Sharay Hayes, an exotic male dancer known as "The Punisher," is testifying for the prosecution in the Diddy trial ... telling the jury about the first encounter he had with Diddy and Cassie ... saying the couple hired him to create a sexy erotic scene for them.
00:00So, every big trial seems to have a character that just pops out.
00:07In O.J. Simpson, it was Kato Kaelin.
00:10In Diddy, it's the Punisher.
00:14This is just almost hysterical.
00:18Yes.
00:19And I can say hysterical because I'm not sure how he connects to any crime,
00:25but it's one of the most entertaining.
00:27You're not sure how he connects to any crime?
00:29Correct.
00:30Correct.
00:31And we'll get into it.
00:32We'll get into it.
00:33The guy, his name is The Punisher.
00:34We first heard about him when Cassie was on the stand,
00:37and she referred to one of the alleged sex workers that they had freak-offs with as The Punisher.
00:44Okay, so let's get into it.
00:45And so he took the stand today.
00:46Yeah, he took the stand.
00:47As an alleged sex worker, and you don't figure out how he fits into this case?
00:52The problem, Charles, is that there has to be—I don't want to bog down in it.
00:59We'll get to it.
01:00Where is the interstate transportation?
01:02He's from Harlem, and he did it.
01:03Right.
01:04Everything he did that he testified to is in New York.
01:07And all of his parties that were all in New York.
01:10Essex House, Trump International Hotel, and that's what I saw.
01:14Now, maybe there's more, but that's what I saw.
01:16The Punisher meets Diddy and Cassie after Cassie says that,
01:22I'm having a birthday party for my husband, and we'd love for you to come and be an exotic dancer.
01:29And so the Punisher shows up at the Trump International Hotel in New York City,
01:34and there are candles lit in the living room.
01:37And he walks in.
01:38What a romantic setting.
01:39And Cassie says to him, well, look, you know, my husband kind of wants to watch
01:47as you do some kind of an exotic dance, and why don't you go into the bathroom
01:53and maybe change into bathrobe or your underwear or whatever?
01:57Slip into something more comfortable?
01:58Well, he slips into nothing because he comes out naked.
02:01And then Cassie suggests that maybe they could even get more intimate as Diddy watches all of this
02:09as she is lathered in baby oil, and they have sex, and Cassie pays him.
02:15Initially, it was supposed to be $800, and then I believe she gives him another $1,200 on his way out the door.
02:22However, this was repeated over a period of time, but it's just, like, unbelievable some of the color of this witness.
02:34I'm telling you, he's written a book, and part of the book chronicles some of this, except he used aliases.
02:43Do you know what the name of the book is?
02:44I do.
02:45Why don't you mention it to our friends here?
02:48Wonderful people.
02:48Yes, the title of the book is Freezer Meat, and they said, why freezer meat?
02:55And he said, well, that's as hard as it gets, essentially.
03:00So, anyway.
03:02Harvey, what's interesting to me about this guy is how does this relate to the case that they're trying to prove against Diddy?
03:07It does seem like it was a very wild sex party.
03:11That's my question, Derek.
03:12No, it's a good question with this witness because there's one instance where he says he saw Diddy giving Cassie
03:18some subtle directions about lighting, adjustments, so I thought maybe this is a witness who saw coercion,
03:23who saw him actually sort of force Cassie into things, but that's not the nature of this testimony.
03:27It sounds like he was hired for some sort of sexual escapade.
03:31They did it, and everything was consensual, so I'm not sure where this gets them.
03:35And, Derek, everything I saw was that it all happened in New York.
03:38At least that's what I looked at.
03:40And if it happened in just New York, it's not interstate transportation.
03:45So I don't see where any crime is in this one, at least based on what he testified to.
03:50It is an odd.
03:51This is just painting a picture.
03:53This is truly just freak-shaming someone because all of his testimony seems to be of a party that maybe some people can't relate to.
