The blockbuster sex-trafficking trial of Sean ‘Diddy‘ Combs is hurtling through its seventh day, with huge tranches of evidence unleashed in the first week alone. 

Combs is charged with racketeering conspiracy, two charges of sex trafficking and two charges of transportation to engage in prostitution. 

Prosecutors claim Diddy coerced victims into drug-fueled sex parties using sex and violence. The rapper has denied all accusations, saying all sex acts were consensual. 

As the 55-year-old music mogul faces at least another six weeks of grilling, the Daily Mail unpacks the drama which has unfolded in the Manhattan federal courtroom so far.

Horror images of ex-girlfriend Cassie’s injuries

The court was shown horrific photographs of injuries Cassie, 38, sustained allegedly at the hands of the music mogul. 

They included pictures of dark bruising on her back and lower thigh that she said came during an altercation with Diddy in Christmas 2011. 

Other photos show her badly swollen lips after the infamous 2016 assault Diddy launched on her in the hallway of an LA hotel, as caught on camera. 

The singer, whose legal name is Cassandra Ventura, said she chose to not report who had assaulted her when police showed up because she wanted to protect Diddy. 

Another image shows what Cassie described as a ‘pretty significant gash’ above her left eye. 

She said Diddy threw her into a bed frame while she was packing to go to Drake’s music festival in Canada. 

Cassie’s graphic verbal testimony 

Cassie said Diddy beat her mercilessly and ordered her to have ‘disgusting’ sex with strangers during drug-fueled, multi-day marathons he called ‘freak offs.’

The singer sniffled and dabbed her eyes with a tissue, sighed heavily and paused to compose herself through about five hours of grueling testimony.

She recalled the ‘freak offs’ in graphic detail, including one alleged instance where a male escort urinated in her mouth at Combs’ request. 

Cassie told jurors that his demands for her to engage in often-revolting sex acts – sometimes as he watched from another room via FaceTime – left her feeling ‘heavily objectified.’ 

But, she said, she endured them for more than a decade between 2007 and 2018 because she was in love with Combs, and because when she did try to leave, Combs would punish her. 

‘I just felt it was all I was good for,’ she said as she broke down in tears on the first day in court.

‘I felt pretty horrible about myself. I felt disgusted. I was humiliated, I didn’t have those words to put together at the time, how horrible I felt. I couldn’t talk to anybody about it so.’

Dawn Richard corroborates Cassie’s claims, while citing Usher and Ne-Yo 

Former Danity Kane star Dawn Richard corroborated Cassie’s claims about the violence against her.

Richard said on the stand Monday that Diddy punched Cassie in the stomach during a private argument at a West Hollywood restaurant in 2010.

She claimed several celebrities were at the dinner, including Usher, Ne-Yo and superstar music executive Jimmy Iodine.

‘Mr Combs punched Cassie in the stomach,’ Richard told the jury.

‘They were having a private conversation, we were all sitting eating at the tables together. Some of Bad Boy label mates, some celebrities were in the room.

‘They were secretly arguing [and] he punched her in the stomach.

Richard added: ‘[Cassie] immediately bent over and he told her to leave, I could see him point out and she went out.’

Disturbing freak-off photographs

The New York courtroom fell silent as the jury members viewed five still pictures of so-called ‘Freak Offs’ on their screens, which were blocked from public view.

One male juror’s eyebrows went up as he saw the images, while a female juror swallowed hard and appeared to move her head side to side.

Cassie spoke in a flat voice while she described the photographs, which showed her with three male escorts.

One picture depicted her and an escort called Greg in the middle of a ‘freak off’. Cassie said she was wearing ‘very high shoes’ and had baby oil on her skin.

To ensure her privacy, the court allowed only the singer, the jurors, Combs and his lawyers, and the prosecution to see the images.

Diddy’s medicine bag: Viagra, diet pills and drugs with Obama’s face on them 

Diddy’s former assistant told the court the mogul always traveled with a medicine bag that contained about 30 pills.

‘Some Advil, Tylenol,’ David James said.

‘He had water pills to help him lose weight, Viagra, pills that helped increase his sperm count.’

James said Diddy would take Percocet pills throughout the day and ecstasy at night.

When asked, James said one of the ecstasy pills Diddy took ‘was in the shape of former president Obama’s face.’

Diddy’s lawyers show texts where Cassie said she loved freak offs 

Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs’ legal team introduced salacious text messages from Cassie claiming the R&B singer ‘loved’ Combs’ infamous ‘freak offs.’

Diddy’s lawyer Anna Estevao used the messages in court on Thursday in an effort to paint Cassie as a willing participant in the drug-fueled sex sessions that could last up to four days.

‘I love our FOs when we both want it,’ she wrote in one missive, adding: ‘I want to Freak Off right now LOL. I want to have fun with you.’

Diddy replied: ‘Let me know if you want to have a late night. Jules is available. If you’re not into that NP. We can just do a thing. Love you.’

