Cudi

May 27 (UPI) — Sean “Diddy” Combs beat his former girlfriend, Cassie Ventura, for having a relationship with another rapper, whom he threatened to kill, former assistant Capricorn Clark testified on Tuesday.

Clark told the court she witnessed Combs beating Ventura, and he told her he wanted to kill Scott Mescudi, also known as “Kid Cudi,” NBC News reported.

Combs, 55, allegedly armed himself with a firearm and rushed to Mescudi’s Los Angeles home upon learning of the relationship between the rival rapper and Combs’ ex-girlfriend Ventura, Clark testified, USA Today reported.

“I’ve never seen anything like this before,” Clark said while telling the court that Combs was in a rage and tried to break into Mescudi’s home.

Combs would not let her leave until she relayed a threat to Ventura, Clark testified.

She also said Combs repeatedly threatened her life several times while he employed her and at one time kidnapped her.

Clark teared up at times while telling the court Combs held her against her will for five days in New York City after he discovered jewelry missing from one of his homes.

She said Combs forced her to retake the polygraph test many times over several days due to her being “petrified” of her boss.

A very large man told her if she failed the polygraph test, “they’re gonna throw you in the East River,” Clark told the court.

She said the polygraph testing continued for five days until they could get a conclusive result.

Combs’ security staff would take her home each night and bring her back to the same dilapidated room on the sixth floor of a New York City building while the polygraph testing continued, Clark testified.

Combs also allegedly forced Clark to work as his personal assistant from 9 a.m. to 4 a.m. with no time off to sleep or eat.

The stress from her employment caused Clark to develop alopecia, which is a health condition that causes hair loss, she told the court.

She also said the human resources department at the business owned by Combs determined she was owed $80,000 in overtime pay after she complained about her working conditions.

Instead of paying her, Combs tore up the paperwork showing the amount of back pay he owed her, Clark testified.

“Your problem is you want a life and you can’t have that here,” Combs told Clark during the summer of 2006, she testified.

Clark said her duties as Combs’ personal assistant included booking hotels for Ventura and Kim Porter, with whom Combs fathered four children.

She also testified that Combs always brought a camera and a toiletry bag that contained illegal drugs and small bottles of baby oil and lubricant.

While in the south of France, Clark said Combs told her to obtain cocaine for one of his friends.

Clark told the court she finally quit after Combs overheard her complaining about his Miami home lacking turkey bacon and saying she hated being there.

She said Combs ran toward her and pushed her for 20 or 30 yards and yelled she could get out of his house if she hated being there.

The shoving continued until Combs’ security stopped him, and Clark said she quit after that incident.

Combs afterward asked her to work for his Sean John women’s apparel business, but Clark said she refused because she “didn’t want to be trapped in his house no more,” she told the court.

Clark’s testimony followed last week’s court appearances by Ventura, her mother, Regina Ventura, musical artist Dawn Richard and Mescudi.

All testified about abuse and threats made by Combs at various times.

Mescudi told the court Combs broke into his home and locked his dog in a bathroom on one occasion.

He said his car was blown up on another occasion.

Prosecutors argue such events demonstrate Combs’ alleged violent acts committed over two decades while coercing women to take drugs and participate in orchestrated sex parties that he called “freak offs” and often recorded on video.

Combs is charged with one count of racketeering conspiracy; two counts of sex trafficking by force, fraud or coercion; and two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution.

He has pleaded not guilty to all charges and could be sentenced to between 10 years and life in prison if found guilty on one or more charges.

The trial began on May 5 at the U.S. District Court for Southern New York in Manhattan.

May 22 (UPI) — Rapper Kid Cudi will take the stand Thursday in the closed door federal sex-trafficking trial against Sean “Diddy” Combs in a big day for prosecutors.

The 41-year-old Grammy Award-winning rapper, whose birth name is Scott Mescudi, is expected to share details about his romantic past from more than 10 years ago with Combs’ ex-partner, Casandra “Cassie” Ventura, particularly the allegations that Combs allegedly was behind the blowing up of Mescudi’s car.

The trial began on May 5 at the U.S. District Court for Southern New York courthouse in Manhattan in a trial where cameras are prohibited.

Combs is charged with one count of racketeering conspiracy, two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution and two counts of sex trafficking by force. He has pleaded not guilty and could be sentenced to up to life in prison if a jury finds him guilty on one or more charges.

On Tuesday, a special agent with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security was the first to open testimony in the trial during the morning hours as a handful of other witnesses took the stand, including a board-certified forensic and clinical psychologist and Ventura’s mother.

Ventura, in a 2023 civil lawsuit settled privately without Combs admitting any wrongdoing, alleged that Combs told her that he would blow of Mescudi’s car.

“Around that time, Kid Cudi’s car exploded in his driveway,” court documents read, adding that Ventura was “terrified, as she began to fully comprehend what Mr. Combs was both willing and able to do to those he believed had slighted him.”

