A $100,000 Payment for Assault Footage
We don’t know yet what the final verdict will be in this case described below. But with each day and each new revelation, the chances of an unpleasant future for Sean Combs increases! It is such a good example of how people with intelligence, resources, influence and cleverness, but also a desire to hurt others, can keep the light from shining on them for a long, long time.
It can lead those who know them to believe that the “Law of Physics” embodied in the title of this book can’t possibly be true. But “Nelly Bar the Door,” when the truth is finally and inevitably revealed. The rule is that “the longer the deception goes on, and the more people effected, the deeper the pit” that awaits them.
Sean Combs may yet squeak out of this one, though I have my doubts. But doubts are not facts, so we will have to wait for the final judgement. I’m pretty sure I know! What do you think?
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A stable, nonpreachy, objective voice makes the book stand apart from others in the genre. A successful guide that uses anecdotes of real human experiences to reveal powerful truths about life.
A $100,000 Payment for Assault Footage: Latest Combs Trial Takeaways
Sean Combs has been accused of using a brown bag filled with cash to buy surveillance video of him beating Casandra Ventura in a hotel hallway in 2016.
On the 15th day of Sean Combs’s trial, a security officer gave a detailed account of how the music mogul gave him $100,000 — delivered in a brown paper bag — in exchange for surveillance footage that captured Mr. Combs beating his longtime girlfriend Casandra Ventura at a Los Angeles hotel in 2016.
The footage, which shows Mr. Combs striking, kicking and dragging Ms. Ventura, has become a centerpiece of the government’s racketeering conspiracy and sex-trafficking case.
Mr. Combs has pleaded not guilty to all charges. His lawyers have said that he and his employees were involved in legitimate business operations, not a criminal conspiracy, and that the sex at issue was entirely consensual.
Here are some takeaways.
The hotel security officer was contacted repeatedly by an employee for Mr. Combs.
The security officer, Eddy Garcia, testified that he arrived to work on March 5, 2016, at an InterContinental hotel in Los Angeles and was shown surveillance footage of Mr. Combs’s assault on Ms. Ventura.
He later received a call from an employee of Mr. Combs, Kristina Khorram, who asked if she could get a copy of the footage. He testified that he told her no and declined again when she showed up in the lobby later that day.
That evening, Mr. Garcia testified, he received another call from Ms. Khorram, who connected him with Mr. Combs. The music mogul sounded nervous, Mr. Garcia said, and explained that he had “a little too much” to drink the day of the assault. If the video got out, “it could ruin him.”
Mr. Garcia, who said he was 24 years old at the time, testified that he rebuffed Mr. Combs again, but Ms. Khorram and the mogul called another time, and Mr. Combs said “he would take care of me,” suggesting a potential payment. Mr. Garcia later called his supervisor, who agreed to sell the footage for $50,000.
When Mr. Garcia told Mr. Combs that they would be willing to sell the footage, the officer said, “He was excited, said ‘Eddy, my angel, I knew you could help. I knew you could do it.’”
The testimony was the most detailed yet in addressing the role of Ms. Khorram, who was recently Mr. Combs’s chief of staff and was once described by him as his “right hand.”
The officer delivered a USB drive with the assault footage.
Mr. Garcia’s supervisor later gave him a USB drive holding the footage, and on March 7, Mr. Garcia brought it to an address in Los Angeles, where he said he met Mr. Combs, a bodyguard and Ms. Khorram.
Mr. Garcia handed Mr. Combs the drive and assured him that it was the only copy, he testified, but he also expressed concern that he could be implicated if there was a police report about the assault. Mr. Combs then called Ms. Ventura on FaceTime, passed Mr. Garcia the phone and told Ms. Ventura to “let him know that you want this to go away too,” the officer testified.
“She said that she had a movie coming out and it wasn’t a good time for this to come out and she wanted it to go away,” Mr. Garcia said Ms. Ventura, known as the singer Cassie, had told him.
Mr. Combs eventually left the room and returned with a brown bag and a money counter, feeding stacks of $10,000 at a time into the machine. At the end, the machine displayed $100,000 — double what his supervisor had asked for. Mr. Garcia said he understood that the additional money was for him and one of his colleagues.
“He said not to make any big purchases,” Mr. Garcia said of Mr. Combs. “I understood it as it would draw attention.”
Mr. Garcia said $50,000 went to his supervisor and $20,000 to a colleague. He kept $30,000 for himself, using the cash to buy a used vehicle.
Mr. Garcia testified under an immunity order after telling the government that he intended to assert his Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate himself.
Mr. Combs sought to ensure the video was the only copy, the officer said.
At the meeting with Mr. Combs, Mr. Garcia said, he signed a document — which was shown to jurors — affirming that he had handed over the only existing copy of the surveillance video. He testified that he did not read the document in full, and that he also signed a nondisclosure agreement.
