Brian Buckmire talks with someone at ABC who’s been tracking Diddy's story very closely: Stephanie Maurice coordinates all the interview bookings for ABC’s coverage of Diddy (including this podcast!). She’s been in the courtroom watching the explosive testimony and comparing it with allegations from the civil lawsuits against Diddy. She’s got her eyes on Diddy everyday in court and she’s noticed how expressive he’s been during testimony. The judge has taken note, too. Got a question about the trial? Leave a voicemail at 929-388-1249 and Brian Buckmire might answer it on a future episode. To get access to all the trial updates in this case, follow "Bad Rap: The Case Against Diddy" on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Chapter 1: What is the main topic of this episode?
Hi, I'm Brian Bachmeier, an ABC News legal contributor and host of Bad Rap, The Case Against Diddy. You're about to hear our latest episode following everything going on in Sean Combs' trial from the prosecution and the defense. Remember, to hear all of our updates on this case, follow Bad Rap, The Case Against Diddy.
We're dropping two new episodes every week, including one that's not available anywhere else. Now here's our episode.
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This is Bad Rap, the case against Diddy. I'm Brian Buckmeyer, an ABC News legal contributor and practicing attorney. This episode, Diddy gets scolded. Week four of USA v. Sean Combs has been another full one. But let's start with this. The judge Thursday delivered a scolding of sorts to Combs through his lawyer, saying that Combs had been too expressive during the trial.
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Chapter 2: What did the judge say about Diddy's behavior in court?
This is definitely something I've noticed, but here's how Judge Subramanian described it. He said, quote, there's a line of questioning where your client was nodding vigorously and looking at the jury. And there was a subsequent moment when there was a sidebar and I saw your client looking at the jury. The judge then added emphatically, that is absolutely unacceptable.
He said that there shouldn't be any efforts to interact with the jury and that if Diddy doesn't comply, he can be kicked out of the courtroom. The last witness to take the stand this week is another of Combs' alleged victims. This is the woman known as victim number two in the indictment, now going by the pseudonym Jane.
Jane is a single mother who started spending time with Combs in 2020, while he was also seeing other women. We know from the opening statement that Jane will testify to participating in freak-offs and physical abuse, while the defense will say that it was a consenting relationship plagued by jealousy. She could be the last alleged victim to testify before the prosecution rests its case.
Chapter 3: Who are the key witnesses in Diddy's trial?
Earlier this week, we also heard witnesses including Derek Ferguson, a former CFO of Combs Enterprises, Eddie Garcia, a member of the Intercontinental Hotel security team, and Brianna Bongolin, a close friend of Cassie's who testified that Diddy lifted her over the railing of a 17-story balcony.
Those last two, Eddie Garcia and Brianna Bongolin, testified under an immunity deal, just like some of Diddy's former assistants. We'll get into some more details of their testimony with my guest this week. Stephanie Maurice is an executive editorial producer at ABC, also many times my line mate while we get into court.
She's been covering the allegations against Diddy since Cassie's lawsuit in 2023. Stephanie started digging in on the 60 or so civil lawsuits against Diddy, learning all she could about the people behind them and the allegations they made. It's Steph's job at the network to coordinate all interview requests in the Diddy story.
All the great interviews you heard in the first few episodes of this podcast, like Tiffany Redd, Cassie's creative collaborator and close friend, and D. Woods, a winner of Making the Band, who became part of Diddy's band, Danny Kane. All those bookings are thanks to the booking team and Steph. So on behalf of our listeners, thanks.
Since the trial has started, Steph's been in court every day, keeping a close eye on Diddy, his family, and the jury. And of course, watching the witness testimony unfold. So Steph, thanks for joining us at Bad Rap.
Of course. I'm happy to be here.
So first and foremost, you've heard about the people in the courtroom for a long time now. Diddy, Cassie. But now we're seeing them up close. What's it like seeing these people and the stories come to life?
I mean, you know, Brian, it's been eight months in the making for us to finally get into that courtroom and see how this case from the government was going to play out. It's fascinating being in the courtroom. It's fascinating to see Diddy take a front seat to his own defense, like literally has a seat at the table.
You've seen it where he's often passing notes, whispering stuff to his defense attorneys. He's having very expressive reactions to things he disagrees with or at times when his ex-personal assistant said things that were favorable of him. Things about his business acumen, things like that. He's shaking like, yep, yep, that's me.
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Chapter 4: What surprising testimony was given by Brianna Bongolin?
Absolutely.
So just to kind of paint the picture for everyone who's listening, When you come in, the media has to sit in like the back three rows of the court, to the right, if you're facing the court. But on the other side of the aisle, closer up to just behind Sean Combs, there's an entire row dedicated to his family.
So when you look over just a little to the left, what have you noticed as to who's shown up for Sean Combs' family and their reaction to some of this testimony?
So the first week, I think the first two rows that were dedicated to Sean Combs' support team were filled. Every mother of his child was there. Sarah Chapman was there. Dana Tran was there. We saw Misa Hilton there. We saw his three sons. We saw his two twin daughters. And we saw his daughter Chance. The only child of his that wasn't here is his toddler child love that he has with Dana Tran.
