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There's a name for what Diddy allegedly did to Cassie — but you won't hear it at trial

There's a name for what Diddy allegedly did to Cassie — but you won't hear it at trial

Vox3 days ago

writes about pop culture, media, and ethics. Before joining Vox in 2016, they were a staff reporter at the Daily Dot. A 2019 fellow of the National Critics Institute, they're considered an authority on fandom, the internet, and the culture wars.
Sean Diddy Combs, who went by P. Diddy, and Cassie Ventura, his girlfriend at the time, attend the Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination Costume Institute Gala at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 7, 2018 in New York City.for Huffington Post
Among all the lurid details and allegations that have surfaced in Sean 'Diddy' Combs's trial on federal charges, including sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy, one potential aspect of the music mogul's relationships has flown under the radar.
What we haven't heard on the witness stand is a concept crucial to understanding intimate partner violence and how individual incidents can form a pattern of abuse over time. That pattern, described by sociologists as 'coercive control,' may have played a major role in Diddy's relationships — but it won't play a major role in the trial.
Generally speaking, 'coercive control' is a pattern of controlling behavior, manipulation, and emotional abuse over time. It is criminalized in the UK, and seven states have passed laws that say coercive control is a form of domestic violence, though how they're applied varies by state. US courts have been slow to adopt the concept, and Judge Arun Subramanian, overseeing Combs's trial in New York City's federal district court, blocked the prosecution's expert on domestic violence, or intimate partner violence (IPV), from testifying specifically about coercive control.
That leaves the prosecution and all witnesses walking a very interesting line in their presentation of the evidence against Combs, who has pleaded not guilty. While 'coercive control' isn't a widely recognized legal concept in the US, 'coercion' as an individual act is. Typically described in the US legal code as being compelled, forced, or threatened to act in a specific way, it's a crucial pillar of several of the legal charges being brought against Combs.
Additionally, if the jury can't hear testimony about the impact of long-term abuse and toxic environments on survivors over time, will they be able to understand why so many of the people testifying against Combs now spent years, even decades, working for him and/or entertaining positive relationships with him?
The case serves as a reminder that, despite having been known to IPV prevention researchers for decades, 'coercive control' is still a little-known term to the public. While it's an important concept for expanding how we think about intimate partner abuse beyond acts of physical violence, some experts say its highly murky legal status is warranted.
That ambiguity, however, makes it hard to talk about ways an alleged abuser might exert control over survivors that aren't always obvious. Many of those methods have surfaced in the Combs trial. That gives us a major opportunity to understand what coercive control is — and the ways in which it's being tried and tested in court.
What even is 'coercive control'?
The term 'coercive control,' reportedly first coined and promoted by the late social worker Susan Schechter, has existed in the fields of domestic violence prevention and feminist circles since the '80s. 'There is no single word to describe the full range of controlling behavior,' Schechter and her co-author Ann Jones wrote in their 1993 book When Love Goes Wrong in a section indexed as 'coercive control.'
They write that many controlling abusers 'never use force' and note controlling behaviors, such as 'deliberately throwing a partner into mental confusion and anxiety, and tearing a partner down emotionally.'
If you or anyone you know is struggling with intimate partner violence (IPV), there are people who want to help.
Contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 800-799-7233 (or text BEGIN to 88788).
Since the late 20th century, the phrase 'battered woman syndrome' has been used in court to describe the psychological effects of IPV on women, which can include trauma and cognitive defects. While still in wide use in courtrooms as a legal defense, the concept has long been a source of debate, with many experts framing it as part of general PTSD or using the gender-neutral phrase 'battering and its effects' instead. Legal advocates have argued for decades for a better descriptor, one that emphasizes nonphysical forms of abuse as well as physical abuse.
