Behind The Trial: Reflections on the Diddy Trial and Media Evolution

I'm a homegrowl that knows a little bit about everything.

And everybody, you know, if you don't lie about that.

Right, Hey, y'all, what's up. It's Laura de Rosa and this is the Latest with Laura de Rosa. This is your daily dig on all things pop culture, entertainment, news and all of the conversations that shake the room.

Baby.

Now we are getting into and I'm so happy we've been doing this so much lately on the podcast. We're getting into another conversation that is gonna shake the room. Uh, And it's about conversations that shook the room. So I was, you know, honored to be invited. Shout out to Jureka Duncan from CBS News. Uh, I was honored to be invited by her and her Association of Black Journalists New York team to speak on a panel about the experience

It, but also it was such a hustle.

I mean every day from you know, early four am, five am mornings with the breakfast club, going right to court, finishing my day six seven pm, and getting back up and doing it again, to the point where I was like cleetwalking, and you guys will know, we were doubling up on content.

And I was very honest about you guys.

I was very honest with you guys about just how I was feeling, how I was handling it, and everything I was seeing in the courtroom.

And it stuck.

So I was joined by some amazing journalists, you know the outlets in the room. Shout out to Picks eleven, which is a local New York traditional news station. There was you know, ABC was in the room. You also had let me actually get their names so I can make sure giving these beautiful journal journalists their credit. So on the panel you had Armind Wiggins shout out to Arma Yaa. I love Armand who is a YouTube content creator. Celia Bussy who is a senior field producer with TMZ.

I worked with her there for some time.

Darla Miles who was a reporter for ABC seven, Jay Dow who is a reporter for Pixe eleven, and then Jureka Duncan, who was the moderator of the conversation who I mentioned in the beginning of this from CBS News, and I was there on behalf of the Breakfast Club and the Latest with Lona Rosa, and we got into some conversations. They weren't the easiest because covering the Diddy trial and all the things we learned weren't but we had it. Let's get into it.

Hello, everybody, thank you so much for coming. I'm like, oh, you look so familiar. I know who you are. I really appreciate you all taking the time to come together to hear some of what we had to say and experience while covering the Diddy trial. Welcome officially to behind the scenes, behind the headlines covering the p Diddy trial

Hi, it's Selia Simone.

I'm here with Arma Legasp I'm j Dal This is the latest with Lona Rosa.

Well that you have been in every single day.

Frega, how wout you describe Passi's demeanor which you took the stands today.

Welcome to the Dissecting Vinny podcast.

Everybody's talking about jury.

I don't believe that when you're telling you right now, it's true that I do believe one day, Willie, And if it is a.

Thank you love, what do you make of the government strength in this case compared to when you represented him twenty six years ago.

And just stepped out of the courtroom? And tensions were extremely high on day fourteen of the Ditty trial, prosecutors accusing Ditty's attorney Ryan Steele of yelling at and humiliating Ditty's formal assistant Niya, who's on the stands today.

Mia had a heartbreaking testimony in which she spoke about being suchly assaulted by did He.

She mentioned seeing tons of abuse.

Could you imagine somebody telling you, do you know what your problem is? Could you went away for a view the video.

Jurra Island for a hour.

And I joked with you a couple of days ago about you know, footsopb the next.

Generation of news gatherers who offer their own opinion.

I'm not on either side. Let me just start there. I'm not on either side.

Did He is facing life in prison and convicted. So let's break down what he's actually charged with. There are five counts total in the indictment, rocketeering conspiracy, rico, two counts of sex trafficking, and two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution. Okay, let's start with Rigo. It was a lot that was passed in nineteen seventy so that the gun making takedown the mob. So he was found not guilty of the racketeering charge. He was found not

So the first verdict Todd racketearing conspiracy, not guilty. You saw him do this, pop and so top it all off.

This week President Nowald Trump was teasing and alluding to possibly.

Part of thing.

Sean Combs, Sewan Buffy Combs, SHAWNA did it comes there's a prostitution for Casy Ventura guilty.

He was shocked.

He was visibly affected when that one came. You could tell he.

Was not a brain for that to come like a kinetic, like a real serious shock because I think you know, once you start hearing the work, heinditive, not guilty.

Bird, it's there.

Maybe have been an assumption that there was going to continue to be a not guilty verdict.

This was the most important day of this case. His sentence is fifty months of incarceration at NIFFOLO, which is the lead of turning for Combs asking for more time to list the recommendations, also supervised release five years. No reaction from Colnes. He is still sitting and there's a five hundred thousand dollars fine.

