Rapper Kid Cudi testifies in Sean 'Diddy' Combs' trial about 2012 Porsche torching
Scott Mescudi also testified in cross-examination that Combs' former girlfriend Cassie Ventura told him Combs physically abused her.
A rapper who dated Sean “Diddy” Combs’ former girlfriend Cassie Ventura testified on Thursday about finding his sports car torched with a Molotov cocktail after the music mogul learned of the relationship.
Scott “Kid Cudi” Mescudi said he learned his Porsche 911 Cabriolet had burned outside his Hollywood Hills home in January 2012 when his dog sitter called him and “told me my car was on fire.”
He arrived to find a bottle near the car, he testified, and police found the Molotov cocktail on the driver’s seat under a scorched hole in the roof.
“What was your reaction to your car being set on fire?” Assistant U.S. Attorney Emily A. Johnson asked.
“What the fuck,” Mescudi answered.
The 41-year-old Grammy winner is the most prominent person to testify so far in Combs’ federal sex trafficking trial in New York City. He arrived at the Daniel Patrick Moynihan U.S. Courthouse wearing jeans and a black leather jacket and smoking a cigarette.
The torching of his car 13 years ago is one several alleged actions that prosecutors say were part of a 15-year organized crime conspiracy led by Combs that coerced Ventura and other women into sex with male prostitutes and was supported by Combs’ employees and multimillion dollar companies.
Combs, 55 and a three-time Grammy winner, is charged with four additional federal felonies: two counts of sex trafficking and two counts of transportation for prostitution. He’s been in federal custody since September.
In addition to the burned Porsche, Mescudi testified Thursday about learning from a friend that Combs had entered his home on Hollywood Hills Road in Los Angeles in December 2011 when he wasn’t there. Ventura already warned him something might happen: Mescudi testified she called about 5:30 a.m. or 6 a.m. “and she told me that Sean Combs had found out about us.”
“She wanted me to come pick her up. And she was also worried that he would come to my house because he asked for my address and she gave it to him,” Mescudi testified.
He said Ventura was “very stressed, nervous, just scared, didn’t know what Sean Combs would do,” and he took her to the Sunset Marquis hotel in Los Angeles because he thought it was safe and just wanted to put her somewhere where she was off the radar.”
While there, Ventura’s friend called and said Combs “and an affiliate were in my house, and she was in a car. She was forced to go along with them over there,” Mescudi testified.
Mescudi said he called Combs, then he warned from the witness stand: “I’m going to be very candid.”
“I said, ‘Motherfucker, you in my house?’ And he was like, ‘What’s up?’ I was like, ‘Motherfucker, are you in my house?’ And he said, ‘I just want to talk to you. I was like, I’m on my way over right now. He was like, I’m here,” Mescudi testified, according to a court reporter’s transcript obtained by Legal Affairs and Trials.
No one was in his home when he arrived, Mescudi testified, but he found his dog locked in a bathroom, and someone had opened gifts from the Chanel luxury fashion line that he bought for his family.
Mescudi testified he called Combs again because “I wanted to fight him.”
“I can’t remember my exact words, but I was kind of, like, asking him where he was. And he was, ‘I’m on my way, I’m on my way,’ Mescudi said on Thursday. “So at that point I hung up and I thought to myself, I was like, ‘OK. You’re angry.”
Mescudi said he reported the break-in to police, then visited Ventura’s family in Connecticut for Christmas and received several texts from Combs.
“It kind of stopped at some point when I responded to him and told him I didn’t want to talk. His text messages were always along the lines of him wanting to speak, just get to the bottom of it,” Mescudi testified. “I told him, you know, specifically told him you broke into my house. You messed with my dog. Like, I don’t want to talk to you.”
By January 2012, “we weren’t really hanging out,” Mescudi said of he and Ventura.
‘I knew he had something to do with it’
At that point in testimony, on the trial’s 16th day, jurors had heard little about the car fire beyond Johnson saying in her May 12 opening statement that Combs “had a man’s car set on fire” and Combs’ lawyer Teny Geragos saying in hers that Combs “was simply not involved in the alleged arson.”
