Diddy’s ex-assistant tells court she ‘hasn't lied to anyone at all’

Summary

Diddy On Trial: Episode Summary Release Date: May 30, 2025

Introduction In this gripping episode of Diddy On Trial by BBC Sounds, host Anushka Matandadawati delves into the intense courtroom battles surrounding Sean "Diddy" Combs. The episode focuses on the testimony of Mia, Diddy's former assistant, who has accused him of serious crimes including sex trafficking, racketeering with conspiracy, and transportation for prostitution.

Diddy's Charges and Allegations Diddy faces multiple grave charges, all of which he vehemently denies. The prosecution has introduced Mia's detailed accounts of her experiences working under Diddy, painting a picture of systemic abuse and coercion within his organization.

Testimony of Mia Mia, the pseudonym chosen by Diddy's ex-assistant, has become a central figure in the trial. Her testimony has been both harrowing and pivotal in shaping the prosecution's case.

• Direct Testimony
  Mia has provided extensive firsthand accounts of sexual and physical abuse. She recounted instances where she was sexually assaulted by Diddy and described an environment rife with emotional and financial manipulation.
  "I used to be suspended without pay for days if I reacted to any of Diddy's violent episodes," Mia testified at [01:57].

• Allegations of Abuse
  Mia detailed a timeline of abuse that began to intensify leading up to her departure from Diddy's company, Revolt Films. She explained how the abuse affected her mental health, leading to long-term PTSD that has hindered her ability to maintain employment.
  "I can't hold a job because of long-term PTSD," she shared at [04:15].

Defense Cross-Examination The defense team's strategy has been to undermine Mia's credibility and portray her as having conflicting sentiments about Diddy.

• Questioning Mia's Integrity
  Defense attorney Brian Steele focused on Mia's previously positive social media posts about Diddy, suggesting a disconnect between her public persona and her accusations.
  "You described this as somebody who traumatized you, as somebody who raped you, and yet on the first time, you recall him sexually abusing you on his birthday. You're writing these birthday messages," Steele pressed at [06:34].

• Scrapbook Evidence
  The defense attempted to introduce a scrapbook Mia created for Diddy's birthday to demonstrate her apparent fondness for him. Although the defense could not present a video Mia had prepared, the scrapbook was introduced to suggest that Mia's allegations were fabricated.
  "I wanted to do something nice for him," Mia explained regarding the scrapbook at [08:54].

Witness Tampering Allegations Prosecutors have introduced claims that Diddy engaged in witness tampering to obstruct the trial. Mia testified about receiving unsolicited calls and messages from Diddy and his former security guard, Drock, which she interpreted as intimidation tactics.
"He missed me and wanted to speak with me," Mia recounted at [02:34], illustrating the persistent harassment she faced post-lawsuit.

Mia's Legal Representation and Settlement The episode highlights Mia's interactions with her legal team. Initially advised to hire an employment lawyer, Mia later disclosed the full extent of her allegations to her attorneys, who proposed a $10 million settlement. However, Mia ultimately received only $200,000, a point of contention that the defense seeks to exploit.
"I ended up with $200,000 and my lawyers with $200,000," Mia stated at [05:57].

Impact on Mia's Life Mia's allegations have had a profound impact on her personal and professional life. She described how the trauma has disrupted her ability to engage in everyday activities and maintain stable employment.
"If somebody calls my name from the other side of the room or I get an email, I can't react in what I would think would be a normal way anymore," Mia revealed at [04:25].

Future Proceedings The trial against Diddy is ongoing, with Mia scheduled to return to the stand the following week. Her continued testimony is expected to further illuminate the extent of the alleged abuse and the internal dynamics of Diddy's operations.

Notable Quotes

• Mia on Abuse and Its Effects:
  "Abuse is more complicated. You don't forget the abuse. But I felt like I would get punished for reacting and was terrified of that." ([08:07])

• Defense's Challenge to Mia's Credibility:
  "Aren't you lying?" Steele questioned Mia during cross-examination, attempting to cast doubts on her honesty ([10:44]).