Sean Combs dropped a different and just bowed his head and just pray.

This is probably the first trial where I've seen so much social media presence, TikTok, Instagram, bloggers, people out here. So even though you're not supposed to look at your phone and you're not supposed to read messages from familin friends about this case, there's a lot of information out there.

Man.

Thank you and thank you to Ron Thompson who put that lovely video together. So before we get started on the questions that I have, and we're going to open it up to Q and A, I want everybody to just take thirty seconds to introduce themselves, who they are and why they're here. Thirty seconds, Lauren, you can start us off.

Hey, everybody, I'm Lauren le Rosa.

I am the senior news producer at The Breakfast Club and I am the host and a creator of the Latest with Lona Roads, of the podcast on the Black Effect Network via iHeart.

And I'm here because I was. I was there. We were in the courthouse and covering the trial.

I was covering it for the radio show The Breakfast Club that I worked for, and then it spilled over into the podcast, and then it took its own life on social media, and it's just been such a conversation because it was such a big deal in pop culture and you know, in conversation.

So thank you for having me.

My name is Jay Dawe.

I'm a correspondent with wpix pix eleven News and the host of Community Close Up with Jay dow And I was in the trenches with these amazing journalists. I'm not going to break it down and call them content creators because we were all there in the courtroom with pads in our laps, pens or pencils taking notes that are re court. You can't bring in cameras, And it was an amazing experience, an eye opening experience for me.

I mean, this is my twenty sixty.

Year reporting in New York City, and this is the first time that I saw our business come full circle, the evolution. I felt like this was the transition where you had, you know, one hundred years ago radio stars and silent movie stars looking to the future.

And I saw folks.

Like Lauren, like armand sitting there doing what they do, delivering the same material to their own audiences, and I was I was so impressed. So I'm honored to be here and it's great to be a part of this.

Good evening everyone. I'm Darla Miles, a correspondent with ABC seven New York. I have been on the streets of New York City for sixteen years. I have been in this industry for thirty years. Benjamin Button, Yes, and you know I've I cover crime. I cover a lot of high profile crime. I produced a documentary set the record straight, the cold case murder of cham Master Jay. And I don't do celebrity news or sports news, but whenever they get arrested, you will see me in court. I just

Hello.

I am Celia Simone. I am a senior fild producer at TMZ Hence Field so for the Diddy Child, I was almost exclusively in the field covering the case. I really was honored to cover the case because, like Jureka said, I grew up listening to Ditty's music and I was always, you know, to be honest, a fan. So this was a different way of seeing someone I looked up to my whole life, a different way to kind of view them.

No one could see my face, just in my voice, and it was great. Loved it.

I do always recognize your voice, lie Hi. I'm Monico sar Abdi. I am a senior correspondent for Extra TV and weekend co host, and I was covering this obviously because I am an entertainment journalism, so a journalist, so I was looking through an entertainment lens. But I'm also a seasoned journalist who was at network news. I was at ABC before Extra came up through local news. So for me, hard news meets entertainment news is my bread and butter.

This is where I excel to bring kind of just the background.

Like Darla said, I covered wins Epstein, Luigi Mangioni so many cases, Jonathan Major's as well, and to look at entertainment news through a hard NewsLens.

It's not very often that they mix, even though more so now.

But taking that and also I have a large following online and bringing it to the audience was a very interesting experience because we've talked about in this case, this was the first time that we saw a lot of creators and a lot of conversation happening online. So there's no blueprint for covering it, both for legacy media channel and also for an online platform, and so it was interesting to see how audiences received it.

It was interesting to see what people were interested in.

I will say that this case, I believe a lot of legacy media outlets thought they were going to cover it for the first week and that was it. And then they saw the interest online and they saw the numbers, and they saw the young people were interested, old people were interested everyone because of the impact that did He had in entertainment and how he, you know, transhid in generations and so it was interesting to see them kind of course correct and really try to follow this case.

Turn it up. Turn you into a very large screen here, arman, we can all see you.

Hey, yeah, it's my turn. Yeah.

So hey guys, my name is Armand Wiggins. I am a YouTuber content creator.

Yeah.

I had a great time covering the trial. I've covered cases before. I've covered the Megan and Tory case, so I like a lot of like hip hop culture news and cases. So the did He trial just fell right

Thank you, Thank you to all of you guys again for being here. My name is Jureka Duncan. I'm a CBS News national correspondent and I have to say this particular case for me was the first time that I really leaned into social media my following group by almost twenty thousand and followers, because I was posting every single day about the nuances of this case at a time when our network actually did not cover it the first day, we covered it, the last day on evening news. We

Well for me?