Ventura didn’t testify about the Porsche burning, but she testified on May 14 that Combs told her Mescudi’s car “would be blown up” after he learned by looking through her phone that she’d been seeing Mescudi.
Ventura said Combs threatened to release videos of her from the “freak offs,” referring to Combs’ name for his elaborate sex parties with prostitutes, and said “how he was was going to hurt Scott and I.” Ventura also said Combs assaulted her, and jurors saw photos of bruises on her back that her mother took when Ventura visited her in Connecticut for Christmas.
Jurors saw a Dec. 23, 2011, email Ventura wrote under an alias, Veronica Bang, that said, “Threats. The threats that have been made towards me by Sean Puffy Combs are that he is going to release two explicit sex tapes of me. One on Christmas Day, maybe before or right after, and another one some time soon after that. He has also said that he will be having someone hurt me and Scott Mescudi physically (he made a point that it wouldn't be by his hands, he actually said he'd be out of the country when it happened).”
Ventura also testified briefly about meeting Combs and Mescudi at the members-only Soho House social club in Los Angeles “to discuss the relationship that we were no longer in.”
“Scott said, ‘What about my vehicle?’ And Sean said, ‘What vehicle?’ And that was the end of the meeting,” she testified.
Mescudi filled in the details on Thursday.
He said he was “confused” to learn Combs was upset because “I didn’t think she was still dealing with him.” After his car burned, his had his manager arrange the meeting at the Soho.
“I reached out to Sean Combs after my car had caught fire and, you know, finally told him that we needed to meet up to talk,” Mescudi testified. “He had been wanting to talk to me. So after the fire I was like, ‘This is getting out of hand. I need to talk to him.’”
Johnson asked why he reached out to Combs and Mescudi answered, “Because I knew he had something to do with it.”
U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian, however, ordered the jury to disregard the answer after he sustained an objection from Mescudi’s lawyer Brian Steel, who emphasized to the judge before testimony began that Mescudi shouldn’t be allowed to say he believes Combs is responsible for the fire.
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Returning to the meeting at the Soho, Mescudi testified Combs’ security guard escorted him into a room.
“One wall was all window and Sean Combs was standing there staring out the window with his hands behind his back like a Marvel super villain. Yeah. It was just me and him in the room. No security, nobody,” Mescudi said.
Mescudi and Combs discussed Ventura and her relationship with Mescudi and “how it ended.”
“And his whole point was, you know, we were homies, you know, that was my girl. I let him know that, you know, she told me they were broken up, and I took her word for it. Yeah,” Mescudi testified.
He said Combs was “very calm,” which he called “very off-putting.”
“It was weird that he was so calm,” Mescudi testified.
Ventura eventually joined the meeting and “pretty much kind of explained that we fell in love and things just happened,” Mescudi continued.
Mescudi said the meeting ended with him and Combs shaking hands and Mescudi asking, “What are we going to do about my car?”
“I made sure to ask him right when our hands were clasped together, where he couldn’t run away and I could look at him square in his eyes, and he looked right back at me, very cold stare, and said: ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ I said: ‘OK.’ I took my hand from his. And he said, ‘Wait. I thought we were cool. Is there a problem?’” Mescudi testified.
Mescudi said he told Combs, “You said you didn’t burn my car, right? You said that’s your word” and Combs replied, “Yeah.”
“I was like, ‘That’s it,” Mescudi testified.
Mescudi said he ran into Combs again at the Soho a couple years later.
“He was with his daughter, and he pulled me to the side and basically apologized for everything. He said, and I quote: ‘Man, I just want to apologize for everything and all that bullshit,’” Mescudi said.
Mescudi said he didn’t have further problems with Combs.
“After I got the apology, I kind of found peace with it because I thought, you know, that was the last thing I was expecting to get from him,” Mescudi answered.
Young Thug’s lawyer does cross-exam
In cross-examination, Steel asked if Mescudi’s aware DNA collected at the scene was identified as belonging to a female, but Judge Subramanian overruled an objection. Mescudi then testified he “didn’t hear any follow up about any of the fingerprints or anything” from police.
“You don’t have any information, do you — you personally — that anybody affiliated with Mr. Combs was on or around your property at the time of the damage to your vehicle. Is that true?” Steel asked.
