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Fame Under Fire
Bryana 'Bana' Bongolan testifies about ‘balcony dangling’ by Diddy
00:16:16
Cassie Ventura’s friend tells court about drug use and Diddy 'holding her over a balcony'
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- [00:01]
Anushka Mutandadawati
BBC Sounds Music Radio podcasts. Hello, and welcome to Diddy on Trial from BBC Sounds with me, Anushka Mutandadawati. It's the middle of week four in Diddy's trial where he's facing federal charges of sex trafficking, racketeering with conspiracy and transportation for prostitution. Sean Diddy Combs denies all the charges against him. Now a warning. This episode contains descriptions of violence and drug use. Today, more witnesses for the prosecution have taken the stand, including Frank Piazza, a forensic audio and video specialist, and also Brianna Barna Bongolan, who we've mentioned on this podcast before. Go back and check out that bombshell balcony dangling allegation episode that we did in the run up to the trial. With me today is neda Talfik, the BBC's New York correspondent, who's going to break down for us what went on in the courtroom with Neda. What did we start with today?
- [00:59]
Neda Taufik
We started with Frank Piazza, who is a forensic video expert essentially hired by the government. He was asked to compile the various videos from the hotel incident. The CCTV footage from 2016 of, you know, that we've seen numerous times now of Diddy beating Cassie in the hotel hallway. And he basically was on the stand just to show that the videos weren't tampered with. Because, remember, this was a big issue. The defense suggesting the videos were manipulated. They wanted them out of this case. But what Frank Piazza said on the stand was that this was an accurate video. It was not tampered with. That even though the system was not able to produce smooth motion throughout, that was just because of motion sensors and other things, but that the video was absolutely accurate. It was important, of course, for the prosecution to remove any doubt whatsoever about that video.
- [01:52]
Anushka Mutandadawati
And that video just cannot convey how important that video is to both the prosecution and the defense. What did the defense do with that on cross examination?
- [02:00]
Neda Taufik
Well, it was interesting. Tenney Garagos, who was doing the cross examination, tried to just talk about how many gaps there were in time, which didn't really land because at points it was 3 seconds, 5 seconds missing from the video. But again, it was just because of a little glitch and, you know, the video correcting itself or more motion detection, not catching certain points, but nothing dramatic.
- [02:25]
Anushka Mutandadawati
But the main witness today was Barna Bongola. Now, if you've listened to the podcast since the beginning, since we were covering all those civil lawsuits that were coming out, you'll know she has a $10 million civil lawsuit out against Diddy for an alleged incident of dangling her over a balcony. What did she tell the court today about that incident?
- [02:42]
Neda Taufik
Well, the balcony incident was mentioned within a few seconds of her testimony. But then we return to it in greater detail. She said that it happened Cassie's apartment in Los Angeles, that her apartment was on the 17th story this was September of 2016, and that she said she was there with Cassie and her ex girlfriend. Cassie was in the bedroom. She said Bonna and her ex girlfriend were on the couch. She couldn't recall if they were doing drugs, but she just remembers Diddy banging loudly on the door and waking her up. She was sleeping, and she says she was stressed out, woke her ex up and rushed her to the bathroom. And on the stand, she put her finger to her mouth. And she said she told her ex to, you know, not to say anything because she didn't want to expose her is the way she put it to Diddy and the things she had witnessed between him and Cassie. Then she said she ran to the balcony to kind of look casual. Now, we see in court at that point a picture of the balcony of Cassie's apartment. And Bonna describes how the ledge we're seeing came about to her waist, that she's 5:1. She was weighing about 100 to 115 pounds at the time. And she says she was looking out at the view, and all of a sudden Diddy came up from behind her, put his arms under her armpit and lifted her up. Now, she says he held her up with her feet on the railing, and she was trying not to slip, that she was pulling, pushing back on him, and that for a split second she was worried she was gonna fall. But he just kept repeating, you know what the F you did? You know what the F you did? And she said she was screaming back, no, I don't know what I did. And she said, till this day, she still doesn't know what it was. And she just remembers him throwing her back on the balcony furniture. This is her testimony. And she said it hurt, but there was just so much adrenaline in the moment that she just got back up. And she remembers, as she's falling, hearing Cassie's voice just in disbelief, saying something along the lines of, did you just hang her over the balcony? And she said after that she heard Diddy and Cassie essentially talking about how her girlfriend was there in the apartment and that he swiftly left after that.
- [05:01]
Anushka Mutandadawati
Did she speak about, like, injuries that she suffered after this?