Cassie simply replies with a ‘love you’ back. Diddy asks: ‘If you’re not super horny wtf?’ ‘Horny. Of course I am,’ said Cassie.

Testimony from ‘The Punisher’ escort Sharay Hayes 

Hayes described his first encounter with Diddy and Cassie to the court on Tuesday, revealing that Diddy wore a veil the first time they met.

‘There was an area for me to sit and her to sit and there were little bowls of water and bottles of baby oil,’ he said of the meeting at the Trump International Hotel on Central Park West.

‘Ms Ventura got on the sofa opposite me and I followed, mimicked what she did. She got a bottle of baby oil and started pouring it on herself and I did similar.

‘A few minutes (later) I could see her husband enter the room. The man was nude but I could not see his face, there was a veil and I could see he had a bottle of Astroglide.

‘At some point the man stood up and left the room. Ms Ventura follow him out.’

He said he was paid an additional $1,200 when he was done.

When asked, the witness said he had between eight and 12 total encounters with the couple.

He said he’d also met with them at Essex House, a luxurious hotel on Central Park South, just a stone’s throw from the Trump International Hotel.

Hayes added that as Combs became more comfortable in his presence, he switched from wearing a veil to a baseball cap.

Testimony from Diddy’s former assistant David James 

James told the court that he quit as Diddy’s assistant after an incident involving the mogul’s rival Suge Knight in 2008.

James said Diddy’s friend D-Roc noticed Knight at a famous diner in LA and approached him.

Knight allegedly asked D-Roc: ‘What you doin’ in my city?’

Diddy’s team returned to the mogul’s house, and the rapper allegedly grabbed three guns and instructed James to drive back to the diner to threaten Knight.  

‘This was the first time as his assistant that I realized my life was in danger. I told them I want to leave but give six months notice so I could train the next assistant,’ James told the jury.

He also gave bizarre insights into the rapper’s life, including his favorite hotel being the Trump International hotel in New York, and how he ‘demanded ketchup for every meal’. 

James claimed that Diddy kept an ’embarrassing’ drunken video of him to assert control as a form of blackmail to keep him on side. 

Testimony from Cassie’s mom Regina Ventura

Ventura testified that Diddy demanded that Cassie pay him $20,000 after he learned she was dating rapper Kid Cudi.

She said she and her husband took out a home equity loan because ‘that’s the only way we could get the money’ and they were scared for Cassie’s safety.

‘[Diddy] was angry he’d spent money on her and she’d been with another person,’ she said.

‘His bookkeeper emailed me the wire information. I went to the (bank) and wired the money to the account.’

Regina said the money came back about ‘four to five days later.’

Images showing Diddy’s hotel room set up for a ‘freak off’ as feds closed in on him 

Incendiary images shown at the trial reveal the disgraced rap mogul was preparing for a hotel ‘freak off’ despite knowing he was about to be arrested, prosecutors say.

The shocking images were shown to jurors as Diddy’s ex-girlfriend Cassie testified at his federal trial on Monday – after she previously alleged how she was coerced into a life of manipulation and abuse.

On Monday, prosecutors brought up a set of images taken by law enforcement when Diddy was arrested at the Park Hyatt Hotel in Midtown Manhattan in September 2024.  

Kid Cudi’s ‘firebombed’ car 

The rapper, whose real name Scott Mescudi, testified that Combs broke into his Hollywood Hills home in 2011 after finding out he was dating Cassie, and that someone set fire to his car weeks later.

According to Mescudi, he broke up with Ventura in late 2011 ‘for her safety, for my safety… because I knew Sean Combs was violent.’

But on January 9 2012 at 6:30am, Mescudi got a call from his dog sitter saying his Porsche was on fire.

The jury was shown photos of the car showing the door covered in black smoke, the red leather seats covered in black stains and the roof slashed. They appear to show evidence of the Molotov cocktail which the rapper told a court was thrown through the roof of his convertible.

The vehicle’s interior was charred and burnt and the red leather on the driver’s seat has been melted away. 

The car’s soft top appeared to have a gaping hole in the middle. Another photograph shows the blackened inside of one of the car’s doors and window.

‘Looks like the top of my Porsche was cut open, that’s where they inserted the Molotov cocktail,’ Mescudi said of one of the images shown to the jury.

Testimony from singer Dawn Richard, former Danity Kane member

Richard got her big break in the music business as a cast member on Combs’ reality TV show, Making the Band. She performed with two Combs-backed acts, Danity Kane and Diddy — Dirty Money.

But Richard said Combs threatened her life after she saw him beat Cassie and try to hit her with a skillet in 2009. She said Combs told her and another woman that they ‘could go missing’ if they didn’t stay quiet.

She said she saw Combs beat Cassie frequently. ‘He would punch her, choke her, drag her, slap her in the mouth,’ she said.

Testimony from Cassie’s ex-best friend Kerry Morgan 

Morgan said she had a falling out with Cassie, her friend of 17 years, after Combs attacked her in a rage in 2018 demanding to know who Cassie was cheating on him with.

