In a Manhattan courtroom thick with contradiction and celebrity shadows, a woman known only as Jane took the stand—shielded by anonymity, but not from the weight of her truth. She said Sean “Diddy” Combs, the man once at the center of her affection, had abused her. Kicked her. Punched her. Dragged her. Ordered her into sex acts she says she didn’t want. And yet, with all of that on record, she still whispered: “I love him.”
“He was my baby,” Jane said softly, facing a phalanx of lawyers and a sea of courtroom sketches.
Combs, 55, music mogul and architect of the ‘90s hip-hop empire Bad Boy Records, sat at the defense table, accused of sex trafficking and coercion. Prosecutors allege he used power, intimidation, and financial threats to manipulate women into performing for him—sometimes in front of others—during what were privately dubbed “hotel nights.”
Jane’s testimony cut to the core of the trial: consent versus coercion. The defense, led by Teny Geragos, tried to paint her as a willing participant in a series of voyeuristic encounters. The prosecution argues otherwise, saying her “choice” was never really a choice at all.
Jane recalled being told to sleep with other men while Combs watched. She said these nights often followed drug use, and while early on she tried to please him—once even agreeing to bring in a male escort—her protests later fell on deaf ears. When she tried to stop, she said, he warned her that her rent money would vanish if she didn’t comply.
And the violence, she claimed, was not metaphorical. Jane told the court that in June of last year, inside her Los Angeles home, Combs lashed out physically—beating her, dragging her. Hours later, she said, he pressured her into performing oral sex on a male entertainer. She didn’t want to. She did it anyway.
In an effort to understand him, she said she researched terms like “cuck” and “cuckold”—words linked to men aroused by watching their partners with others. She wanted to decode his cravings. “I just wanted to know why my partner wanted so many of these nights and what was driving him,” she explained.
Combs, who once turned artists like The Notorious B.I.G. and Usher into household names, now faces the potential of life in prison if convicted. Testimony is expected to continue through the week.
The stage is no longer a concert arena. The lights are harsh, the audience somber. And somewhere beneath it all, a woman says she still holds love for the man she says broke her.