- [05:04]
Neda Taufik
Yeah, she talks about how after she left Cassie's, she went back to her apartment and she was shaking. She Said she was shaking a lot. She felt disgusting. She wanted a shower. And she said at that point, she realized she had a huge bruise on the back of her leg with a puncture in the middle of it. She said she also had back and neck pain. And at that point in court, we are shown photos that she said she took that day. And you can see it's like this big red bruise with this tiny piercing, as if something kind of ruptured the skin in the middle. And she also talks a little bit about the fact that she was just too scared to get any medical treatment. So she said she spoke to her managers, who told her, look, if you don't want to say what happened, at least go to a chiropractor. And she said she got a neck brace from the chiropractor. Was asked, who did this to you? But she was too scared to say. And in terms of lasting impact, she does say that she still has nightmares about it, that she just the other day had a nightmare, that she has paranoia. She screams in her sleep. She says that's dissipated a little bit. And in terms of the pain to her neck and her back, she's like, look, I was on a lot of drugs at the time, so I didn't quite realize how much pain I was under. But once she got sober, she realized how much of a lasting impact the neck and back pain became.
- [06:29]
Anushka Mutandadawati
Did she speak about what Diddy's interactions were like with her after this incident while she was still in the hospital, in his circle?
- [06:35]
Neda Taufik
She basically said that he just FaceTimed her a little bit later, him or someone in his entourage. And she just remembers saying in a FaceTime video, Look, I don't want any issues with you and him putting his hand on his head in the video, and that they just kind of moved on because they both wanted to be cool. They just wanted to have a good relationship.
- [06:59]
Anushka Mutandadawati
And then the prosecution asked her questions that would help flesh out the picture of her and Cassie's relationship. What did Barna tell the court about her and Cassie and kind of what they bonded over?
- [07:09]
Neda Taufik
She said her and Cassie first crossed paths when she was working at Young and reckless Streetwear in 2013-2014. She said that they started to bond over time, that she would stay at Cassie's house a lot, that their drug use increased as their relationship got closer and closer, and that there were times where they both tried to get sober. They would kind of fall back into addiction because it was hard, but that they were hanging out together with the same group of Friends. They were working together. They were doing drugs together. And she said they're still friends to this day.
- [07:46]
Anushka Mutandadawati
Barna has a civil lawsuit against Diddy for $10 million. So Barna talks about her lawyers having sent on her behalf a demand letter to Diddy. Then she spoke about something that happened with Rob Halliday, who was in Diddy's circle but was also friends with Barna. What went down there?
- [07:59]
Neda Taufik
Yeah. Barna talks about how was a best friend of hers, that they hung out all the time, that she knew him even before Cassie. But she details getting a FaceTime call from him in early 2024 from what looked like Diddy's backyard in Los Angeles. And essentially what prosecutors were trying to get at was that he had been authorized by Diddy to talk about a settlement with her. And they kept asking, you know, what offer, if any, was conveyed. There were a lot of objections to that. And essentially she says she declined the offer that was made to her and that they've never spoken since that moment.
- [08:37]
Anushka Mutandadawati
And then after that, she filed her civil lawsuit.
- [08:40]
Neda Taufik
Yeah, so she says that she got a lawsuit a month or two later filed. She insisted it was because she wanted to seek justice for what happened to her. And she was asked, you know, how much her lawyer on her behalf requested. And they requested $10 million. She says it's the figure her lawyer came up with, not from her. And she says, look, I'm not expecting to get any money from the criminal trial, and, yes, I would give the money back if I could take away everything that happened to me.
- [09:10]
Anushka Mutandadawati
Now, I came and joined you inside the court for the cross examination of Barnan. Cross examination is always trying to destabilize the narrative that's been offered through the direct testimony. But it was one of the trickiest ones I've seen. There were lots of I don't remembers or can you rephrase the questions? So it was quite stop, start, stop start. But a lot of it centered around inconsistencies in Barna's story.
- [09:31]
Neda Taufik
Yeah. So this, I think, was a day that the defense were celebrating, probably. I mean, in my notebook, I can't tell you how many I don't remembers I wrote or I can't recall or can you rephrase the question? So we go back through several different incidents, but if you look at the balcony incident in particular, Nicolas Moreland, the defense lawyer, really zeroed in on the inconsistencies in their story. And she suggested under cross examination that actually Cassie and Bonna spoke. They were working together in November of 2023 and December of 2024. Bona was aware of Cassie's lawsuit and that they were speaking throughout this whole entire time discussing past claims. Well, on cross examination, Nicole Westmoreland made it seem like the two of them were essentially plotting together in a way. She said, you know, isn't it true that you discussed the locations of where you said this happened? Cassie said it happened at a hotel, you said it happened at her apartment. Isn't it true that you two were discussing specific dates? She said one, you suggested another. Isn't it true that you were asked who was there?