Morgan said he slung a hanger at her head and tried to choke her, leaving her dizzy, vomiting and concussed, with finger imprints on her neck.

As Morgan contemplated a lawsuit a month later, she met Cassie at a pizza parlor, where Cassie had her sign a nondisclosure agreement in return for $30,000, she said. But then, she said, Cassie ‘told me she thought I was milking it, that I was overexaggerating.’ They haven’t spoken since.

Testimony from Diddy’s ex-assistant Capricorn Clark 

Clark, the former global brand director for Combs’ Bad Boy Entertainment, said she was only weeks into the job when Combs tasked her with carrying diamond jewelry and it went missing. As a result, she said, she was repeatedly given lie detector tests over five-day stretch by a man who seemed five times larger than her own size.

‘He said: ‘If you fail this test they’re going to throw you in the East River,” she recalled, adding that they eventually let her return to work.

Clark testified  that the hip-hop mogul threatened to kill her during her first day on the job and waved a gun as he kidnapped her years later in an angry rush to find and kill rapper Kid Cudi.

Combs was angry Cudi was dating Cassie, Clark said, and he came to her home holding a gun and demanded she get dressed because ‘we’re going to kill Cudi.’

They the drove to Cudi’s house and Clark said she stayed in the car while Diddy and his security stepped out. 

After the break-in at Cudi’s home, Clark said Combs threatened to kill her if she did not prevent Cudi from calling the police.

50 Cent gun threat comes up in Diddy’s trial

Diddy’s ex-assistant Capricorn Clark told the court she once heard the mogul discussing weapons as he spoke of his rivalry against rapper 50 Cent.

She said she and Diddy were leaving a press event at MTV when the mogul told an executive he was having issues with 50 Cent.

Diddy reportedly said, ‘I don’t lie the back and forth, I don’t like that. I like guns.’

Diddy has frequently dispelled any rumors of a feud between the legends, but Curtis Jackson, also known as 50 Cent, has been slamming his nemesis publicly for years.

Testimony of former Diddy stylist Deonte Nash

Deonte Nash told jurors that he saw the temperamental Combs berating Cassie as she pleaded for him to let her enjoy her 29th birthday on her own terms. Later that night, Nash said, Cassie told the stylist, ‘I don’t want to freak-off,’ but that she had to because Combs was making her. 

Nash testified that the 2015 conversation was one of several times Cassie, whose real name is Casandra Ventura, confided to him that she didn’t want to engage in Combs’ drug-fueled hotel encounters.

Along with shedding light on Cassie’s feelings about freak-offs, Nash also corroborated her testimony that Combs frequently beat and tormented her. Combs would threaten to hinder Cassie’s fledgling music career and said he’d ruin her reputation by releasing recordings of their sexual encounters, Nash said. 

Testimony of alleged Diddy victim ‘Mia’

Diddy’s former personal assistant testified that the hip-hop mogul sexually assaulted her, threw her into a swimming pool, dumped a bucket of ice on her head and slammed her arm into a door during a torturous eight-year tenure.

The woman, testifying at Combs’ sex trafficking trial under the pseudonym ‘Mia,’ has alleged that he put his hand up her dress, forced her to perform oral sex and climbed into her bed to have sex with her against her will. 

Mia, speaking slow and haltingly at times, portrayed Combs as a brutal, controlling taskmaster who put his own needs and desires above the health and wellbeing of his staff and loved ones. She said Combs berated her for mistakes, even ones made by other employees, and loaded her up with so many tasks she didn’t sleep for days.

‘It was chaotic. It was toxic,’ said Mia, who worked for Combs from 2009 to 2017 and co-founded the Revolt Films studio with him. 

‘It could be exciting. The highs were really high and the lows were really low.’

Mia also pushed back at defense lawyer Brian Steel’s suggestions that she fabricated her claims to cash in on ‘the #MeToo money grab against Sean Combs.’

Steel had Mia read aloud numerous text messages she sent Combs. In one from 2019, she told Combs that he’d rescued her in a nightmare in which she was trapped in an elevator with R. Kelly, the singer who has since been convicted of sex trafficking.

In an Aug. 29, 2020, message to Combs, Mia recalled happy highlights from her eight years working for him – such as drinking champagne at the Eiffel Tower at 4am and rejecting Rolling Stones front man Mick Jagger’s offer to take her home – saying she remembered only ‘the good times.’

In the same message, Mia mentioned once feeling ‘bamboozled’ by a woman. Steel asked why she didn’t say Combs had bamboozled her as well.

‘Because I was still brainwashed,’ Mia answered.

Asked to explain, Mia said that in an environment where ‘the highs were really high and the lows were really low,’ she developed ‘huge confusion in trusting my instincts.’

Mia alleges Combs forcibly kissed her and molested her at his 40th birthday party, and raped her months later in a guest room at his Los Angeles home. She testified that the assaults were ‘random, sporadic, so oddly spaced out’ she didn’t think they’d happen again.