Enter 'coercive control.' Experts like Schechter and the late Evan Stark have helped mainstream the phrase as an alternative concept, one that more clearly acknowledges the ways abusive partners often use nonviolent abusive tactics, such as emotional abuse, gaslighting, manipulation, threats, and unpredictable behavior, to influence and control their situations. Research has shown that coercive control is present in up to 58 percent of relationships where IPV occurs, and even nonviolent coercive control engenders PTSD, depression, and ongoing fear in survivors.
Understanding that such patterns exist helps us understand intimate partner violence, especially in answering questions like 'why didn't the victim just leave?' when 'just leaving' is not so simple. But because coercive control is coercive, and coercion is often hard to pin down, it's also a somewhat slippery legal concept. There's not much precedent in the US court system for a discussion of coercive control as an ongoing pattern of abuse. There's also debate among experts about whether trying to codify it is ultimately helpful or harmful — manipulation and gaslighting can be harder to identify than physical abuse or explicit threats as well as easier for abusers to turn around and use to accuse their victims.
What 'coercion' — and 'coercive control' — have to do with the Diddy trial
The charges against Combs are a bit tricky, which isn't unusual for a racketeering case. Combs is charged with two counts of sex trafficking, two counts of transporting people across state lines for sex work, and one count of 'racketeering conspiracy,' which is a broader charge than racketeering itself and merely requires the guilty party to have agreed to participate in any of a litany of crimes that fall under the Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organization ACT, commonly known as RICO laws.
In this case, those alleged crimes include forced labor, kidnapping, arson, bribery, sex trafficking, and obstruction of justice — all acts that witnesses have testified to having seen Diddy commit or experienced themselves while with him.
In all three charges, the legal concept of coercion plays a major role. It's part of the criteria that must be met to prove illegal sex trafficking: Per the federal statute under which Combs is charged, any use of 'force, threats of force, fraud, [or] coercion' to induce people to engage in sex work violates the law. Similar wording and logic apply to the transportation charge. If Combs used coercion to get people to travel across state lines for the purposes of sex work, he could be guilty.
But an understanding of coercion can be very different based on different contexts. In the case of this trial, Judge Subramanian seems to be allowing discussion related to alleged individual moments of actual physical coercion, violent coercion, or the implied threat of physical harm to a target or others close to them.
The prosecution's domestic violence expert, clinical and forensic psychologist Dawn Hughes, was able to discuss elements of IPV on the witness stand, such as trauma bonding and reasons why survivors stay with their abusers — but she was prohibited from discussing how long-term coercive control can impact them and their reasoning.
'There's so much physical violence in this case, and I think it's easy to extrapolate how fear of physical violence could coerce somebody into making choices,' Courtney Cross, who runs a law clinic for abuse and IPV survivors at the University of Nevada Las Vegas, told me. 'But coercive control itself as a dynamic is way less about the physical violence and so much more about that web of nonphysical tactics of abuse.'
Since testimony in the case kicked off May 12, we've already heard plenty of evidence pointing to physical coercion or the threat of it. Combs's ex-girlfriend, Cassie Ventura, played an inadvertent role in jump-starting the federal investigation into Combs when 2016 surveillance footage surfaced in 2023 showing Combs violently beating her in a hotel hallway.
Ventura testified over several days on the witness stand that during their 11-year relationship, Combs frequently physically assaulted her, threatened her with violence, and dangled the possibility of leaking filmed sex footage of her to the public (which might be considered 'revenge porn' or a form of image-based abuse). Multiple witnesses have corroborated Ventura's testimony with their own accounts of having seen or heard Combs abuse Ventura. Bryana Bongolan, a friend of Ventura's, testified that Combs once threatened her in Ventura's 17th-story apartment by hoisting her to the balcony ledge. After yelling at her, he allegedly threw her into the balcony furniture, causing wounds and bruises to her legs.
What's perhaps even more striking, however, is the bigger picture that emerges from all of this witness testimony: an environment, in both Combs's working relationships and his intimate ones, of fear, paranoia, and unpredictable outbursts of temper.
