NEW YORK (AP) — A woman who was dating Sean “Diddy” Combs at the time of his arrest last year broke down Friday describing their many drug-fueled sex marathons, saying the music mogul ignored her signals to stop and scolded her for crying after another encounter.
Testifying under the pseudonym “Jane” for a second day, the woman recounted how Combs pushed her to continue having sex with men while he watched even after she gave “subtle cues” — saying she was tired and hungry, making faces and gestures — that she wanted to stop. Instead, she said, he told her to “finish strong.”
Asked why she didn’t tell him outright, Jane sobbed, “I just, I don’t know.” Later, she said Combs would shut her down when she tried to talk about ending the encounters, which she called “dark” and “sleazy.”
Combs, 55, has pleaded not guilty to running his business empire as a racketeering enterprise that enabled and concealed the abuse of women over two decades. If convicted, he faces 15 years to life. The defense has asserted the sexual activities were all consensual and nothing Combs did amounted to a criminal enterprise.
Jane tells a story similar to Combs’ ex Cassie
Jane’s account in the trial’s fourth week has closely mirrored that of R&B singer Casandra “Cassie” Ventura, another former girlfriend who testified Combs assaulted her and forced her into “hundreds” of encounters with male sex workers dubbed “ freak-offs.” Jane called them “hotel nights” and the men “entertainers.”
Prosecutor Maurene Comey sought to show that Combs used his wealth to manipulate women into submitting to his sexual demands and make them reliant on him and his needs. By September 2023, Jane said, Combs had been paying her rent for about five months. Asked what she feared would happen if she stopped doing hotel nights, Jane replied, “That Sean would take the house away.” Combs is still paying her rent, Jane said.
After one such hotel encounter, Jane said she cried and Combs told her “Don’t do that right now,” and “I can’t do this right now. I’m too high.” She testified she’d blacked out earlier from the drug ecstasy that Combs gave her.
During another encounter, she tried to remain sober but vomited in a bathroom after having sex with two men in a row. Combs told her, “That’s good. You’ll feel better now that you’ve thrown up. So let’s go.” She then had sex with a third man, describing herself as “repulsed.”
Jane said she endured the encounters because she valued time alone with Combs afterward. “I would really fight to block out how sad I was after,” she testified. In messages to him, she wrote: “my heart is really in this and it’s breaking.”
Jane wiped away tears as she recounted the many ill-effects of hotel nights, including constant back pain, frequent urinary tract infections and soreness in her genitals and pelvic areas. Cassie testified she also suffered UTIs after enduring sex marathons involving Combs and male sex workers.
Jane unsuccessfully tries to end hotel nights
Jane dated Combs from 2021 to 2024. On Thursday, she testified their relationship began as loving and passionate but soon veered into having her engage in sex with other men. The longest lasted three and a half days, while most went on for 24 to 30 hours.
On Friday, she said she poured her thoughts into the Notes app on her phone in November 2021, drafting a message to Combs but never sending it.
“I don’t know what you’re calling me for, but I’m sorry I don’t want to do drugs for days and days and have you use me to fulfill your freaky, wild desires in hotel rooms,” Jane wrote in the unsent missive.
In 2023, she said she texted Combs to say she longed to return to the early days of their relationship and regretted ever getting involved in the sexual encounters, but felt obligated. Combs responded: “Girl, stop,” she said.
Jane said the encounters continued into 2024 and she participated in one at Combs’ Miami-area estate as late as August — just weeks before his arrest at a Manhattan hotel.
Jurors on Friday heard the first audio from inside one of those encounters. In the recording, Jane asked a man to wear a condom during her first hotel night, but Combs “guilt tripped me out of it. It wasn’t something he wanted to see.”
Jane also said Combs had her act as his drug mule at least twice, nervously smuggling pills in her checked luggage on commercial flights from Los Angeles to Miami. She said he divvied up in the colorful pills into bottles, and she ended up using some of the drugs with him.
To protect Jane’s anonymity, the judge has barred courtroom observers from describing or sketching her appearance in a way that would reveal her identity. The Associated Press does not identify people who say they’re victims of sexual abuse unless they choose to make their names public, as Cassie has done.
Defense targets credibility of witnesses
Combs’ lawyers have tried to sew doubt among jurors about the credibility of the prosecution’s witnesses. In opening arguments, lawyer Teny Geragos acknowledged Combs had a “bad temper” and violent outbursts, but argued his sexual habits were part of a consensual swinger lifestyle.
The defense painted Cassie, for example, as an eager participant in the freak-offs. When Cassie was on the stand, Combs’ lawyers had her read texts and emails in which she expressed willingness to engage in the encounters.
Before Jane began testifying on Thursday, the defense cross-examined Bryana “Bana” Bongolan, a friend of Cassie and a graphic designer who is suing Combs. Bongolan testified that in 2016, Combs held her over the edge of a balcony at a Los Angeles high-rise for 10 to 15 seconds, an episode she said traumatized her and left her with lasting night terrors.
Defense attorney Nicole Westmoreland suggested that Bongolan lied or exaggerated. The lawyer noted Combs was on tour for much of September 2016, including East Coast shows around the time of the balcony incident. Bongolan later testified she didn’t recall the exact date of the incident, but had no doubt it occurred.
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Collins reported from Hartford, Connecticut.