DAY 3: Cassie vs. Diddy

The Cross-Examination

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Dear Permission to be Powerful Reader,

Sean “Diddy” Combs’s federal sex-trafficking trial continued today with an electrifying showdown between Cassie Ventura and defense attorney Marc Agnifilo.

What began as a gut-wrenching testimony expanded into a full-blown courtroom war over truth, trauma, and power.

Cassie returned to the stand with a quiet steeliness, visibly pregnant but composed.

Her words this morning were among the most devastating yet. She described a private jet ride from Europe during which Combs played explicit footage of past "freak-offs" on his laptop, threatening to release them to destroy her if she ever left him.[1]

"I felt trapped at 40,000 feet," she said. "Terrified. Like I didn’t exist anymore."

Cassie confirmed that Combs filmed many of the drug-fueled sex parties for his own viewing pleasure. Sometimes he watched live via FaceTime. Other times, he reviewed the tapes later—"for him, for after," she said.[2]

She admitted to numbing herself with MDMA, cocaine, alcohol—anything to dissociate.

"I couldn’t imagine myself doing any of that sober," she testified.

"It was emotionless sex with strangers I didn’t want to sleep with."[3]

She later confessed to an opioid addiction, fed by Combs’s inner circle who filled prescriptions in other people’s names. Vicodin. Percocet. Oxycodone.

“He always had a way of getting it to me,” she said.[4]

As prosecutors displayed a photograph of another alleged victim, Mia, Cassie’s face tensed.

She confirmed knowing the young woman, setting the stage for additional testimony and affirming that Cassie’s case is not isolated.[5]

Jurors scribbled furiously.

To preempt the defense, prosecutors asked Cassie about moments when she had acted violently.

She admitted to once dragging a woman from a car and punching her in the head over an unflattering photo.

She also described striking Combs during an argument in an SUV—and the brutal retaliation she endured.

"His eyes went black," she said. "My face was knots and bleeding. Swollen everything."[6]

That punch, she said, was met with a beating she’d never forget.

Combs’s own daughters reportedly fled the courtroom in tears earlier this week when hearing about a similar incident involving boiling oil.

She described one of the hired escorts by nickname—"The Punisher"—recalling how Combs specifically requested him.

“That was the name Sean liked.”[2]

After a short recess, Marc Agnifilo stood, straightened his jacket, and approached.

The tone shifted instantly. If the morning had been Cassie's crucible, this was open warfare.

He began calmly: "There was hitting on both sides, wasn’t there?"

Cassie conceded she had struck Combs in moments of desperation—but countered:

"Look what happened to me when I did."[7]

Agnifilo prodded why she stayed. Cassie said by the time she realized the depth of her danger, she felt worthless.

She reminded the jury that Combs had once allegedly blown up Kid Cudi’s car after a falling out.

"He made sure we knew what he could do," she said.[8]

The attorney pivoted to the freak-offs. "You arranged them, didn’t you? You hired the escorts?" he asked.

Cassie answered with fury barely restrained:

"I did it because Sean told me to."

He brought up the infamous 2016 hotel video.

"Didn’t you provoke him by flirting with the escort?" Agnifilo asked.

"No," Cassie said. "I was apologizing because I was terrified."[9]

One juror visibly leaned forward. Another wiped a tear.

He shifted to her 2023 lawsuit. "You were paid to settle, weren’t you?"

Cassie nodded but added,

"That payoff didn’t buy my silence. I’m here now. Under oath."[10]

Throughout the cross-examination, Judge Arun Subramanian sustained multiple objections from the prosecution, notably when Agnifilo veered into shaming territory.

"Stick to the facts," the judge reminded, glancing sternly at the defense table.

Despite hours of interrogation, Cassie never wavered on her core truth: that she was abused, manipulated, and forced into acts she never consented to.

"I was high. I was afraid. I didn’t feel like a person anymore," she said.

The room remained hushed. The gravity of her testimony pressed down like a physical weight.

Cassie stepped down, shoulders slumped but eyes blazing with resolve.

She didn’t look at Combs as she exited. Her husband took her arm and they left together.

Combs, flanked by his team, stood slowly. He said little. He didn’t have to. The room had heard enough.

Tomorrow, the prosecution calls Mia.

Asked in redirect why she chose to testify now, Cassie didn’t hesitate:

“Because if I don’t… no one will ever stop him. And I want my daughter to grow up in a world where no man can do what he did to me and get away with it.”

A collective exhale swept the gallery. The jury had seen three days of trauma, control, and resilience.

The trial is only beginning.

Until next time,