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NOTE: The following article accommodates disturbing particulars and video footage. Please learn at your individual discretion.
A girl recognized solely by the pseudonym “Mia,” a former assistant of Sean “Diddy” Combs, continued her testimony for the third day on Monday at his intercourse trafficking and racketeering trial.
Mia testified that she continued sending Combs loving textual content messages for years after her job resulted in 2017 as a result of she was “brainwashed.”
The girl used the phrase as defence lawyer Brian Steel confronted her with skepticism and even urged she had fabricated her claims.
Steel had Mia learn aloud for the jury quite a few loving textual content messages she despatched to Combs, together with one in 2019 by which she stated she had a nightmare that she was trapped in an elevator with the singer R. Kelly and Combs rescued her.
“And the person who sexually assaulted you came to your rescue?” Steel requested. He rephrased, asking if she actually dreamed of being saved by a person “who terrorized you and caused you PTSD?” Prosecutors objected and the decide sustained it.
Combs has pleaded not responsible to a number of counts of an indictment accusing him of a sample of abuse towards ex-girlfriend Cassie Ventura and others.
Day 14
In an Aug. 29, 2020, message to Combs, Mia recalled blissful highlights from her eight years working for him — akin to consuming champagne on the Eiffel Tower at 4 a.m. and rejecting Mick Jagger’s provide to take her house — saying she remembered solely “the good times.”
In the identical message, Mia talked about as soon as feeling “bamboozled” by a girl. Steel requested why she didn’t say Combs had bamboozled her as effectively, given her accusations.
“Because I was still brainwashed,” Mia answered.
Asked to elucidate, Mia stated that in an surroundings the place “the highs were really high and the lows were really low,” she developed “huge confusion in trusting my instincts.”
“I was punished whenever Puff would be violent and I would react, confusing me and making me think I did something wrong. Nobody around batted an eye. He was still praised by everyone around him and the public,” Mia added.
When Steel urged that her assault claims have been made up, Mia responded: “I have never lied in this courtroom and I never will lie in this courtroom. Everything I said is true.”
Mia testified that Combs required her to hold round a pocket video digicam to document him earlier than he determined to rent full-time videographers.
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Steel requested Mia if she recorded any movies of Combs “in a moment of rage.”
“Absolutely not. No, I would not have been allowed to film that. I was filming whatever he wanted me to film,” she stated.
She added that if she had ever filmed him in these moments, it will have been a “huge break of trust, loyalty and confidentiality.”
Steel went on to ask Mia if she ever instructed anybody concerning the abuse she stated she skilled by Combs whereas it was taking place.
“Do you have anything where you contemporaneously wrote to a friend, family member, police officer, anybody, and said this is what’s going on, I’m being assaulted, berated, anything?” Steel requested Mia.
“No, the only time I reached out for help was very subtly to people in the office, but not disclosing things that other people hadn’t witnessed,” she responded.
Mia instructed the courtroom that “nobody around batted an eye” when Combs would act out and that he was nonetheless praised by all people in his circle.
“I was always constantly seeking his approval. He was my authority figure, my only authority figure,” she added.
When Steel requested Mia about Combs discovering out about non-public messages between her and Ventura, she accused Combs of stealing her cellphone “many times.”
“He has stolen Cassie’s phone many times, he has put tracking devices on her car. I’m not sure what he’s capable of. I was terrified,” she stated.
Mia stated that she was very shut with Ventura however stated she was “not allowed to tell her the truth about a lot of things.”
“Whatever story Puff told me, I had to uphold that,” she stated. “One of the worst parts was being put in the middle and having to cover up for Puff to Cass, which he forced me to do constantly.”
Steel requested Mia if she ever instructed Ventura that she ought to finish issues with Combs.
“Not in the way I wish I could have,” she stated.
Ex-employee says she was ‘screamed at’ if Combs thought she wasn’t doing her job
Prosecutor Madison Smyser went by way of lots of Mia’s social media posts throughout cross-examination.
Mia confirmed that selling Combs’ occasions and initiatives was a part of her job.
When Smyser requested Mia what Combs would do if he thought she wasn’t doing her job, she stated, “I would be screamed at, humiliated, made fun of, and my job would be threatened.”
She additionally stated her Instagram posts for Combs’ birthday have been a part of her job and if she didn’t make the publish, she can be “in trouble.”
Mia stated she didn’t really feel like she may have left her job with Combs.
“I would’ve been stripped of any credibility, would’ve lost — wouldn’t have been able to get a job in the same or any industry that I wanted and would’ve lost anything I knew,” she stated.
She instructed the courtroom that when she tried to depart her job, Combs’ chief of employees instructed her to return and she or he additionally feared for her security.
“I just knew his power and his wrath,” Mia stated.
When Smyser requested Mia about talking to human sources, she stated a former worker was fired after reporting Combs’ abuse of Ventura.
“Human resources only punished me unjustly, also fired Kayla for even discussing Cassie’s abuse. They wouldn’t have believed me and I would’ve been fired immediately,” Mia instructed the courtroom.
Smyser additionally requested Mia what she thought would occur if she had disclosed that Combs had sexually assaulted her.
“That I wouldn’t be believed. I would be wiped out, I would be abused, fired, and somehow made out to look like I was a crazy person making everything up,” Mia responded.
After Mia stopped working for Combs in 2017, she stated she labored for Madonna for eight months.
“Did Mr. Combs assist you in getting that job?” Steel requested.
“Absolutely not,” Mia stated.
What Combs is on trial for
U.S. prosecutors allege that for 20 years, behind the scenes, Combs was coercing and abusing girls with assist from a community of associates who helped silence victims by way of blackmail and violence.
Combs faces an indictment that features descriptions of “freak-offs,” that are outlined within the courtroom doc as “elaborate and produced sex performances that Combs arranged, directed, masturbated during, and often electronically recorded.”
Numerous witnesses have come ahead to accuse Combs of terrorizing folks into silence by choking, hitting, kicking and dragging them, in accordance with prosecutors. One indictment alleges that Combs dangled somebody from a balcony.
Although dozens of women and men have alleged in lawsuits that Combs abused them, this trial will spotlight the claims of 4 girls.
Combs is charged with intercourse trafficking, racketeering conspiracy and transportation to interact in prostitution. He has denied all the fees in opposition to him and has rejected a plea deal, selecting to go to trial as an alternative.
If discovered responsible within the New York courtroom, he may face life in jail.
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Global News might be masking the Diddy trial in its entirety. Please test again for updates.
— with recordsdata from The Associated Press
