Capricorn Clark, a longtime employee of Sean “Diddy” Combs, testified at his sex trafficking trial and accused him of kidnapping her with a gun and bringing her to the home of singer Scott Mescudi, aka Kid Cudi.
In 2011, Clark was Combs’ global brand director, and she was close friends with his then-girlfriend Casandra “Cassie” Ventura. When Ventura began dating Mescudi, Clark helped Ventura buy a burner phone to keep her relationship with Mescudi a secret from Combs. Still, Combs discovered the relationship and appeared at Clark’s home in Los Angeles around 5:30 a.m. one morning in December.
“He was pacing,” Clark said, “He was furious.” She described Combs as wearing a white button-down shirt and business slacks that were split open at the crotch. He was holding a gun.
Clark let Combs into her apartment, and he asked, “Who is Scott?,” to which Clark said, “I don’t know a Scott.” Combs said, “Kid Cudi,” and Clark responded, “Oh, Cassie’s friend.” Then, Clark testified, Combs said, “Get dressed, we’re going to go kill this n—-.” Asked whom Combs was referring to, Clark said, “Kid Cudi.”
Clark said she told Combs she didn’t want to go, but he was “livid” and had a gun tucked in his waistband. He told her to exit the apartment and get in the car, where one of his security guards, known as Rubin, sat in the driver’s seat.
Rubin drove Combs and Clark to Mescudi’s house in the Hollywood Hills, and the two men allegedly entered the home. (Mescudi testified on Thursday that his house was broken into in December 2011, and that someone had unwrapped Christmas presents he bought for his family, and put his dog behind a closed door.) As Combs and Rubin were in Mescudi’s house, Clark called Ventura on her burner phone and told her that Combs had brought her to Mescudi’s house with a gun to kill him.
Ventura was with Mescudi at the time, and Clark overheard him say, “He’s in my house?” Clark then told Ventura to stop Mescudi from heading home because “he’s going to get himself killed.” Still, Mescudi drove home.
According to Clark, Mescudi pulled his car up next to Combs’ black Escalade and then zoomed away, and Combs drove after him. (During his testimony, Mescudi said when he arrived at his house, no one was there.) Clark said they lost Mescudi in the chase, and they regrouped at a nightclub on Sunset Boulevard, where Combs called Ventura. Combs allegedly demanded that Clark and Ventura convince Mescudi not to name him in a police report, saying, “If you don’t convince him of that, I’ll kill all you motherfuckers.”
Later that day, Clark and Ventura went to Combs’ house, and upon their arrival, Combs “immediately” began kicking Ventura with “full force,” Clark testified. She said Ventura dropped to the floor and assumed a fetal position as Combs “repeatedly kicked her” in her legs and back. “She was crying silently,” Clark said, so she began calling Combs’ security guards to tell Combs to stop.
Asked if she intervened to stop the alleged abuse, Clark said no. “[Combs] said if I jumped in he was going to fuck me up too,” she said. “My heart was breaking seeing her get hit like that.”
Clark then said she called Ventura’s mother, Regina, and said, “He’s beating the shit out of your daughter … please help her … I can’t call the police but you can.” Asked if she ever called the police, Clark removed her glasses and wiped away tears with a tissue. “I did not,” Clark said in a shaky voice, crying.
Mescudi also testified about a January 2012 incident in which his car was set on fire via a Molotov cocktail. He speculated that Combs orchestrated the explosion, but there is no sufficient evidence to prove it. Clark said she was contacted by arson investigators in the summer of 2012 to provide a statement about the incident, but she did not know anything about it.
Clark said she reported the kidnapping, the threats and the alleged physical abuse she witnessed to then-president of Bad Boy Records Harve Pierre, who brushed it off. She was terminated five months later for not getting her vacation time authorized properly.
Throughout her time working for Combs — first as a personal assistant, then as a marketing exec and eventually as the creative director for Ventura — Clark said he “often” threatened her. Once, she said, Combs told her “I should kill you.” Later, when she was terminated in August 2012, Combs said “he would make me kill myself,” Clark said.
Once, in Miami, Clark said Combs “charged” her after she said “I hate it here.” “He ran toward me with his hands open and pushed me,” Clark said. She remembered Combs saying, “You hate it here? Get the fuck out of my house.”
Clark was fired multiple times, and went back to work for Combs every few years from 2004 to 2018. In October 2012, she reached a settlement with Combs over wrongful termination. She said she returned to work for him after that because she had trouble holding onto other jobs, and when she was terminated by Combs, she lost her car, house, health insurance and other benefits provided by the company.
Clark also detailed an alleged incident during her time as Combs’ personal assistant, from 2004 to 2006. She was instructed to carry three pieces of rented jewelry for Combs on a trip to Miami, when she suddenly realized it had gone missing. Combs sent Clark and one of his security guards back to his office in New York, where Clark was met with a “heavy-set” man who was “the size of two linebackers.” He was chain smoking cigarettes and drinking black coffee, and he was to administer a lie detector test for Clark. “If you fail this test, they’re going to throw you in the East River,” she recalled the man telling her.
The lie detector test lasted five days, with a security guard driving Clark home every night and picking her up every morning. When the test spat out inconclusive results, the man told Clark to “calm down,” but she was “petrified.” She did not report the incident to the police because “I was just trying to survive.”
Combs is on trial for charges of sex trafficking and racketeering. If convicted, he could spend the rest of his life in prison.