One longtime staffer, Capricorn Clark, testified that Combs issued a death threat to her on the first day she worked for him, physically assaulted her, and at one point kidnapped her, forcing her to come with him to track down Ventura's boyfriend. (The boyfriend was musician Kid Cudi, whose Porsche Combs is also accused of firebombing.) She as well as another former staffer have each testified to having been required to take polygraph tests by Combs to keep their jobs.
Another former staffer, testifying under the pseudonym Mia, recounted being pressured to reside mainly with Combs at his residences, where she said she was then not permitted to lock her bedroom door or leave the property. At one point, she alleged on the stand, Combs began a pattern of intermittently sexually assaulting her over the eight years she worked for him.
The physical abuses that Combs allegedly inflicted are covered in the trial and are on their own horrific enough. But what's left unexplained is the mental and emotional anguish that a pattern of coercive control creates. Having rules about where and how to live, the implicit invasion of privacy that comes with a forced polygraph test or not being allowed to lock a door; these things could add up to a sense that a person does not have agency over their own life.
All of these moments arguably create a pattern of abuse and manipulation by Combs — the hallmarks of coercive control that the witnesses seem to have lived with and experienced, even if they can't refer to it by name in the courtroom.
'Coercive control' has a long history but a tricky legal status — perhaps for good reason
So far, the only area of the legal system where coercive control has made inroads is the family court system — and the few states that do have laws on the books often have harrowing stories that put them there.
Take Jennifer's Law, for instance, the 2021 Connecticut law criminalizing coercive control. It was named in part for Jennifer Magnano, a mother of three who was shot and killed in 2007 by her estranged husband. The murder occurred shortly after a judge ordered Magnano, who had fled the state, to return with her kids for a custody hearing, ignoring her claims of having experienced over a decade of abuse. The Connecticut law now defines coercive control and increases protections for people experiencing it while ensuring they don't have to testify in person before someone they are being protected against.
Yet even with these stiffer types of legal protections in place, problems abound. To someone experiencing coercive control, it's often the nonphysical meanings of 'coerce' that can exert the most power and have the longest-lasting psychological effects. But courts may fail to recognize highly individualized acts of coercion because they're looking for signs of physical violence or threats.
Additionally, just as abusers often use DARVO tactics (in which an abuser paints themselves as the wronged party using a strategy of 'deny, attack, and reverse victim and offender') to get authorities on their sides, coercive control patterns can be used against survivors in similar ways. Abuse victims can and often do react to their abusers with self-defense, or reactive violence. Their abusers will often use this reactivity to their advantage with authorities, rendering abuse victims vulnerable to being targeted by the same laws put in place to protect them. Think of it like a zero-tolerance policy in a school that punishes the bully and their victim equally without questioning who has the power and who is the target of abuse.
Related Diddy was hiding in plain sight
Cross has argued against passing laws criminalizing coercive control in favor of expanding resources to empower survivors who are trying to escape abusive situations. She points out that, unlike the UK, the US lacks a system of robust resources, rigorous risk assessment, and training around the issue that could help authorities identify it when they see it — and seeing it at all is the first challenge.
'You would need professionals to be able to see it differently in different people and validate that and understand how to respond to that,' Cross said. Rather than the courts trying to address coercive control after it's already established as a pattern, Cross explained what we need is 'a wholesale societal reorganization to be able to take care of people.'
And most of all, what we need is money.
'People are trying really hard to meet this massive demand, but there aren't nearly enough supportive resources for anybody, including DV survivors, especially the most marginal DV survivors,' she said.
One thing that makes coercive control particularly complicated, Cross said, 'is that to recognize and respond to it, we have to see it in ourselves' — and culturally, many of the traits that often comprise an abusive personality begin as highly lauded attributes, such as confidence, forcefulness, or invulnerability.
