“HUMBLED AND BROKEN”
Ventura, the 39-year-old singer known as Cassie, testified for days while heavily pregnant.
She described in wrenching detail physical, emotional and sexual abuse she suffered while in a more than decade-long relationship with Combs.
Ventura and another woman, identified as Jane, said they were coerced into performing so-called “freak-offs”: sexual marathons with hired men that Combs directed and sometimes filmed.
“The entire courtroom watched actual footage of Combs kicking and beating me as I tried to run away from a freak off in 2016,” Ventura wrote.
“People watched this footage dozens of times, seeing my body thrown to the ground, my hands over my head, curled into a fetal position to shield me from the worst blows,” she said, noting she has nightmares and flashbacks “on a regular, everyday basis.”
Ventura said she and her family had left the New York area for fear of “retribution” from Combs if he is released.
The defence didn’t deny Combs’s sexual activity but insisted it was consensual.
They also didn’t deny Combs’s years of violence against both romantic partners as well as employees, but they said it didn’t meet the legal threshold for the grave charges he faced.
Jurors took their side.
The conviction on lesser if still serious counts stemmed from a federal statute that makes it illegal to transport people across state lines for prostitution.
Combs has been incarcerated in Brooklyn for more than a year.
He said his time in prison has left him “reborn.”
“I have been humbled and broken to my core,” Combs wrote.