• Mia on Her Relationship with Diddy:
  "My job was to manage his social media profile. This was essentially Instagram versus reality." ([07:00])

Conclusion This episode of Diddy On Trial provides a comprehensive and nuanced exploration of the allegations against Sean "Diddy" Combs through the lens of Mia's testimony. The detailed accounts of abuse, combined with the strategic maneuvers of the defense, create a compelling narrative that underscores the complexity and high stakes of the trial. As the proceedings continue, listeners are left anticipating further revelations and developments in this high-profile case.

Transcript

[Stephen Stockwell]

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[Zing Singh]

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[Simon Jack]

And I'm Simon Jack.

[Zing Singh]

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[Simon Jack]

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[Simon Jack]

Yep, LeBron James and Martha Stewart, to name just a few.

[Zing Singh]

And as always, Simon and I are trying to decide whether we think they're good, bad or just another billionaire.

[Simon Jack]

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[Zing Singh]

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[Anushka Matandadawati]

BBC Sounds Music Radio podcasts. Hello and welcome to Diddy on Trial from BBC Sounds with me, Anushka Matandadawati. Now I'm in lower Manhattan at the Southern District of New York Court, like we are every day. But guys, it's getting kind of crazy here. One journalist described it to me as a circus outside the court. One woman has turned up and taken all her clothes off and is just live streaming the whole thing. Apparently she does this. Apparently she was here at the Trump trial doing the same thing. Now, a reminder, Diddy is charged with sex trafficking, racketeering with conspiracy and transportation for prostitution. He denies all the charges. Inside the courtroom, it's been another day of detailed testimony from the woman who is using the pseudonym Mia. She used to work for Diddy and testified yesterday about being raped and sexually assaulted by him. Today she's been back on the stand giving more direct testimony and being cross examined by Diddy's defence team. I'm here with the BBC's New York correspondent, Neda Taufik, who's been inside the court. Neda, Mia was still on the stand doing her direct testimony at the beginning of the day, right?

[Neda Taufik]

That's right. Prosecutors were wrapping up and we heard more distressing accounts of what she claimed was sexual abuse, physical abuse, emotional and even financial abuse, claiming again that she would be suspended without pay for days if she reacted to any of Diddy's violent episodes. But beyond that, we really saw for the first time prosecutors introducing this idea of Diddy witness tampering. What we saw, of course, before this trial even started was arguments that he was doing that to try to prevent him from getting bail. Prosecutors introduced that alongside the idea of him being a flight risk. And so what we heard from Mia today was that after Cassie Ventura sued Diddy, that she started to get calls and text messages from him and his former security guard Drock. And she said she took that as them trying to gauge whether she was a threat. She said it first started in November of 2024, with Drock calling her out of the blue. They hadn't spoken in about two years. He actually wasn't even an employee of Diddy's at the time. And him calling and saying everything that's going on is so crazy. Telling her that Puff missed her and wanted to speak with her and that maybe she could say something publicly. And she said she kind of just played dumb because she was worried about her life being in danger. But she says within a few hours, she got a call from Diddy himself, but she didn't answer. She said in reaction, she just threw the phone as far as she could and ran outside her house because it was so triggering. But the messages didn't stop. She understood they wouldn't stop. She suggested that Drock wanted to send her money at one point. So these were some serious allegations from Mia. And then in the end, she said she did get two text messages directly from Diddy. He told her that he just wanted to talk to her for 10 minutes to hear her voice, to jog his memory. But if she didn't want to talk, it was okay. And she said she wanted nothing to do with him at that point. She just didn't answer. And then prosecutors wrapped kind of with a final question, just about how this has affected her working with him. And she talked about not being able to hold a job because of long term ptsd.

[Anushka Matandadawati]

Did you say something like if somebody calls her name from the other side of the room or she gets an email, she can't react in what she would think would be a normal way anymore?

[Neda Taufik]

Exactly. She said she gets triggered by normal situations that she just overreacts to because she gets an overwhelming fear that she's being in trouble. So, for example, if someone asked her where she was, you know, because they just wanted to grab a drink or get together, she said she took that as she was in trouble, like she had to justify where she was and what she's doing. So she said it all just kept coming back, that anxiety, and that's why she couldn't hold a trigger job.