'We don't want to see that sometimes we do shitty and manipulative things and that maybe that crosses a line,' Cross said. 'We don't want to see that we may have and take advantage of power differentials with our partners and people we love. I think to really understand coercive control, we have to be willing to look inside of ourselves, and people don't want to do that.'
Cross pointed out that while coercive control isn't under discussion on the witness stand, it is on full display throughout the Diddy trial itself.
'There is such an obvious analogy to me between the idea of this enterprise and the way that it relies on power and control and using fear to regulate and enforce the enterprise,' she said. 'It may not be fraud, extortion, and bribery per se, but the emotional and psychological abuse amounts to a pretty similar outcome on an interpersonal level.'

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Jane said she suggested they go to Thailand, where there was a facility with a 30-day program, to which Combs allegedly responded, "What the hell, you think I need rehab?" "I felt that I encountered somebody that was overdoing the partying," Jane said, adding she would now call Combs a drug addict. She said she wanted "him to get back to his natural form and natural state." Combs' attorneys have once again had their push for a mistrial in his sex-crimes case denied. The embattled music mogul's legal team's latest request for a mistrial has been rejected by Judge Arun Subramanian. Combs' lawyers had renewed a motion for a mistrial due to alleged prosecutorial misconduct in a letter to the judge dated June 7. Combs' lawyers' latest push for a mistrial centered around testimony from Bryana "Bana" Bongolan, a friend of Ventura Fine. Bongolan testified about an incident where Combs allegedly held her up on a balcony in Ventura Fine's Los Angeles apartment in September 2016. Combs is facing federal sex-crimes and trafficking charges in a sprawling case that has eroded his status as a power player and kingmaker in the entertainment industry. He was arrested in September 2024 and later charged with racketeering, sex trafficking and transportation to engage in prostitution. The rapper has pleaded not guilty to the five counts against him. Racketeering is the participation in an illegal scheme under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Statute, or RICO, as a way for the U.S. government to prosecute organizations that contribute to criminal activity. Using RICO law, which is typically aimed at targeting multi-person criminal organizations, prosecutors allege that Combs coerced victims, some of whom they say were sex workers, through intimidation and narcotics to participate in "freak offs" — sometimes dayslong sex performances that federal prosecutors allege they have video of. The trial will not be televised, as cameras are typically not allowed in federal criminal trial proceedings. USA TODAY will be reporting live from the courtroom. Sign up for our newsletter for more updates. Contributing: USA TODAY staff If you are a survivor of sexual assault, RAINN offers support through the National Sexual Assault Hotline at (4673) and and en Español If you or someone you know is a victim of domestic violence, call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 or text "START" to 88788. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Diddy trial recap: Jane testifies he forced her to have sex with 3 men

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Diddy trial live updates: Jane says she was sick over 2016 video of Diddy attacking Cassie

This story contains graphic descriptions that some readers may find disturbing. Sean "Diddy" Combs' ex-girlfriend "Jane," who has pulls back the curtain on their allegedly volatile sexual relationship, is set to conclude her time on the stand in the high-profile criminal trial. The woman, who is testifying under a pseudonym in the sweeping federal sex-crimes case, returned to Manhattan court on June 12 to wrap up cross-examination. Attorneys for Combs have attempted to elicit testimony that indicates she freely participated in, and even encouraged, the sexual performances she took part in during her on-and-off romance with Combs. During cross-examination on June 11, Jane was asked to explain messages from the Grammy-winning rapper that appeared to give his then-girlfriend options when it came to their "hotel nights," or sexual encounters Combs allegedly orchestrated between Jane and various sex workers. "I was just adapting to my circumstances and my environment," and adjusting to "the pressures of my lover," Jane told the court, responding to messages where she'd