03:59They don't have sex parties with the Punisher, but it doesn't seem illegal, any of this stuff.
04:03So it raises the bigger issue that I talked about yesterday, which is if the jury feels they are reaching so hard to dirty him up, it might backfire.
04:16I could see that.
04:17It could.
04:17I mean, I think they have a lot of dirty stuff.
04:19I mean, Cassie's mom testifying and so forth.
04:21They've got other testimony that they're going to really bolster this RICO claim that he was running a criminal operation.
04:26I just don't know that the Punisher did anything than entertain the jury a little bit.
04:30We're going to get to Cassie's mom in just a moment, but there were yesterday they displayed.
04:36The whole big thing with this is the freak-offs, right?
04:38So they wanted to introduce the freak-offs to the public, and they did it through the Punisher.
04:43But they've already done it, though.
04:45You know that one of the things that really got a lot of attention yesterday, and by the way, on our website is still getting a lot of attention,
04:53are these photos of the sex workers that they hired for the freak-offs.
04:57All their names and faces were displayed in court, and so now everyone got a look at these guys.
05:07And there's a TV show.
05:08And people quickly noticed that, at least that we've figured so far, two of the guys were on a TV show called Gigolos.
05:17Two of these guys, Ash, and on the show his name was Vin, though they displayed him in court as Jules.
05:26And we heard Cassie talk about Jules.
05:28Both of these guys were on that show and have very interesting stories in and of themselves.
05:34We actually did a story about Ash.
05:36Right.
05:36Years ago, he is in prison right now because he was, at the time, working as like a healer or massage therapist,
05:47but he had gone to a client's house in Vegas, and they took mushrooms together.
05:52He admitted all this to the police, and then he literally beat her to death, punched her,
05:58and she ended up dying from the blunt force trauma of his blows.
06:03And so now he's doing time.
06:04He's in prison.
06:05But he was a guy that Cassie says they frequently hooked up with.
06:10And again, this is a very specific case about specific charges.
06:15And it's true that closing arguments is when prosecutors try to tie everything together.
06:22But if the jury is asking the question, at least that I'm asking, which is, okay, and they're watching it that way,
06:32and they start thinking, why are they reaching for this?
06:36Do you run a risk of losing the jury?
06:38Yes.
06:38What if the prosecutors do actually, like you say, close the loop, and they come back to it, I don't know, two, three, four weeks from now?
06:45They may have lost him by then.
06:46Right.
06:47Like the jurors.
06:48They already have a thing.
06:49They've already formed the thought that, first of all, it's all over the place.
06:53And secondly, I'm hearing about things that don't align with what he's charged with.
07:00And if, I mean, because I don't get the punisher.
07:02I don't understand the point of it.
07:04And, you know, if there was a real point, you would have thought the prosecutor would have brought it up during opening statements to say,
07:12and we're going to call this guy called the punisher because, so at least the jury knows why.
07:17Right.
07:17But I don't know about you, I'm confused.
07:19No, the punisher is an absolutely confusing witness as far as what he testified to.
07:25Who is not confusing to me, though?
07:27Is the mom.
07:27The mom.
07:29Cassie's mom.
07:29Regina Ventura was on the stand and testified about a transaction that went down between herself, her husband, and Diddy.
07:39A $20,000 transaction that she says this was money that Diddy demanded from her.
07:45In her words, he wanted to recoup money he was losing because at the time Cassie was then dating Kid Cudi.
07:52So Cassie sent her mom an email saying that Diddy had threatened to release some of the freak-off tapes, sex tapes.
08:03She wasn't specific in the email, but on the heels of that email, she and Cassie and her mom had a discussion where the $20,000 came up.
08:14So I think the idea here is they're trying to say, give me the $20,000 or else I will release the sex tape.
08:23So I think they're doing this for the purpose of racketeering, and that would seem to be the point of all of this.
08:28You've got to imagine how damaging, by the way, she said that they had to take out a loan to pay him the $20,000.
