Scott Mescudi, the rapper and actor also known as Kid Cudi, took the stand as a witness during Sean “Diddy” Combs’ sex trafficking trial on Thursday, recounting his relationship with Casandra “Cassie” Ventura and Combs’ alleged acts of retaliation.
Mescudi appeared in the New York courthouse dressed in jeans, a leather jacket and a white T-shirt. Prosecutors began by asking him about his relationship with Ventura. “We were friends and dated briefly,” he responded, noting that his understanding at the time was that “she and Sean Combs had some problems and they weren’t dating” when they began seeing each other in 2011.
That December, Ventura called Mescudi and told him that Combs had found out about their relationship. She sounded “stressed, nervous and scared,” and Cudi went to pick her up. “I didn’t think she was still dealing with him,” he said. Ventura had told him that Combs was “abusive,” and that “she didn’t know what [he] would do.”
Mescudi picked her up and drove her to the Sunset Marquis in West Hollywood, where he and Ventura received a call from Combs’ employee Capricorn Clark, who Mescudi said was “scared” and “on the verge of tears.” Clark told them that Combs was at Mescudi’s home in the Hollywood Hills, so Mescudi drove home. On the way there, he called Combs, recalling that he asked him, “Motherfucker, are you in my house?” Combs responded, “I just want to talk to you.”
When Mescudi arrived, no one was home, but he could tell there had been a break-in. The Chanel gifts that he had bought for his family for Christmas had been opened, and his dog was locked in the bathroom, which was unusual since he usually let the dog roam around the house. The dog was “very jittery, on edge all the time” when he let him out. Mescudi got back into his car and called Combs again. “I wanted to confront him, I wanted to fight him,” Mescudi said.
After giving it some thought, Mescudi called the police because he didn’t know what Combs’ “intentions” were. He spoke to the cops and made a report about the break-in.
Later in December, Mescudi spent the holidays with Ventura’s family in Connecticut. Combs had texted him around this time, and suggested that he wanted to speak with him. Mescudi said he responded, “You broke into my house, you messed with my dog, I don’t want to talk with you.” Mescudi’s relationship with Ventura ended after the holidays, as “the drama was just getting out of hand,” according to Mescudi.
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One day in January 2012, Mescudi was in Los Angeles when he received a call from his dog sitter, who was at his home at 6:30 in the morning. The sitter told him that his car was on fire, and Mescudi returned home to see the damage. Photos of the car were shown in court, with smoke damage to the doors and a hole cut in the roof of his convertible. A Molotov cocktail was found near the car. Though there was no clear connection between Combs and the incident, it has been speculated on the witness stand that Combs orchestrated the explosion. (Earlier in the trial, prosecutors displayed a December 2011 email from Ventura in which she wrote Combs “said that he will be having someone hurt me and [Mescudi] physically. He made a point that it wouldn’t be by his hand, he actually said he’d be out of the country when it happened.”)
The day after Mescudi’s car was set on fire, he met with Combs and Ventura at the Soho House in L.A. Mescudi described Combs’ demeanor as “calm,” which was “off-putting.” At the end of the meeting, as Combs and Mescudi shook hands, Mescudi asked, “So what are we going to do about my car?,” to which Combs responded, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Asked how he interpreted Combs’ words, Mescudi said, “He was lying.”
The next time Mescudi saw Combs was a few years later, when they bumped into each other at the very same Soho House. Combs approached Mescudi and said, “I just wanted to apologize for all the bullshit,” Mescudi remembers. He said the general apology was “the last thing I was expecting” from Combs, and he “made peace” with the situation.
Questioned about why he and Ventura ended their relationship despite having feelings for each other, Mescudi told the court they broke up “for my safety, for her safety.” Asked to elaborate on his safety concerns, Mescudi said, “I knew Sean Combs was violent.” During his cross-examination, Mescudi said he did not personally witness Combs abuse Ventura, nor did Combs ever threaten him directly.
Mescudi is not the only celebrity suitor to be mentioned in Combs’ trial. During her testimony, Ventura mentioned a brief fling with “Sinners” star Michael B. Jordan in 2016. Ventura’s then-best friend Kerry Morgan testified that Ventura and Jordan “hung out together” and Combs “was jealous of it.”
From Variety US