Sean ‘Diddy' Combs trial: Male escort, former ‘trusted assistant' and Cassie Ventura's mother all testify

NZ Herald

20-05-2025

While one of Combs' former staff members has blasted the musician's own lawyers for asking a 'crazy question'.
Hayes said he got the nickname 'The Punisher' playing on New York basketball courts. But it was useful in his career as an exotic dancer usually for birthdays and bachelorette parties.
He said that in late 2012 he received a call from a 'Janet' who he later found out was Cassie Ventura.
He testified he was asked to come to New York's Trump International Hotel at 2.45am to dance for a group of friends. When he arrived he saw 'Janet' was wearing a dressing gown and nothing else.
He said he was given US$800 ($1352.61), four times his usual rate, and asked to create a 'sexy scene' with her and her 'husband'.
'I was specifically told to try not to look at or communicate with her husband,' Hayes said.
Ventura, he said, told him to rub baby oil into his and her skin.
'The man then came out and he was nude but for a veil. You could only really see his eyes.
'I noticed at times he was masturbating'.
After 45 minutes, Hayes said the man walked off and Ventura – whose identity, like the man, he didn't know – asked him if he wanted to 'finish', which he took to mean climax.
He declined, he said, because he wanted to remain 'professional'. He then left with a further $1200.
Hayes said he continued to be hired by the mystery couple. But one slip-up saw the mystery revealed, he alleged.
In one hotel, he was told to wait in a room within the suite.
'The hotel TV was on, and it said 'Welcome Sean Combs'.
'Then I looked on his social media and I recognised Cassie Ventura,' said Hayes.
His testimony came after Combs' former 'trusted assistant' David James returned to the stand on Tuesday.
James was cross-examined by Combs' defence lawyer, Marc Agnifilo, during which he mentioned two other celebrities.
He said that when his boss was in Miami, he recorded in the same studio that Pharrell Williams and Will Smith used.
'He would go where Pharrell was working. Will Smith had a studio,' James said.
The former assistant testified that Combs would regularly stay up until 3am or 4am recording music, and when Combs was in New York City, he recorded at a studio in Midtown Manhattan.
He also had a run-in with Combs' own lawyers.
James testified that on one occasion, he had gone out to buy burgers for Combs when he and another staff member called D-Roc came across a rival music producer to Combs in a diner car park.
While they were in the diner, he said, several additional cars turned up and guns were suggesting they were in danger. The pair then fled back to Combs' LA mansion.
Defence lawyer Marc Agnifilo asked James if he had left D-Roc at the diner.
'That's a crazy question,' said James.
'Why would I leave D-Roc at the diner when guns were being passed around.
'That doesn't make any sense.'
On another occasion during his cross-examination, Agnifilo said 'that's a bad question'.
'I agree,' snapped back James.
James also testified about Combs' wild riders – his list of must-haves when he was travelling or in hotels.
In the UK for instance, he demanded US Heinz ketchup in his room because he disliked the taste of British Heinz.
But the rider went far beyond tomato sauce.
'Apple sauce, Jello, Just for Men, Fiji Water,' listed James.
He also needed to go to a chemist and get 'baby oil, condoms, Astroglide lubricant, Viagra, pills to increase sperm count, prophylactics'.
Combs' Louis Vuitton wash bag also included Ecstasy pills, which it's claimed he took regularly.
James said he could be reimbursed through Bad Boy Records for all the items aside from the condoms, lube and baby oil.
They were off-the-books purchases, he agreed, which he got paid cash in hand for. Combs didn't want a paper record of them.
Ventura's mother, Regina Ventura, also testified on Tuesday.
The jury was shown an email from her daughter around Christmas 2011 claiming she was being blackmailed by Combs.
'Threats have been made to me by Sean 'Diddy' Combs relating to 2 explicit sex tapes of me.
'He also said someone would hurt me and made a point it would not be by his hands and he would be out of the country when that happened'.
Regina Ventura said she was told Combs was demanding US$20,000 ($33,815.20) to be 'recouped' from Cassie because he found out she was seeing someone else.
'I was physically sick,' said Ventura when she read the email. 'The sex tapes threw me.'
She said they had to remortgage her house to pay the money and then a staff member of Combs' Bad Boy Records gave her the details to wire the money to. But five days later, the money came back.