So the first week, we saw the entire family. And then as the week went on, you know, things started to trickle off. We know that his daughters had some things going on with high school and prom. But now it's basically Janice Combs has a standing seat in that courtroom. And one day I saw Combs turn to his mother at the end of court and he mouthed to her, see you tomorrow. And she said every day.
And he mouthed back to her every day. Oftentimes he's turning around at the beginning of court, checking to see if they're there yet. And there are moments where he turns around and he doesn't have their intention. They might be looking down. One time he was looking at his mom and he waited for her to look up to make eye contact.
And he often does the heart heart with his hands and he'll blow her kisses. And he's one time he said, love you, mama. I think it's really an opportunity for him to connect with his children in these moments. He's often having, you know, brief little conversations with his sons. They're smiling, laughing in these sidebars and breaks and at the end of court.
So this is really his connection to his family every day in court.
Let's take a short break. When we come back, one of the wildest moments in court so far and who Stephanie would like to see take the stand.
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Chapter 5: How did Diddy react during witness testimonies?
Chapter 6: What allegations have been made against Sean Combs?
Right, so we know Diddy got in trouble Thursday for how expressive he's been during this trial. You're really supposed to try to keep your face pretty neutral, but as we're describing here, Diddy's actually been quite animated. But back to Bonna's testimony. On cross-examination, the defense really tried to suggest there were inconsistencies in the story she told about this balcony incident.
They focused on that drug use, but they also honed in on the fact that Sean Combs was performing in New York and New Jersey for the Bad Boy reunion and was staying at Trump Hotel on the exact days that Bonna said Sean Combs had assaulted her on the balcony in California. Bonna provided a photo of an injury that is timestamped through metadata at 9.45 a.m. on September 26, 2016.
Chapter 7: What evidence has emerged from the trial?
But the defense provided information to suggest that Sean Combs was performing with Lil' Kim on the night of September 25th and was in Trump Tower the morning of the 26th, the exact time that Bonna said she was assaulted by Combs.
As we mentioned, Bonna has her own civil lawsuit against Combs, alleging sexual battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and false imprisonment, amongst other things. Those allegations we know Sean Combs vehemently denies.
And we also heard from Eddie Garcia. And Eddie Garcia was a security guard at the Intercontinental when that hotel incident that we've now all seen where Diddy is seen attacking Cassie. And he was the missing link. We kept hearing about this hotel incident. We kept seeing the video. But none of us really knew where they got this video from.
Yeah.
And Eddie Garcia finally filled in those blanks for us, sharing with us that it was actually his supervisor who said, I'll give it to him for $50,000 when Diddy had his chief of staff, Christina Karam, calling Garcia, coming to the Intercontinental Hotel. finding out his personal cell phone, calling him, looking for this video.
And we hear this incredible testimony about him going to the west side of LA, meeting with Sean Combs himself, handing over what they claimed was the only copy of this video, and getting $100,000 in cash, how he doled it out amongst three people that were involved. He tells us that Combs kept referring to him as you know, my angel, my angel Eddie.
And we see it in Sean Combs' phone in evidence as an exhibit that he saved it as my angel Eddie.
And the best part about this case that I think is so phenomenal to have you here talking with us is the jury is listening to the witness, seeing their body language, but they're also watching Sean Combs and seeing how he reacts to things and whether or not they believe his reaction or the witness.
Absolutely.
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Chapter 8: What is the significance of the $20,000 loan mentioned in court?
People are really into this trial. They want to be a part of it. They want to be in the room. But obviously, you can't have those kinds of outbursts. And You've seen it outside of the courthouse. We've had to call NYPD. We've had to call the U.S. Marshals over.
There is a cast of characters that are there between the bloggers, the YouTube personalities, just everyday New York people that are like, what's happening? Diddy's in there and then they stop and everybody wants to wait for the kids to come out and the mom to come out and catch them going into the sprinter. It is a spectacle on a daily basis.
Cast of characters is definitely the way I would describe it. But there's, I think most people would agree, the most important people in the room are the jury. And so what are you seeing of them as they react to testimony, outbursts, the arguments, everything?
So we have been quite surprised to see how expressive some of the jurors in particular are. There has been particular testimony that I have seen jurors smirk at, laugh at, roll their eyes at. There are jurors that are not hiding their feelings on their faces. And we're also seeing during sidebars, jurors whispering behind notebooks, jurors talking, jurors laughing.
And while we obviously don't know what they're talking about, it's just interesting to see them speaking during the court proceedings when the judge is off with the defense and the prosecution in a sidebar. But we are absolutely seeing some of these jurors express one way or another how they're feeling about certain testimony. For instance, when Mia in particular was testifying,
there seemed to be a lot of jurors that were rolling their eyes and laughing at things that some would deem very serious. And while we can't read in it too much, you know, it's those expressive moments where, you know, as journalists, we're wondering, what are they thinking? Which way are they leaning? Obviously, we don't know. But we'll know when there's a verdict, which way the jury's leaning.
But for right now, we can just see them.
So as we sit here now... What questions do you have about this case?
Well, I'm interested to see what else Jane is going to say. I mean, Jane has just finally taken the stand. She's victim to. We knew very little bit about her going into it. But she's expected to be on the stand through next week. They said she has a flight Thursday evening. And they are expecting to have her on the stand until at least through late next week.
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