When I went into the trial, I went into it this is crazy, Like, of all the places in the ways that I've seen Diddy, to be with him in court is like I couldn't even fathom.

What seeing him in court would be like.

And you know, all of that because I've been working in entertainment for some time and I was living in LA for eight years. I was working at TMC with Salia, so like you know, I've been in interaction and things like that. I just remember the first day being at courtroom and seeing him walk out. I was like, oh wow, like he man, Nothing's ever going to be the same for him. So for me, it was kind of like

I was fortunate enough, and that's what I'm gonna call it to be reporting. When Diddy was on trial the first time, I was working at New York one and I was what twenty five, I twenty six years old, and I remember that case, and at the start of this trial, I knew things were going to be different

But we had to figure it out.

We have to figure it out because that is where everything is going. So yeah, going into this trial, I was ready for the.

Unknown and we got it.

Okay.

So a couple of things. So I was I was not on the first trial. I think I was somewhere in the South reporting, but I was, well, yeah, where is that? But I was at his first arraignment, so I caught the assignment when it was when he was arrested. I think it was September seventeenth. He was arrested the night before. Darling, you're going to be covering the the US attorney's press conference, are going to be announcing the charges.

I cover this all the time.

But there is going to be an element of chaos that I know is going to be untenable and that I know it's going to be exhaustive trying to tame it.

And you know, I'm so I wasn't annoyed.

I just you know, you just know, it's almost like cleaning out your garage, right, You're annoyed that you got to clean it out, but you know you don't have to do it, and you're going to be happy with your sense of accomplishment after the fact, So that's a way to kind of frame it. So I know it

But I think we all.

Grew for it, and I think we all I think we're here because we all gained a respect for each ingredient to this news ecosystem. So I think what we realize it's not legacy versus YouTube versus social I mean, it's like making, you know, a pie, and you have little ingredients that feed that pie. So you know, I'm never my colleague's enemy. We're all here for the greater

Can I jump in there or somebody going.

I'll be fast.

What I will say is when they when the office reached out to me, I felt excited and I felt like we gonna gie me. You know, I really wanted to that. I really wanted to get it right. But it was something you know, I had done a little bit of Luigi, I'm trying to figure out the timeframe. I had did some stuff sometimes going to the court, but I was mainly like the girl who went to all the morning shows and found talent and got.

A viral clip.

So this was really very much structured for me, and I was just thinking to myself, how am I going to do this?

Like how am I going to get up?

And I went to half earlier do what I normally get up, and like, you know, I just wanted to figure out what was expected of me and how I was going to deliver. And I think the first day it really proved to me that my job was so important. There was an intern that I never met.

She was there. I was like, what the heck.

Then there's like this other person that they bought in from another state to help us. And there were so many people that I had to work with that I had never met, and we had to figure out who was going to what. And once we figured out, you know, everyone set job on that first day, it was it was like game.

You know.

I just remember also getting to the court at about five am and there was no parking already and I'm like, okay, I'm gonna have to be here at four thirty to make sure I get a parking spot. Because the office, I realized with this case, especially the first day, they were expecting me to be superwoman, the one who.

Always figures it out.

And I was just thinking to myself, what if I dropped the ball this time? What if I because it was just so different, you know, and instead of me knowing who's going to come out that door at like say a Sherry Shepherd show, I didn't always know who was going to come out the car. And then then later on in the case, we had people like popping up special guests, and then you had witnesses who didn't

But overall, I was excited and it was mayhem.

The first day when I tell you, everybody TikTok, everybody you too, I said, what the heck? It was like fifty something social media people screaming at themselves, screaming at each other, screaming.

At you, talking to you.

It was.

It was a lot.

It was.

I was inundated with noises, and but I felt proud to be there, and I knew I wanted to really show up and show out, if that makes sense.

And died, yeah, okay, and you met me.

Yes.

So for me, I'm gonna be honest, it's a little selfish. But you know, for one, I did want to go because I had interest in the case, and I just felt like, Wow, this is huge. But then too, personally, i come from a place where I'm independent, and I've always looked for, you know, a bigger platform to back me. I've always wanted to be a part of a larger come GLND. I've always wanted to be a part of an iHeart or a major news station or a major network to push me.

But it just seems like it never happened.