agreed to sex acts. "I was going along with something I really didn't feel I could say no to." The online content creator, who previously said she still loves Combs to this day, admitted she also harbors negative feelings: "I resent him for all of it," she told Combs' attorney Teny Geragos. Combs, 55, was arrested in September and charged with sex trafficking, racketeering and transportation to engage in prostitution. He has pleaded not guilty. Diddy on trial newsletter: Step inside the courtroom as music mogul faces sex-crimes charges. After CNN published surveillance footage of Combs beating his then-girlfriend Cassie Ventura Fine at a Los Angeles hotel, Jane said she was lost her appetite and was sick. She said Combs had never laid a hand on her at that point in their relationship. 'That was just not the man that you knew?' Geragos asked. 'Right,' Jane friends told her to break up with him amid the public outcry over the video, but Jane said she wanted to support Combs at the time. 'You felt this was another example of how complicated he was?' Geragos said.'Like in his past?' Jane answered. 'Yes.' In the final hours of Jane's cross-examination, Combs' lawyers asked the anonymous witness about her relationship with the rapper after Ventura Fine filed a bombshell 2023 lawsuit accusing him of sweeping abuse. Geragos said Jane previously found Combs 'egotistical and cold,' but 'you felt much more love from him' after the lawsuit. 'You saw a positive change from him and that he could be much more apologetic.' He 'listened better,' 'spent more time at the house' and 'didn't disappear for days.' Jane agreed with all of these sentiments, responding 'yes' and 'right' to Geragos' comments. Geragos added that after Cassie's lawsuit, Combs changed the terminology of how he spoke about his relationship with Jane. While he used to say he was 'single and polyamorous,' he started saying 'we're in a relationship and you're my girlfriend.' Combs was 'more loving and made it seem more like a relationship.' Overall, 'I felt that I could assert myself a little bit more,' Jane said on the stand. 'I felt we had some growth in our relationship.' Jane finally took the stand on June 12 after a lengthy delay. In the morning, Judge Arun Subramanian the defense, prosecution and Jane's lawyer into his chambers for a private meeting that lasted nearly two hours. Afterward, Combs' lawyer Marc Agnifolo addressed the court in cryptic terms, alluding to an event that happened "behind closed doors" in a hotel room in January 2024. 'Many other people were there,' he said, adding that while the defense had agreed to the use of a pseudonym for Jane, they objected to some other names and events not being made 'fully public.' "Other people might have information about the event," Agnifolo said. "The public can do what it does in all issues of importance." It's not clear what Agnifilo meant, but remember that the public has provided some evidence in Combs' trial. For example, one of Combs' former assistants, who testified using the pseudonym Mia, made a birthday video for him, and it was used in her cross-examination. The defense may therefore, be trying to call on the public to potentially corroborate whatever this mystery event is. Mia, who worked for Combs from 2009 to 2017, testified on May 29 that he sexually assaulted her on "more than one" occasion. The former assistant alleged the first time Combs assaulted her was at the Plaza Hotel in New York City when they were celebrating his 40th birthday in 2009. Mia recalled having two shots that were affecting her much more than alcohol typically impacted her memory and balance. She said Combs approached her in a penthouse suite and sexually assaulted her, and she woke up sitting on a chair in the morning. In later years, Combs allegedly assaulted her several additional times, including at his Los Angeles home and on a private plane. Federal prosecutors on June 5 referred to Combs' former staffer Kristina Khorram as "an agent and co-conspirator" of Combs. That doesn't mean she's about to face charges: Instead, it indicates she's likely reached an agreement with prosecutors and will testify. Combs previously called Khorram his "right hand" in business ventures. The designation also comes as prosecutors submitted a text from Ventura Fine to Khorram about the alleged balcony incident in which Combs attacked Bongolan. The message read Combs "went at Bana, choked her, dangled her feet off the balcony. This is crazy. I have to get away." In emotional testimony during the first week of trial, Combs' ex-girlfriend Ventura Fine told jurors Combs physically and emotionally abused her throughout their tumultuous 11-year