[Anushka Matandadawati]

And we've heard a few times before from the prosecution. They ask about legal representation. Did they question Mia about whether she'd retained any?

[Neda Taufik]

Yeah, they did. And again, I think this is getting ahead of any defense argument. Right. So they asked her about her break with Diddy's company, Revolt Films. Basically, she describes how Diddy wanted to disband the company and move on. And after she left, in her telling, she was told by executives to hire an employment lawyer. But Diddy and others took that as a betrayal, asking her why she was doing that. But then she got into describing how when the talks dragged out about her settlement, she eventually told her lawyers about the violence and the other accusations she's made, and that her lawyers suggested a settlement of $10 million. Prosecutors asked her how much she ended up getting in the end. She said she ended up with 200,000 and her lawyers with 200,000 and that she never received any other money. And at the moment, at least, she has no pending lawsuits.

[Anushka Matandadawati]

Did she tell her lawyers about the sexual assault and the alleged abuse?

[Neda Taufik]

She said she didn't say anything about the sexual assault. She said she was going to die with that.

[Anushka Matandadawati]

So.

[Neda Taufik]

So she didn't have any plans to share that at the time. But again, prosecutors wanted to get that out on direct. Right, because no doubt, just like we've seen with other witnesses, the defense are gonna ask, why did you not speak about this earlier?

[Anushka Matandadawati]

And then she has her direct testimony, and then we go into the cross examination. The main goal to destabilize the narratives being offered to the jury from the prosecutors. Was it Brian Steele who took this one?

[Neda Taufik]

It was. It was Brian Steele. And he came off right from the get go, putting up various different Instagram posts she had made that were very flattering towards Diddy, describing him as something of a mentor of a best friend, posting about all the vacations that they went on. And he kept asking her over and over, you described this as somebody who traumatized you, as somebody who raped you, and yet on the first time, you recall him sexually abusing you on his birthday. You're writing these birthday messages. You're always being complimentary toward him. And Mia kept saying, you know, my job was to manage his social media profile. This was essentially Instagram versus reality. She said people on Instagram at the time were only sharing the good stuff about their lives. She didn't want her family to worry about her, and she wasn't going to post the negative things. But what the defense was trying to do by posting Instagram post after Instagram post after Instagram post was just to try to hammer in the jury's minds, if somebody was so traumatized, how could they be able to write such loving and glowing descriptions of their boss and someone they described as, you know, a best friend and a family member?

[Anushka Matandadawati]

Mia kept making reference to her therapist and therapy and her processing why she reacted in those ways.

[Neda Taufik]

Yeah, she said, look, you know, I'm not a professional. You'll have to ask someone why victims react that way. But she said, I just wanted to keep him happy, that I would be safer if he was happy, and that there were very high highs and very low lows. She said, I'm not going to shy away from the fact that we did have great times together. And she said, you don't forget the abuse. But she felt like she would get punished for reacting and was terrified of that. And so she didn't want it to happen again. So repeating this idea of keeping him happy for her safety.

[Anushka Matandadawati]

And I saw about the Instagram post, but then I also saw about this birthday scrapbook and that being brought up a few times. Where were the defense going with that?

[Neda Taufik]

Yeah, so before we got to the scrapbook, there was a really interesting discussion amongst the prosecution and the defense in front of the judge, out of the presence of the jury. And the defense wanted to introduce a video of Mia. It was a birthday message, about a 20 to 30 second message. Now, the court never saw this video because the judge said the defense didn't get it in on time. But what they were saying to the judge was they wanted to portray Mia as putting on an act. They said the video would show her real personality and it would be at odds with this woman on the stand who, you know, is looking down, not able to look up with her head bowed. But they weren't able to introduce that. But what they were able to introduce was the scrapbook. Right. And it was because they were coming off of Mia suggesting that the Instagram posts were for public consumption. It was all part of her job. And they were expected as staff to post about Diddy and all his events. But this scrapbook was a present for his birthday. So this was a personal thing. There was no pressure to do it. And she essentially said, look, I wanted to do something nice for him. So she put together different articles from the 1990s to show his career progression and how well he'd done over the years. The prosecutors really hammered her during this cross examination. Just saying it doesn't make sense. Somebody that you said touched you, did unforgivable things. How can you create the scrapbook if he abused you? And she just kept saying, you know, it's more complicated than you describe. Abuse is more complicated. And she said, you know, that's how victims behave. And he said, well, what if you're not a victim? And then he kept asking her, aren't you lying? Aren't you lying? And she was adamant that everything she had said was the truth.