And so I told myself, listen, I'm gonna stop waiting for people to give me opportunity and I'm just gonna create my own opportunity. So for me, I said, I'm not sitting around waiting for somebody to say, yeah, it's okay for you to be a journalist. Oh yeah, it's okay for you to go get the story. I said, you know, once this case happens, I'm gonna be an icon.

I'm going to be a legend.

These people are gonna respect me, and I'm gonna get out there and I'm going to create my own table and I'm gonna do a damn good job at it. So when the thing came, when the Cassie lawsuit first hit, I told myself, Hey, I'm going to cover this case. I started saving my money. In January, I took out a loan for thirty thousand dollars, booked to Airbnb and soho Manhattan. I said, I don't care who's there, what's happening.

Let me tell you something. I had got into it with a lot of people that first first. That that first okay, but you know, I was navigating a lot.

But I felt like I came out of that so much better, so much stronger. And then I've gotten some of the oppisodes, one of the greatest opportunities I've been on television shows, radio. I finally got my chest shot at radio, I got my shot on the news, and yeah, a lot of great things have came from it, and I've learned a lot and I met some great people.

So yeah, it was dope for me.

For me, I would say. So I covered the arraignment before that.

Once the lawsuit dropped, I usually break things down on my TikTok anyway, So I broke that down and I could see the interests and also the need to break down these complex legal procedures and terms and what's happening and do it in layman's terms, right, So I did that, and then I covered the arraignment, and.

What was shocking to me.

Was the transformation that did he made from the arraignment where he was in a black T shirt. He was kind of a little, you know, a little buff. He was the person that we saw full head of black hair. And then the first day when we saw him come out in a crew next sweater with a collared shirt, full head of gray hair. This was the first time I saw him in a really long time in my mind, and I'm like, this was the guy who was the king of New York right like you grew up seeing him on TV.

He was celebrated for being a shrewd business.

Man and everything, the bad behavior, the making people walk for cheesecake, all the things that he was doing and was celebrated for in the two thousands with reality show. On Reality show, I want to work for Diddy, making the band, mistreating people. He is now in this courtroom in the middle of Manhattan, and I for a while was just trying to process all of that.

And then I will say that day, I.

Think it was two days later, maybe when Cassie first testified. I again broke it down on my TikTok I think what was really difficult to try to figure out as well was the fact that you have no cell phone, no electronic devices, you have a pen and paper, but

I would go in.

Cover, sit through the trial the entire day, do my hits between lunchtime, come out, do any updates. Then I would go home and do three to four videos a day. And it went on for like eight weeks.

It was a lot. I was burned down by the end of it, but I did see the need.

To meet the audience where they're at. People are interested in this, and they're not going to always look for your report.

They're not going to always come to you.

And I think this is a valuable discussion as the industry evolves, as media changes, how can we bring people information?

How can we also adapt so that we don't go extinct because things are looking good sometimes.

So I want to ask you, guys Rapid Fire, if you could answer in like twenty seconds, and I'll ask each of you a different question. Lauren, I'll start with you, as you're reporting and telling the story, what's the number one thing you're taking into consideration.

As I was reporting and telling the story, the number one thing I was taking into consideration is that any other outlet is focused on one thing and it's always like the big thing, like they want to go for like, what is sensational? What is like you know, because there's a lot to cover. So I was like, I'm gonna tell you everything. If he's sweating, if he coughs, if he like I just wanted to be that Like, so you have the tmzs and the Rolling Stones, and you

Jay, so much was seen and heard in that trial, how were you able to process that? And I know personally, when the jurors were looking at those sex videos, there was a moment in the beginning where we could hear certain sounds, but there were graphic details of combsists and Cassie and people's sex lives, pictures of escorts. How do you process something like that, even though again, I know you've been covering colms for a while and covering the streets to New York City, but it was a lot.

It was a lot. And you know, unlike unlike Lauren, unlike Armand, you know, where they can say what they want.

I mean, I was cracking up watching some of Armand's episodes, right, I mean, hilarious, man.

But you know, we have the FCC to worry about.

So yeah, I mean, there was so much graphic material and we had to figure out a way to kind of filter it in a way that it did not lose its impact. But at the same time, we stayed within the guardrails of traditional broadcast news. We work for a network, and content creators have evolved to become their own network, and so yeah, there were some considerations that we had to make.

Carla, what did you learn most from covering this trial?

You know, one of the biggest lessons came from Salaia Me. Yes, and I will tell this story over and over again because you.

Know, like you said, it was exhausting.

Getting up early, having to log all of this information by hand.

And for me, I don't have a.