relationship and raped her shortly after they broke up for good. Ventura Fine, a pop and R&B singer, said she participated in alleged drug-fueled freak offs because she feared Combs would release sex tapes of her if she didn't, but also because she loved him. Friends and associates of Combs and Ventura have testified about Combs' alleged abuse, describing Combs as a domineering figure who relied on bodyguards and associates to enable his alleged crimes and keep victims in line. A team of experienced lawyers is helping Combs defend himself against sex crimes charges. Nicole Westmoreland of Westmoreland Law LLC, filed a notice of attorney appearance with the court last month. Combs' defense team was already being led by attorneys Marc Agnifilo and Geragos. Agnifilo is a founding partner at Agnifilo Intrater and, according to the firm's website, has tried more than 200 cases in his 30-year career. He is a former Manhattan Assistant District Attorney. Geragos is also a founding partner at Agnifilo Intrater and is "particularly experienced in defending and investigating allegations of sexual misconduct," according to the firm's website. Reports have emerged that the prosecution is moving to have a juror removed. Assistant U.S. Attorney Maurene Comey told Judge Arun Subramanian there "appeared to be a lack of candor with the court" from Juror No. 6, according to CNN and NBC News. Alexandra Shapiro from Combs' team reportedly accused the prosecution of trying to get a Black juror dismissed. Both sides are expected to file letters detailing their respective arguments. The issue was first brought to the judge's attention while court was in session on June 10. Diddy has seven children, six of whom are biological. Diddy had his first biological son, Justin Combs, with fashion designer and stylist Misa Hylton. Diddy adopted Quincy Brown, the son of ex-girlfriend and model Kimberly Porter, who died in 2018 after a battle with pneumonia. The former couple also shared three other children: son Christian "King" Combs and twin daughters D'Lila and Jessie Combs. Diddy has another daughter, Chance Combs, whom he shares with businesswoman Sarah Chapman. His seventh and last child, daughter Love Sean Combs, was born in October 2022 with model and cybersecurity specialist Dana Tran. As Geragos presented more texts between Jane and Combs from 2023 during the June 11 hearing, the witness was visibly emotional and started crying on the stand. "The feeling you are the reason for my child's joy" means more than she could explain, one of Jane's messages read. She'd added, "You are my friend, my lover, my boyfriend — even though you don't like that word — LOL but you are LOL." It was during the reading of this message that Jane began crying, with Geragos going on to read more of Jane's texts that expressed her affection for the music mogul. Discover WITNESS: Access our exclusive collection of true crime stories, podcasts, videos and more Reviewing a text exchange between Jane and Combs ahead of their 2023 "sobriety party" — a "hotel night" at L'Ermitage Beverly Hills that allegedly lasted 12 to 18 hours and involved having sex with three escorts — Geragos asked whether she'd agreed to do this. "Unfortunately, yes," Jane testified. Geragos replied, "You keep saying 'Unfortunately', but didn't you agree to it?" to which Jane clarified, "I resent him for knowing how much I loved him and knowing I couldn't say no to him." Asked whether she regrets doing that freak off, Jane said, "I believe resent and regret lie in the same feelings." Jane told the court she was jealous of Yung Miami, a rapper Combs started dating around the same time he was seeing Jane. She said Combs took Yung Miami on her "dream vacation" to Turks and Caicos, days after Jane had spent her birthday having an alleged "freak off." "I think after being made to have sex with three men on my birthday," it was "very hurtful" to see him taking a "beautiful" trip with another woman, Jane said. "I was extremely heartbroken." In a message Jane read aloud in court, she alleged she was forced to participate in the sexual performance. "I didn't wanna do all that on my birthday. I was tired and put on a good face," she said. Jane previously testified that she recruited sex worker Sly Williams to join their alleged hotel nights after watching him in adult films. During the June 10 hearing, she explained that she and Combs watched Williams on a pornography site in October 2021. When Jane messaged Williams, Combs was "surprised and really happy because he had never had a girl pick the guy before," she said. Jane also found another sex worker named Anton through the same site. She alleged Williams later threatened