“No,” Mescudi answered.
Steel turned to questioning Mescudi about learning Ventura was still seeing Combs.
“She played you. That was your words, right?” asked Steel, who is rapper Jeffery “Young Thug” Williams’ longtime lawyer in Atlanta, Georgia.
“Yes,” Mescudi answered.
“When she played you, she was convincing about that, right? You had no clue?” Steel asked.
“No clue,” Mescudi answered.
Steel questioned Mescudi about meeting Ventura through Combs, who “actually asked you if you would do him a favor and do a song with Ms. Ventura.”
“Mr. Combs wasn’t around you and Ms. Ventura when you were with her, right?” Steel asked.
“No.” Mescudi answered.
“And she wasn’t getting all these text messages from him, to your knowledge, when you were with her, right?” Steel asked.
“Not to my knowledge,” Mescudi answered.
Steel questioned Mescudi about his activities with Ventura, including if they “did drugs together.”
“When you say drugs, what do you mean, like weed?” Mescudi replied.
“Yeah,” Steel replied.
“We smoked some weed, yeah,” Mescudi answered.
Judge Subramanian held a sidebar at Johnson’s request, which jurors couldn’t hear. He began by telling Steel, “Let’s move on. We don’t need to cover this. What’s going on?”
“I believe that it was discussed on direct, and I’m exploring their relationship,” Steel answered.
“What is there to explore? What’s the relevance of the question?” Subramanian asked.
“That they were intimate,” Steel answered.
The judge said their relationship is established so “What other relevance to this does any of this line of questioning have? What does it matter?”
“Alright. I note my objection,” Steel said.
Subramanian didn’t let up.
“I’m asking you a question. What is the answer?” he asked Steel.
“I think it matters that there has been testimony from Ms. Ventura that she is being suffocated — these are my words — by Mr. Combs, and she is spending all her time doing unconsensual sex, yet she is having intimate relations with this gentleman and it’s all calm and consensual. That’s really where I’m going,” Steel told the judge.
“If that’s the proffer of relevance, then the objection is sustained,” Subramanian said.
Steel returned to the lectern and questioned Mescodi about his interest in Ventura, confirming through separate questions that he found her to be smart, talented, fun to be with and outgoing and has a strong personality and is interesting to be with.
“And she told you, did she not … that she really wasn’t with Mr. Combs. It was off again, on again, something to that effect. Is that true?” Steel asked.
“I don’t know if that was the exact conversation we had. The first time she talked to me about her relationship with him was around Thanksgiving 2010, and that’s when she was telling me she was having problems,” Mescudi answered.
Steel showed Mescudi a police report that quotes Mescudi saying he and Ventura had “been off again, on again for four years.”
“In 2011, Ms. Ventura confided in you, true?” Steel asked
“Yes,” Mescudi answered.
“And you confided in her?” Steel asked.
“Yeah,” Mescudi answered.
Steel turned to questions about Combs entering Mescudi’s home in December 2011.
“And in the home there was no damage to the home? By damage I mean there was no chairs turned over, glass broken, holes in the wall, things like that. True?” Steel asked.
“No,” Mescudi answered.
“I’m not belittling it, but the only things that were displayed differently is there were some Christmas presents that were unwrapped, right?” Steel asked.
“Yes,” Mescudi answered.
“And your dog was behind the door?” Steel asked.
“Right,” Mescudi answered.
Steel also emphasized that Mescudi said Combs was calm when they spoke, and that Combs never mentioned having a gun.
“You are a strong person. Is that fair to say? That’s how you categorize yourself?” Steel asked.
“Yeah,” Mescudi answered.
“You are a principled person, fair to say?” Steel asked.
“Yes,” Mescudi answered.
“And you went back to your home, you told the ladies and gentlemen of the jury, to fight Mr. Combs if he was there, right?” Steel asked.
“Yeah,” Mescudi answered.
“Because nobody has the right to wait for you in your home, whether damage was done or not. That was your position, right?” Steel asked.
“Yeah. If you want to talk, you can text me. We can talk. But this crossed the line,” Mescudi answered.