Israel Florez, a former hotel security staffer who responded to the assault, testified that after he returned to work following the incident, the footage had disappeared from the camera system.
It is unclear how footage of the assault then ended up at CNN, which broadcast clips of it a year ago.
After the footage was first published by CNN, Mr. Combs apologized on social media, saying “my behavior on that video is inexcusable.” His lawyers have acknowledged that he has a pattern of violence, but they have argued that he is not a racketeer or sex trafficker.
At least two of the criminal allegations that are part of the racketeering charge — bribery and obstruction of justice — relate to the aftermath of the hotel assault.
Mr. Combs’s lawyers have not disputed that their client paid hotel security to make the assault footage “go away,” but they have argued that it was to prevent “bad publicity” for both Mr. Combs and Ms. Ventura, not to obstruct any law enforcement investigation into the beating.
“No law enforcement investigation existed, period,” said Teny Geragos, one of Mr. Combs’s lawyers, at the start of the trial.
During her four days on the stand, Ms. Ventura testified that she had recently arrived at a settlement agreement with InterContinental worth about $10 million.
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A former top executive took the stand.
Derek Ferguson, who was the chief financial officer of Bad Boy Entertainment, Mr. Combs’s company, also testified on Tuesday, explaining the structure of the music mogul’s businesses, executives and various bank accounts. He is the highest ranking executive of Mr. Combs’s businesses to testify so far.
As part of the racketeering conspiracy charge, the government has argued that Mr. Combs used resources from his companies to “feed his every desire,” including sexually exploiting women. While Mr. Ferguson was on the stand, the government highlighted bank records that showed transfers of business funds into an account associated with one of Mr. Combs’s personal properties.
The defense has countered throughout the trial that Mr. Combs’s businesses were entirely lawful and separate from his “private, personal sex life.”
On cross-examination, lawyers for Mr. Combs sought to highlight the corporate oversight over his businesses, showing organizational charts from his companies and underscoring Mr. Ferguson’s education at Harvard Business School.
Responding to a series of questions from the defense seeking to undercut the racketeering charge, Mr. Ferguson testified that during his nearly 20 years as an executive at Mr. Combs’s companies, he never saw anyone help Mr. Combs commit crimes.
“Did you see anyone enhance Mr. Combs’s reputation or the reputation of any business through emotional, physical or sexual abuse?”
“I did not,” Mr. Ferguson replied.
Asked whether he thinks “highly” of Mr. Combs, Mr. Ferguson paused for several seconds.
“I don’t know how to respond to that,” he said.
Anusha Bayya and Ben Sisario contributed reporting.
Julia Jacobs is an arts and culture reporter who often covers legal issues for The Times.
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What Goes Around Comes Around:
A successful guide that uses anecdotes to reveal powerful truths about life.
The stable, positive, non-preachy and objective voice makes the book stand apart from others in the genre.
~ Kirkus Reviews
“I’ve read a number of books that focus on sharing a similar message, including “The Secret” by Rhonda Byrne, “The Answer” by John Assaraf & Murray Smith, “The Celestine Prophecy” by James Redfield, “Think and Grow Rich,” by Napoleon Hill, and I must say that I find Rob’s to be my favorite.” – Sheryl Woodhouse, founder of Livelihood Matters LLC
A $100,000 Payment for Assault Footage
A $100,000 Payment for Assault Footage
U.S. Coast Guard Academy, in New London, Connecticut between 1988 and 2006, including the revelation of leaders who discouraged disclosure. Those cases do not include at least 42 more that have been identified as not having been properly investigated. That is not to mention new Pentagon published statistics showing student-reported assaults at West Point, the Naval Academy and the Air Force Academy.
So after all the accusations and denials, the truth is finally revealed about Bill Cosby’s lifetime of raping young women, who were unfortunate enough to cross his path. The answer as to how he got away with it for so long, lies in his skill of slipping a Methaquolone pill, otherwise known as a Quaalude, into a drink he would give them. It would render them helpless to escape his subsequent sexual assault. Of course, he had also built a persona of America’s Grandpa, that was the ultimate deception.I first heard about quaaludes (‘ludes) in college in the 60’s. Apparently, he did as well! The word was that if you could slip one into a girl’s drink, she would be more compliant than otherwise. The records show that Cosby had multiple prescriptions filled at least throughout the 70’s, then apparently, subsequently found other sources. It became his “MO” and many women his victim. But that game is over now, most likely for the duration of his life! As with most abusers, Cosby felt he had a way to evade the light from shining on what he was up to. He thought he was safe and would never get caught, but If accused, he could claim it was consensual. It is what all abusers think, regardless of the form that abuse takes, and sometimes it can work for a long while. But when the light finally does shine and reveals the truth, the rule is that the longer the perpetrator got away with their nasty deceptions, the deeper the hole they will have dug for themselves. Epstein escaped via suicide. I think they’ll be keeping a close eye on Bill!