to sell a tape of the two of them having sex and extorted her not to release it. Jane said Combs was "livid" and told her to call the police, but she didn't out of fear. On June 10, Jane said she, Combs and one of the escorts they allegedly hired used the nickname "trifecta" when they had sex. Jane claimed she was Kobe Bryant; Paul, the entertainer, was Shaquille O'Neal; and Combs was Michael Jordan. Jane said she frequently called Paul, the escort, her "boyfriend" and called Paul and Combs her "boys." Despite videos circulating online, which appear to show artificially generated court sketches of Eddie Murphy testifying at the Combs trial, the actor hasn't been in the courtroom and isn't expected to be called as a witness. While a specter of celebrity hangs heavy over the proceedings, many of the big names roped in have merely been name-drops from the standby lesser-known witnesses from Combs' inner circle. The only true "celebrities" to testify thus far have been Ventura Fine and Kid Cudi. Ventura Fine alleged that Combs physically, sexually and psychologically abused her for years of their relationship. Kid Cudi, whose real name is Scott Mescudi, old the court that Combs allegedly broke into his home and locked his dog in a bathroom when he found out his fellow rapper was dating Ventura Fine. He also alleged Combs was behind an explosion that destroyed his car around the same time. You may have seen major celebs like Brad Pitt and Leonardo DiCaprio named during Combs' trial. But the A-list actors aren't accused of anything — they've only been mentioned in the background of events Combs attended. For example, trial witness "Mia" alleged that she witnessed a 2012 discussion between Combs and Ventura Fine escalate at the premiere of a Pitt film during the Cannes Film Festival in France. She claimed she saw Combs grit his teeth while digging his nails into Ventura Fine's arm, and he eventually insisted that Ventura Fine leave. Mia also referenced a high-stakes poker game between Combs and DiCaprio in texts she sent him around 2020. In one message, she wrote that Combs said, while cursing: "That 'Titanic' (guy) doesn't know (anything). He won $10,000, I won $650,000." BET Awards host Kevin Hart alluded to the music mogul during his opening monologue as he joked about why the show was happening on a Monday night. Hart called for "no afterparties" on a work night and said those are were things get "slippery, at them god damn afterparties." After dropping the reference to Combs' propensity for baby oil, Hart added, "We're learning a lot about people, ain't we?" 50 Cent is looking to give President Donald Trump his two cents about Combs. In an Instagram post on May 30, the "In da Club" emcee said he would reach out to Trump after the president said he would "look at the facts" in Combs' case, suggesting a pardon could be on the table. The rapper shared a clip of the president's comments in his post and wrote that Combs "said some really bad things about Trump," adding that he will "reach out so he knows how I feel about this guy." Combs is facing federal sex-crimes and trafficking charges in a sprawling case that has eroded his status as a power player and kingmaker in the entertainment industry. He was arrested in September 2024 and later charged with racketeering, sex trafficking and transportation to engage in prostitution. The rapper has pleaded not guilty to the five counts against him. Racketeering is the participation in an illegal scheme under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Statute, or RICO, as a way for the U.S. government to prosecute organizations that contribute to criminal activity. Using RICO law, which is typically aimed at targeting multi-person criminal organizations, prosecutors allege that Combs coerced victims, some of whom they say were sex workers, through intimidation and narcotics to participate in "freak offs" — sometimes dayslong sex performances that federal prosecutors allege they have video of. The trial will not be televised, as cameras are typically not allowed in federal criminal trial proceedings. USA TODAY will be reporting live from the courtroom. Sign up for our newsletter for more updates. Contributing: USA TODAY staff If you are a survivor of sexual assault, RAINN offers support through the National Sexual Assault Hotline at (4673) and and en Español If you or someone you know is a victim of domestic violence, call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 or text "START" to 88788. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Diddy trial live updates: Jane sick over video of Diddy beating Cassie

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