Singer Casandra "Cassie" Ventura, the ex-girlfriend of Sean "Diddy" Combs and a leading witness to the federal sex trafficking and blackmail trial, will return to the witness stand Wednesday morning as the high-profile trial enters the third day.
Ventura, who is eight and a half months pregnant, testified Tuesday that in her decade-long relationship with the comb, she endured years of physical abuse, control and violence, as well as detailed drug-powered sexual encounters involving male escorts, she said she was directed by the comb.
She described the comb as controlling control of almost every aspect of her life, and testified that it sometimes became violent, telling the court that the comb would “mash my head, knock me, drag me, kick me.”
Ventura, 38, filed a lawsuit against the comb in 2023, accusing him of physical and sexual abuse. Although the two settled undisclosed payments for the lawsuit, it sparked a federal investigation, leading to Combs' arrest in September 2024.
The combs face charges including extortion, sexual trafficking and transportation. He pleaded not guilty and denied all charges.
During the hours of testimony on Tuesday, Ventura became instantly emotional, pausing to take deep breaths or cry. She wiped her eyes with a tissue and placed her hands on her pregnant belly regularly.
Ventura tells a multi-day drug-style sex session called "Freaks" who claims to be instructed and “choreographed.”
Ventura testified that she did not want to participate in an encounter involving male escorts and that she would take drugs every time, usually MDMA or ecstasy, and she said the comb provided the comb, which would help her stay awake and let her "demolite".
Ventura told the jury that the "freak" made her feel "terrible", "worthless" and "humiliated". However, she said she was still young, fell in love with combs and felt obliged to participate in them because she didn't want to "angry" the combs.
"I want him to be happy," she said. "I don't know what' can be turned into."
At one point during the testimony, she told the court: “Do the wrong face and the next thing I know will be hit.”
When Ventura first saw the comb at the age of 19 in 2005, he also told me that he was "greater than life than entrepreneur and musician." She told the court how she continued to sign 10 Album deals with Combs' record company Bad Boy Records, but ended up releasing only one album.
Just before Tuesday's court meeting adjourned, prosecutors began asking Ventura about key evidence of the case: a 2016 hotel corridor surveillance videotape showing comb kicks and drags Ventura.
Ventura testified that when the comb hit her, she, the comb and the male escort had been in the hotel room for "freaks" in the hotel room, so she grabbed her stuff and left the room.
Ventura will continue her testimony on Wednesday before cross-examination.
The trial, which is expected to last for at least eight weeks, has not been televised.
If convicted, Combs, who has been sentenced to jail since his arrest last year, could spend the rest of his life in jail.