Meanwhile, Ventura testified in court last week and said she kept a burner phone to hide her relationship with Cudi.

The prosecution will likely try to prove that Combs used his considerable influence and wealth to execute the bombing of Cudi’s vehicle, according to a former federal prosecutor for New York’s Southern District.

Calling Mescudi to the witness stand could help the prosecution if it can demonstrate Combs used his considerable financial and business resources to carry out the bombing, said Rachel Maimin, a former federal prosecutor for the Southern District of New York.

“The burden of proof is on the federal government, so they’ll have to show this was part of the racketeering,” Rachel Maimin, now a criminal defense attorney with Lowenstein Sandler LLP, told NBC.

“This may be a way of explaining how he used his business empire to further the prosecution’s goal of proving the racketeering enterprise,” she added.

NEW YORK — Sean “Diddy” Combs’ one-time personal assistant testified Wednesday that he was in charge of cleaning up hotel rooms after the hip-hop mogul’s sex marathons — tossing out empty alcohol bottles, baby oil and drugs, tidying pillows and making it look as if nothing had happened.

Implied in the job was that “protecting him and protecting his public image were important to him,” George Kaplan told jurors at Combs’ sex trafficking trial in federal court in Manhattan.

“That’s what I was keen on doing,” Kaplan said.

Kaplan, who worked for Combs from 2013 to 2015, said the Bad Boy Records founder would sometimes summon him to a hotel room to deliver a “medicine kit,” a bag full of prescription pills and over-the-counter pain medications. He said Combs also dispatched him to buy drugs, including MDMA, also known as ecstasy.

Kaplan, 34, was granted immunity to testify after initially telling the court that he would invoke his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. Prosecutors contend Combs leaned on employees and used his music and fashion empire to facilitate and cover up his behavior, sometimes making threats to keep them in line and his misconduct hush-hush.

Kaplan testified that Combs threatened his job on a monthly basis, once berating him for buying the wrong size bottled water. Combs’ longtime girlfriend, the R&B singer Cassie, testified that Kaplan quit after seeing Combs beat her.

Kaplan’s testimony resumes Thursday. He’ll be followed by rapper and actor Kid Cudi.

Cudi, whose legal name is Scott Mescudi, is expected to testify about his brief relationship with Cassie in 2011. Prosecutors say Combs was so upset that he arranged to have Cudi’s convertible firebombed.

Also Wednesday, a federal agent showed jurors two handguns he said were found in a March 2024 raid at Combs’ Miami-area home, along with photos of ammunition and a wooden box marked “Puffy” — one of his nicknames — that the agent said contained psilocybin, MDMA and other drugs.

Investigators also found items prosecutors say were hallmarks of “freak-offs,” including dozens of bottles of baby oil and lubricant, said Homeland Security Investigations Special Agent Gerard Gannon.

Combs’ lawyer Teny Geragos suggested the search — which involved 80 to 90 agents, an armored vehicle smashing the security gate, handcuffed employees and boat patrols — was overkill. Combs’ Los Angeles mansion was also searched.

Gannon confirmed the federal investigation began the day after Cassie filed a lawsuit in November 2023 alleging that Combs abused her for years and involved her in hundreds of “freak-offs” with him and male sex workers. He soon settled for $20 million, she said.

Combs has pleaded not guilty to charges alleging he leveraged his fame and fortune to control Cassie and other people through threats and violence. His lawyers say the evidence reflects domestic violence, not racketeering or sex trafficking.

Jurors also heard from a psychologist who delved into the complexities of abusive relationships. Dawn Hughes explained victims often experience a “low sense of self” and tend to stay with abusers because they yearn for love and compassion they experienced in a relationship’s early “honeymoon phase.”

Hughes also explained how a victim’s memory can sometimes become jumbled — retaining awareness of abuse, but mixing up details. Hughes, who was paid $6,000 by the prosecution to testify, didn’t examine or mention Cassie or Combs, but her testimony paralleled some of what Cassie said she experienced with him.

Cassie testified that she started dating Cudi in late 2011. Although she and Combs broke up, they still engaged in “freak-offs,” she said. It was during such an encounter that Combs looked at her phone and figured out she was seeing Cudi, Cassie said.

Cassie’s mother, Regina Ventura, testified Tuesday that Cassie emailed her in December 2011 that Combs was so angry about the relationship that he planned to release explicit videos of her and have someone hurt Cassie and Cudi. Regina Ventura said she Combs also demanded $20,000. Scared for her daughter’s safety, she said she sent Combs the money, only to have it returned by Combs days later.

Cassie testified that she broke up with Cudi before the end of the year.

“It was just too much,” she said. “Too much danger, too much uncertainty of, like, what could happen if we continued to see each other.”

After Cassie reunited with Combs, he told her that Cudi’s car would be blown up and that he wanted Cudi’s friends there to see it, Cassie said.

Sisak and Neumeister write for the Associated Press. AP reporter Julie Walker contributed to this report.