- [10:42]
Anushka Mutandadawati
And.
- [10:42]
Neda Taufik
And on and on and on it went. And it was to kind of give this sense to the jury that, you know, here are two people who are still talking and are colluding to go after Diddy and make money off of him. That's the impression they were trying to leave the jury with.
- [10:59]
Anushka Mutandadawati
The defense's strategy wasn't just about weakening the credibility of Barna. They also wanted to weaken some of the narratives offered to us by the prosecution, namely one that Diddy held back Cassie's career. This is central to the coercion element of the sex trafficking charge.
- [11:13]
Neda Taufik
And.
- [11:13]
Anushka Mutandadawati
And they spoke about Beyonce and Rihanna.
- [11:16]
Neda Taufik
Basically, the defense pointed out that Vonna and Cassie were working to put out a clothing line that they were working over a two year period. And this was at a time when they were doing drugs almost every single day. And they said, weren't you competing with the likes of Beyonce and Rihanna? And Bona agrees with the defense that the reason the company didn't work out was not because Diddy was holding Cassie back in any way, but it was actually because of their own problems in getting the business together. And there was one very pointed question where she says, isn't it hard to be productive in business when you're getting high every day? So it was an attempt by the defense to show that Cassie was failing at other ventures and other things at a time when she was also pursuing a music career. And that Vonna was somebody who wasn't just doing drugs with her, but was acting almost as her supplier, actually getting part of her income on the drugs she was selling to Cassie. And that was a big part of their dynamic and why Cassie wasn't able to be successful.
- [12:29]
Anushka Mutandadawati
And aside from inconsistencies that the defense were highlighting in Cassie's lawsuit and Varna's lawsuit, they spoke about inconsistencies in Barna's own testimonies.
- [12:38]
Neda Taufik
Yeah, that's right. And this is another point where we heard a Lot of these I don't recall or I don't remembers from Bana. You know, Nicole Westmoreland was saying, isn't it true that you first told the government that you were at a party, not that you were sleeping? Wouldn't you agree that sleeping and being at a party are two different claims? Then she said, you know, you never told the government that Diddy came in banging the first time you made the allegation of him banging on the doors. And your civil complaint, also, you said one point you were smoking weed, another time you were smoking a cigarette or pretending to smoke weed. She says those are three different things. She also says you told the government that you saw Diddy charging directly at you from across the room. Again, she says, I don't remember, I don't remember. I don't remember when this Nicole Westmoreland kind of tries to hammer her on that. And then she says, you know, didn't you accuse Combs of sexually assaulting you, putting his hands on your chest and groping you after your demand letters, essentially, when you spoke to the government? And so Nicole Westmoreland telling her, you know, are you lying? Trying to bring up any inconsistency in their stories to attack their credibility?
- [13:55]
Anushka Mutandadawati
Westmoreland even pointed out the fact that Barna had met with the government two days ago and asked her, you met two days ago. You can remember that. Starts asking her questions, and then once again we get another, I don't remember.
- [14:07]
Neda Taufik
I mean, every answer toward the end was almost, I don't recall, I don't remember. And the defense at one point, the judge asked them, how much time do you have? And they said, how much time will you give us? They didn't want this to go into the next day. They wanted to finish with her on the stand then and there because clearly they felt they were in a position of strength with this questioning.
- [14:31]
Anushka Mutandadawati
Yeah, and that was definitely reflected by, you know, Diddy's supporters who were in the room who were like, this was a win for him. So that was interesting to see, but we're not done yet. They said potentially another 45 minutes of cross examination of Barna, which is pushing back Jane's testimony.
- [14:45]
Neda Taufik
Victim number two, let's not forget that Jane is the second alleged victim that underpins the sex trafficking allegations. Her testimony is going to be so critical to this case alongside Cassie's. And sure, prosecutors would have loved to have started the day fresh with her, but we are going to have more time with Bona on the stand.
- [15:08]
Anushka Mutandadawati
Neda, thank you so much for filling us in on that today.
- [15:10]
Neda Taufik
My pleasure.
- [15:12]
Anushka Mutandadawati
That was neda Taufik, the BBC's New York correspondent. And that's it for this episode of Diddy On Trial from BBC Sounds with me, Anoushka Mutandadawati. Don't forget to subscribe and turn on your push notifications so you never miss a thing. And if you've got questions for us, you can send us a WhatsApp at 033-01-235551. That's 033-01235, 551. And if you're in the UK and would like support about any of the issues we've talked about in this programme, you can go to BBC.co.uk actionline.
- [15:46]
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- [15:57]
Neda Taufik
It's a tragedy what's happened. I love them.
- [16:00]
Stephen Stockwell
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