Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs has once again requested a mistrial in his sex trafficking trial.
The hip-hop mogul’s lawyers asked the presiding judge to throw out the trial over their allegations that prosecutors presented false testimony, according to TMZ. The dispute arose from Cassie’s friend Bryana “Bana” Bongolan alleging during her testimony on Wednesday, June 4, that Diddy once dangled her over the balcony of a Los Angeles building and then tossed her into nearby patio furniture.
Diddy’s lawyers said Cassie (real name Casandra Ventura) incorrectly testified in May that she’d seen Diddy, 55, holding Bongolan, 33, over the balcony. According to TMZ, Diddy’s legal team provided text messages from Cassie to Diddy’s employee Kristina Khorram, in which Cassie allegedly suggests she didn’t actually witness the incident because she wrote: “I just found out some crazy s***.” In addition to disputed testimony, Diddy contends that the photos of Bongolan were taken on a day when he was not in Los Angeles.
U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian has yet to rule on Diddy’s latest mistrial motion. He previously declined to throw out the case in May following a dispute over Cassie’s ex-boyfriend Kid Cudi testifying about Diddy allegedly blowing up his car.
Us Weekly has reached out to Cassie’s representatives for comment.
Bongolan reflected on her alleged confrontation with Diddy in September 2016 during her appearance at the Daniel Patrick Moynihan United States Courthouse in New York City earlier this week. She told the court that she and her girlfriend were sleeping on the couch in Cassie’s Los Angeles apartment when her then-boyfriend Diddy allegedly started banging on the door. (Diddy and Cassie, 38, dated off and on from 2007 to 2018.)
Bongolan recalled urging her girlfriend to hide in the bathroom, before walking out onto the balcony to “act casual.” Once Diddy entered the apartment, he allegedly grabbed Bongolan from behind and “lifted [her] up and then put [her] on top of the rail.”
She remembered “trying not to slip” over the balcony, while Diddy allegedly yelled at her, “You know what the f*** you did.” Bongolan estimated that Diddy held her over the balcony for 15 seconds, leaving her with physical injuries as well as longer-term emotional effects like “paranoia” and “night terrors.”
Under cross examination, Diddy’s lawyer Nicole Westmoreland brought up apparent discrepancies in the testimony, pointing out that Bongolan told the court that she was smoking weed when she was allegedly attacked while she previously stated in a lawsuit that she was smoking a cigarette. (Bongolan sued Diddy last year, and he denied her claims in a statement via his lawyer.)
Diddy was arrested in September 2024 and charged with sex trafficking, racketeering conspiracy and transportation to engage in prostitution. He pleaded not guilty to all charges and has denied all of the allegations against him.
“We are disappointed with the decision to pursue what we believe is an unjust prosecution of Mr. Combs by the U.S. Attorney’s Office,” Diddy’s attorney Marc Agnifilo said in a statement at the time. “He is an imperfect person, but he is not a criminal. To his credit Mr. Combs has been nothing but cooperative with this investigation and he voluntarily relocated to New York last week in anticipation of these charges. Please reserve your judgment until you have all the facts. These are the acts of an innocent man with nothing to hide, and he looks forward to clearing his name in court.”
Since his arrest, Diddy has been held at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn. His four requests for bail were denied by Judge Subramanian.
Diddy’s arrest came nearly one year after his ex-girlfriend Cassie filed a lawsuit against him accusing him of sexual and physical abuse throughout their relationship, which lasted off and on from 2007 to 2018. The mogul denied her claims in a statement shared by his attorney.
“Mr. Combs vehemently denies these offensive and outrageous allegations,” Diddy’s lawyer Ben Brafman said at the time.
One day after the suit was filed, Diddy and Cassie settled out of court. In May 2024, CNN published a hotel surveillance video of Diddy kicking and grabbing Cassie in 2016. He later apologized for his actions in a video shared via Instagram.
If you or someone you know has been sexually assaulted, contact the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673). If you or someone you know is experiencing domestic violence, please call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 for confidential support. If you or someone you know is a human trafficking victim, contact the National Human Trafficking Hotline at 1-888-373-7888.
Read the full article here