Steel said Ventura told Mescudi that Combs physically abused her, but “she never told you, as close as you were with her, that there was any type of sexual abuse. Is that true?”
“No,” Mescudi answered.
“Am I correct?” Steel asked.
“Yes,” Mescudi answered.
Mesucdi also confirmed he never saw Combs act inappropriately to Ventura, and he answered “yes” when Steel asked if Ventura “was living two different lives” when she was dating Mescudi but still seeing Combs.
“And the person who played you is the same person who played Sean. It’s Ms. Ventura, true?” Steel asked.
“True,” Mescudi answered.
Mescudi answered “no” when Steel asked if anyone has been charged or arrested over his Porsche, but Judge Subramanian sustained Johnson’s objection and told jurors to disregard the answer.
Steel ended his cross-exam by confirming with Mescudi that Ventura told him she’d given Combs his address.
Steel’s cross opens door for questions about Ventura’s physical abuse claims
In redirect, Johnson asked Mescudi what “specifically” Ventura said about Combs physically abusing her.
She had tried to question Mescudi about physical abuse in direct-exam by asking, “What, if anything, had Ms. Ventura previously told you about Mr. Combs being physical with her?” but Judge Subramanian sustained Steel’s objection as Mescudi began to answer, “That he was abusive.”
However, Steel’s questions in cross about physical abuse but no sexual abuse allowed Johnson to elicit more testimony from Mescudi about physical abuse.
“Mr. Mescudi, you were asked by Mr. Steel some questions on cross-examination about Ms. Ventura confiding in you. Do you remember those questions?” Johnson asked.
“Yes,” Mescudi answered.
“And do you recall that Mr. Steel asked you about Ms. Ventura confiding in you about Mr. Combs being physically abusive to her?” Johnson asked.
“Yes,” Mescudi answered.
“What did Ms. Ventura confide in you specifically about that abuse?” Johnson asked.
“That he would hit her, sometimes kick her,” Mescudi answered.
Johnson referenced Steel’s question about Ventura being “carefree.”
“Directing your attention to the day of the break-in, the morning when Ms. Ventura called, would you describe her as carefree when she called you that morning?” Johnson asked.
“No,” Mescudi answered.
“Would you describe her as carefree throughout that day when you saw her?” Johnson asked.
“No,” Mescudi answered.
Johnson questioned Mescudi about his concerns about Combs entering his home.
“I didn’t really know what I was walking into, but I was so angry at first. Then, once I thought about it, not really knowing if they had weapons or if there was any type of situation like that, that’s when I called the police,” Mescudi testified.
He described Ventura as “just really shook” “because of just the circumstance of him finding out about us.” He said their relationship ended because of the drama.”
“It was just getting out of hand and I kind of wanted to give her some space,” Mescudi testified.
“What drama are you talking about?” Johnson asked.
“The break-in and everything,” Mescudi answered.
When Johnson asked why he had safety concerns, Mescudi started to answer, “Because I knew Sean Combs was violent,” and Steel objected, then during a sidebar asked Judge Subramanian to declare a mistrial.
“The government knows that the answer is about to be that Mr. Combs has had other people killed. This is an outrageous question,” Steel said.
“He didn’t say that,” Subramanian said.
“But he will say that,” Steel said, citing statements Mescudi made to police.
“He hasn’t said that,” Subramanian said.
“Well, he’s about to say it. I’m putting the Court on notice,” Steel said.
“No. You don’t get to put me on notice,” Subramanian said.
Back at the lectern, Johnson turned to the meeting at the SoHo and Mescudi’s question to Combs about his car when she returned to the lectern.
“What was your understanding when Mr. Combs said he didn't know what you were talking about, at the end of that conversation?” she asked.
“That he was lying,” Mescudi answered.
Those were Mescudi’s last words of testimony. He left the courthouse through a swarm of cameras, then posted a video on Instagram thanking his supporters.
“People been hitting me up the past week, just checking in. Even today. It just really means a lot to me, man. You guys are the best. I love y’all. It’s a stressful situation, I’m glad it’s all behind me,” he said.
Testimony resumes on Tuesday, May 27. I’m putting together another article on all the testimony so far; if you subscribe you will get it in your email inbox the moment it publishes.
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