. But when Assistant U.S. Attorney Christy Slavik launched closings on Thursday, she gave the allegations of arson and kidnapping a starring role in her first sentences, naming them before any others. 'Over the last several weeks, you've learned a lot about Sean Combs. He's the leader of a criminal enterprise. He doesn't take no for an answer. And now you know about many crimes the defendant committed with members of his enterprise: Kidnapping of one of the defendant's employees; arson by trying to blow up a car; forced labor, including of an employee the defendant repeatedly sexually assaulted; bribery of a security officer to keep damning evidence against the defendant buried; and of course, the brutal crimes at the heart of this case — sex trafficking,' she said. The arson claim stemmed from evidence that Slavik said showed Combs was behind the firebombing of rapper Kid Cudi's Porsche in 2012. The kidnapping allegation also related to Cudi. Slavik said Combs kidnapped an employee to join him when he broke into Cudi's home after learning the rapper was dating his girlfriend. A defense lawyer strikes back, belittling government's case Attorney Marc Agnifilo in an at-times folksy presentation spared few theatrics in mocking the government's case against Combs as overreach, saying hundreds of agents poured into Combs' residences in Miami and Los Angeles to seize hundreds of bottles of baby oil and Astroglide lubricant. 'I guess it's all worth it because they found the Astroglide. They found it in boxes, boxes of Astroglide taken off the streets. Whew, I feel better already,' he said, before adding: 'The streets of America are safe from the Astroglide!' From the start, Agnifilo tried to portray prosecutors as unjustly targeting Combs after a former girlfriend of nearly 11 years — Casandra 'Cassie' Ventura — sued him in November 2023. She testified for four days in the trial's first week. The lawsuit was settled for $20 million the next day but she touched off a criminal probe with her allegations of being subjected to hundreds of drug-fueled 'freak-offs' in which she alleged she was forced to perform sexually for days with male sex workers while Combs watched, filmed and directed the action. A woman who testified under the pseudonym 'Jane' also testified during the trial that she experienced 'hotel nights' similar to 'freak-off' in a relationship with Combs from 2021 until his arrest. Agnifilo maintained the prosecution was an unjust attack on a prominent and wildly successful Black entrepreneur. 'They took Astroglide and they took baby oil, and that ends up being the evidence in this case, because his businesses are outstanding. There's nothing about the businesses to find. There's nothing about the businesses to make into a criminal case,' he said. Defense personalizes the case for jurors, calling it attack on 'your bedroom' Agnifilo tried to cast the case for the jury as an attack on everyone's bedroom and the secrets of one's sex life. 'They go into the man's bedroom. They go into the man's most private life. Where is the crime scene? The crime scene is your private sex life. That's the crime scene,' he said as he stood before jurors, who were largely expressionless as they took occasional notes and watched the closings. The lawyer said it was not uncommon that Combs liked to film sexual events with his girlfriends, calling it 'sort of typical, you know, homemade porn' and adding that 'I don't think by any stretch of the imagination this is the only man in America making homemade porn.' Still, he said, investigators "take yellow crime scene tape, figuratively, and they wrap it around his bedroom. Crime scene — your bedroom, your hotel rooms, where you go with your girlfriends. Crime scenes. A lot of yellow tape.' Then, he gave a nod to the 50th anniversary of the movie 'Jaws,' resurrecting a classic line from Hollywood history when he said: 'We need a bigger roll of crime scene tape, because that's just not going to be enough.' Judge agrees defense went too far saying prosecutors targeted Combs Just after Agnifilo told jurors that it 'takes a lot of courage to acquit,' he ripped the government's case a final time in stark terms, saying the trial was 'very different" from any other trial. 'I think that the evidence shows, and you can conclude, that the government targeted Sean Combs,' he said, noting that nobody complained to the government to instigate a probe, but investigators instead began their work a day after Cassie filed her lawsuit. After the jury left the room at the conclusion of Agnifilo's four-hour summation, his statement about targeting drew an outcry from the prosecutor, Slavik. When the jury returned, Judge Judge Arun Subramanian noted the remark Agnifilo had made about targeting Combs and told jurors that 'the decision of the government to investigate an individual or the decision of a grand jury to indict an individual is none of your concern.' In rebuttal, a prosecutor tells jurors that Combs is 'not a god' Assistant U.S. Attorney Maurene Comey got the final word with a rebuttal presentation to jurors, telling them: 'The defendant is not a god.' She said that Combs in his mind 'was untouchable." She noted that one former personal assistant even described him as a 'god among men.' 'For 20 years, the defendant got away with his crimes. That ends in this courtroom,' she said. 'He is a person. And in this courtroom, he stands equal before the law. Overwhelming evidence proves his guilt. It is time to hold him accountable. Find him guilty.'


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