After male escort Daniel Phillip told the jury Monday that he saw “Sean Combs hit Cassie,” a defense attorney today questioned whether he embellished the account to make Combs seem more callous.
Phillip testified that after a sexual encounter at Ventura’s residence, Combs threw a bottle toward her and “grabbed her by her hair and dragged her by her hair into the bedroom” after she did not immediately get up from a computer to go into the bedroom as he instructed. Phillip said Combs emerged from the bedroom a while later to ask Phillip, “Are you guys ready to continue?”
On cross-examination today, defense attorney Xavier Donaldson questioned whether Combs said something else.
“Isn’t it true he said, ‘You got to get out of here?’” Donaldson asked.
“I don’t recall that,” Phillip responded.
“’Yo man, I’m going to have to deal with this you need to get the f— out?’” Donaldson quoted Combs as saying.
When Phillip responded that was not what Combs said, Donaldson confronted him with a December 2023 law enforcement report from an interview agents conducted with Phillip.
“Mr. Combs told you ‘Yo man, get the f— out,’” Donaldson insisted.
“I do not recall that,” Phillip replied. “I do not remember saying that.”
On re-direct examination by the prosecution, Phillip sought to clarify his statement.
“I recall him coming out of the room and trying to get us to have sex again,” Phillip said. “I just recall him asking us if we’re ready to go.”
“And what did you understand that to mean?” prosecutor Maureen Comey asked.
“If we’re ready to have sex again,” Phillip answered.
“I was completely shocked and messed up in my head,” Phillips said, at which point, he said, Combs told him to leave.
“Is Sean Combs the same man who threw a liquor bottle across the room when Ms. Ventura told him to wait a minute?” Comey asked.
“Yes,” Phillip responded.