[Anushka Matandadawati]

And when I was talking to our resident criminal defense Attorney Sean Kent. The other day, we were speaking about Mia and what charges, some of what she said spoke to during her direct testimony. And he kept talking to me about forced labor. And we've heard this before, being forced to work ridiculously long hours and to do it via threats of fear, fear or coercion, et cetera. Now, did they speak about this in the defense? Did they talk about, you know, her freedom of movement or how much she was allowed to have free time, for instance?

[Neda Taufik]

Yeah. So some of the photos of her and Cassie in different countries, they'd ask, you know, was Diddy there with you? Was Mr. Combs there with you? You had friends outside. You had family that you could reach out to. In response to that, she actually said, no, I really didn't have time to have an outside circle. In fact, I had to ask for permission to go to my grandmother's funeral. But they kept hammering this idea, like, are you a weak person? She didn't know how to answer that. This idea that she had the ability to leave and she had choices, and the cross actually opened up a few opportunities for her to express herself more. So she talked about how nobody in the office ever flinched at his behavior, that she was always in trouble and they never stood up for her, and she was just always flinching, finding ways to not face punishment. And this also really elicited a strong cross examination from the defense. They were saying, why would you need somebody to tell you that what he's doing is wrong? If he's abusing you, if he's threatening to kill you, why do you need somebody to tell you that that's wrong? And again, you could tell that Mia was trying to find a way to explain that. She said, look, I'm a people pleaser. I try to make everyone happy. She's like, I don't know if I should be apologetic for that.

[Anushka Matandadawati]

And they're not quite done with Mia. She's back on Monday.

[Neda Taufik]

Yeah. So Mia has been on the stand for quite a while. Right. We've had nearly two full days, and she's going to be back next week. Now, I mean, Cassie had four days on the stand. But look, Mia is somebody who was a very longtime employee. In fact, Diddy, in one of the messages, allegedly called her his right hand. And she was close to Cassie, so she has a lot of testimony on what she witnessed there. And then she has her own allegations of abuse. So there's been a lot to pick through. And so I would, you know, expect the defense to also just need some more time to try to undercut that testimony.

[Anushka Matandadawati]

Neda, thank you so much for filling us in today.

[Neda Taufik]

Absolutely.

[Anushka Matandadawati]

That was the BBC's New York correspondent, Neda Taufik. And that's it for this episode of Diddy on Trial with me, Anushka Matandadauty. Don't forget to subscribe and turn on your push notifications so you never miss a thing. And if you're in the UK and you would like support about any of the issues we've talked about today, you can go to BBC.co.uk actionline.

[Stephen Stockwell]

She'S accused of murdering her relatives by serving death cap mushrooms inside a beef Wellington. Erin Patterson's trial has finally started and all the details about that infamous lunch are now coming out.

[Neda Taufik]

It's a tragedy what's happened.

[Simon Jack]

I love them.

[Stephen Stockwell]

I'm Stephen Stockwell and I'm here in the small Victorian town of Morwell where the triple murder trial is underway every day. On the Mushroom Case Daily podcast, we'll tell you about all of the evidence presented in the courtroom. To make sure you don't miss an episode, hit follow on the Mushroom Case Daily podcast. Wherever you get your podcasts.

[Zing Singh]

I'm Zing Singh.

[Simon Jack]

And I'm Simon Jack.

[Zing Singh]

And together we host Good Bad Billionaire.

[Simon Jack]

The podcast exploring the lives of some of the world's richest people.

[Zing Singh]

In the new season, we're setting our sights on some big names.

[Simon Jack]

Yep, Lebron James and Martha Stewart, to name just a few.

[Zing Singh]

And as always, Simon and I are trying to decide whether we think they're good, bad or just another billionaire.

[Simon Jack]

That's Good Bad Billionaire from the BBC World Service.

[Zing Singh]

Listen now, wherever you get your BBC podcasts.