08:34A mortgage.
08:35Diddy doesn't need $20,000.
08:37Diddy return the money.
08:38Diddy got the money and then he returned the money.
08:40So it was really just kind of a flex.
08:43Did he return it when he and Cassie got back together?
08:46They were unclear on that.
08:47Unclear on that.
08:47Wouldn't you be nervous if he returned the money that he had some consciousness that this looked like an extortion attempt and he wanted to pull the reins back a little bit?
08:54Well, if it's true, it is an extortion attempt.
08:56I mean, if it's true, it is extortion.
08:57Right, that's the problem.
08:58He's sort of acknowledging that he was making an extortion attempt and then pulls it back.
09:01That's great for the prosecution.
09:03That would be great for the prosecution in terms of proving extortion.
09:06Now, the question, is it racketeering?
09:09And I think the defense's argument, and again, I'm just telling you what I think the argument is, not whether I embrace it or not.
09:15But the defense's argument is, yeah, it was extortion because he was pissed off that she's dating Kid Cudi.
09:21It doesn't make him an organized criminal.
09:24And, you know, they can make that argument.
09:26These are the means of the criminal enterprise he was running, extortion, threats, other types of coercion.
09:32And they're painting a picture that he ran this vast criminal enterprise with many entanglement and used these means.
09:38But this vast criminal enterprise, he's putting ecstasy in a Louis Vuitton bag, Derek.
09:41I mean, come on.
09:41That's the only thing you keep pointing to.
09:43I mean, but that's what they're bringing up in court.
09:46He threatened his assistant, David James, to testify and said that he literally looked at a video of him, David James, partying at one of his parties while he was on ecstasy.
09:55And said, I could release this thing.
09:56He said, hey, I'm just going to hold on to this in case I need it at some point.
09:59I get it.
10:00I get it.
10:01I'm just saying, look, everything they're painting, he is a terrible guy.
10:06Right.
10:06But this has to, racketeering typically is not used for these things.
10:12You have individual crimes of extortion, threats, and whatnot.
10:17But to create a criminal organization with one guy is very unusual.
10:24In the same way that they could lose.
10:26Get you there a little bit more.
10:28What was that, Derek?
10:28We've seen Suge's at Mel's.
10:29What was that?
10:30We missed the top of what you said.
10:31What about, hey, personal assistant, let's grab some guns and go confront Suge Knight, my arch nemesis in rap, and let's go threaten him.
10:39Is that starting to get closer to a kind of criminal enterprise you could get on board with?
10:42They didn't say, let's threaten him.
10:44He just said he brought some guns.
10:46Okay, but he still had to drive them down there with armed guys to go meet Suge Knight.
10:50I get it.
10:50But he never said, okay, I'm going to go shoot Suge Knight.
10:53He never said that.
10:54The only thing I would say.
10:55By the way, by the way.
10:56We are all reacting to this as jurors might, right?
10:59Because the juror, and you're right, at some point, are they asking the jury to make a slight leap?
11:05Yes, but will the jury make that leap, especially if they just hate everything about Diddy?
11:10Okay, so I have one final question for you.
11:14Do you think I have any good points in what I'm saying?
11:18Yes, and I've said so.
11:19When you have made those good points, I have said so.
11:21And I think you have good points, too, but you've never said so.
11:24I'm saying it, and my point being, that's what you call a hung jury.
11:29That might be your best point.
11:33Hey, my name is Nick from Knoxville.
11:34I think your guys' points are absolutely correct of, like, bringing the Punisher up there.
11:38If he's guilty of all these giant crimes, it seems like they don't have a lot of proof.
11:42It seems like they're saying, look at all these weird things he did.
11:44So it shouldn't be that shocking if he would do these other things, right?
11:47Just like you said, it's losing me if I was a juror.
11:49It feels like they're just throwing stuff at the wall and seeing what sticks at this point.
