‘Take it to your room’: Security guard tells Diddy trial of finding Cassie in hotel
WARNING: This article contains graphic detail that may distress some readers.
New York: A former security guard has told a court Sean “Diddy” Combs offered him a “stack” of cash following a violent altercation between the rapper and his then-girlfriend in the aftermath of a “freak-off” sexual encounter in a Los Angeles hotel.
The assault, in which Combs hits, kicks and begins to drag Cassandra Ventura, the R&B singer known as Cassie, down a hotel hallway, was caught on surveillance footage and was published by CNN last year. It was also shown to the jury in Combs’ racketeering and sex-trafficking trial, which began in New York on Monday (Tuesday AEST).
Israel Florez, now a Los Angeles police officer, was stationed at the Intercontinental Hotel in Century City, near Beverly Hills, on the morning of March 5, 2016, when the incident took place. He told the court he went to the sixth floor after being alerted to a “woman in distress”.
When he got there, he found Ventura “bundled up in the corner” of the hallway with a hoodie on, looking “scared” and with a “purple eye”. In the lobby, a vase had been destroyed. Combs, Florez said, was wearing a towel and coloured socks, and sat slouched in a chair with a “blank stare” or a “devilish stare”.
Florez said he told Combs and Ventura that if they were going to argue they would have to take it back to their room. He said Cassie wanted to leave but Combs told her not to. When they went to the room, Florez said he stood in the doorway and watched her gather her belongings, while Combs reappeared with a “stack” of cash, which he understood to be a bribe.
“I don’t want your money,” Florez recalled telling the music producer. He says he then went downstairs to find Cassie outside the hotel at the valet, where he suggested she might wish to call the police. But she got into a black SUV and left the premises.
The prosecution alleges Combs and his team paid another security guard $US100,000 to make the video footage disappear, although it did not. This was part of a wider conspiracy to use the rapper’s music business to support and advance his abusive sexual predilections, prosecutors say, and cover up his behaviour.
Combs, 55, has been charged with racketeering and sex trafficking. He has pleaded not guilty, and his lawyers argued in court that while he has committed domestic violence and is prone to jealous rages, the women freely participated in these sexual acts and no trafficking took place.
The jury was sworn in on Monday after a week of selection and a final flurry of potential jurors being struck off by both sides. Combs’ lawyers accused federal prosecutors of a pattern after they struck seven black people from the jury, but the judge, Arun Subramanian, agreed they had acceptable reasons in each case.
Subramanian issued the jury with clear, explicit instructions against reading anything about the case, posting about it on social media or discussing it with anyone. Jurors were warned not to say “good morning” to any lawyers or witnesses, nor to call up their lawyer friends.
Family and supporters of Sean “Diddy” Combs arrive to the courthouse in New York on Monday. Credit: AP
Later in the afternoon, the court heard from a second prosecution witness, Daniel Phillip, who used to work on a male revue show. It is alleged that in 2012 he was paid to have sex with Ventura in Combs’ company, starting with an encounter at the Gramercy Park Hotel in New York.
Phillip testified about an occasion on which he urinated on Ventura, but said this came at her instruction. He told the court that on one occasion he heard Combs yell out to her to “come here”, and when she did not immediately comply, “he grabbed her by her hair and dragged her to her bedroom”.
As she was apologising, Phillip says he heard a sound “like him slapping her” and he heard Combs say: “Bitch, when I tell you to come here, you come. Now, not later.”
Phillip told the jury: “I was shocked. It came out of nowhere. I was terrified. I didn’t know what to do.”
Under cross-examination, Phillip was led in excruciating detail through his first sexual encounter with Cassie, before which she presented him with thousands of dollars in cash. Phillip said when the sexual intercourse started, Combs “was in the corner masturbating immediately”.
Combs’ mother and three of his daughters were in the courtroom for Monday’s evidence. Afterwards they left the courthouse and walked straight into a waiting black van, and did not say anything to the waiting press pack.
Phillip’s cross-examination will continue on Tuesday, after which Ventura is expected to take the stand.
If you or anyone you know needs support, you can contact the National Sexual Assault, Domestic and Family Violence Counselling Service on 1800RESPECT (1800 737 732), Lifeline 131 114, or Beyond Blue 1300 224 636.
Get a note directly from our foreign correspondents on what’s making headlines around the world. Sign up for our weekly What in the World newsletter.