Producer, so I have multiple hits a day and I'm creating graphics and I'm like, oh, there's a BlackBerry, so let me make sure I have a graphic that has a BlackBerry, and let me make sure I can make this case that has no pictures and no video as you know, as demonstrative as I possibly can. And so I'm I really got into the details. And so the next week Seleia was like, Celia, sorry, I always get there wrong. She was like, did you go did you do a social media I was like, I'm tired, I cannot do.

I'm like, I just can't. I'm old, I'm tired.

She goes, no, this is what you have to do. So she literally walk me through how to do a TikTok in like seven minutes on the steps of the courthouse, and you know, she was like, no, this is how you record click click, and you can do the double I'm like, oh, you know, and go to cap cut and use this. And so I tell that story all the time that I literally learned how to social media from the queen next to me in this trial because and just such a healthy respect.

So yeah, that was your girl, you got it. So Celia described trial day, Oh my god, well.

Intense and intense and also just like getting a lot of demands from the office because one thing, I kind of I didn't start it. I definitely didn't start it, but I think I've done it a lot. I realized that they didn't say it, but they wanted viral.

But that makes sense.

They didn't say that, but they wanted that, and they didn't say go get something viral.

It was like, get what you can get. I'm like, okay, you know.

So it was really intense, but I think, like Lauren said, it was really important for us to get content that other people weren't going to get. And every day it was struggle to kind of be super creative and not be redundant. So specifically on trial day, one of the images that I got normally I would cover the front of the courthouse, and that one day, one of the head producers said, Celia, go to the pack. I need you to get the prosecutors and whoever else.

You can get.

And I don't know, I was just standing there and someone just walks by and he had a backpack on I'm like, he looks like the judge filmed him, and then they were like, Celia, that was the judge and that went viral and they were like.

Hey, we need more of this every day.

So it kind of I feel like I felt that pressure to repeat that every single day and to create fireroom moments every day, and I think we started to become the lead of all the people that were outside getting outside content on what was important. And it was nerve wracking because every day it was like trying to beat and top what you got that first day. And we got that like seven am in the morning, so then it was like, okay, at noon, make sure you

To Darlas point, I remember watching where you were going when there were the rumors about Kanye. I said, I'm following Celia, Selia gonna know where Kanye is at.

Oh wait, really quickly, I just did a video on that. Yeah, I just did a video on that on my Instagram and ten seconds vet every tip.

If you are a journalist, some random.

Kid that's like twenty years old, he's out there covering the case he kept me saying Kanye was gonna come. Everybody's like he's crazy. And I made a phone call and confirmed that Kanye was in New York City and the rest is history. And the next day and no one believed me, and the next day he came to the court.

I believe you, Mona. In terms of the sentencing day, if you can describe the mood, because I feel like it's tense and for me, everything that we learned was coming to ahead. In terms of people also asking predict what do you think how much time do you think is going to get? It's like, we're not attorneys, but it was the moment where you knew he could get as much as twenty or he could get you know,

Yeah, I'll start with verdict day.

I mean, it was something that inside the courtroom for Team Diddy was celebratory.

They beat the Feds, and then that messaging kind.

Of permeated through to the public where everyone was like, oh my god, he beat the Feds, he beat the cave. But that wasn't the case. Obviously, he was still found guilty on two counts. But I feel like there was this idea of you know, this was a hit for the me too movement, and you know, he's not going

Of being violent.

And then when he read his sentence of fifty months, I feel like you could see the air.

Being sucked out of ditty.

Before that, his kids we heard from them for the first time where his girls gave this powerful plea to the judge where they were saying that this is their father. They already lost their mother. And I will say I started getting emotional. These are two young three young girls who are eighteen and nineteen years old, and for the comes twins, we know that they lost their mother a kimporter, and to say that again they were going to lose

But I think he kind of fell somewhere in the middle.

I would say for me, Armand there are times I think, yes, I'm ready. There are times as journalists, as producers I would imagine as a content creator where you feel like you grew up because we don't cover these types of stories every day. Do you think this trial did that for you? And how are you a different person as a result of covering this case?

Yeah, I definitely feel like I grew up, and I feel like I have the stamina to do a lot more and I feel like, you know, the stretch that I was looking for I got.

I got.

I felt more inspired, and I realized where my superpower lies within this space and I and it makes me appreciate everybody in media because.

For me, specifically our storytelling.

You know, I think for me, like the way that I did this case, like you would see everybody going out going live in front of the courthouse or outside the courthouse during every break. I didn't do that or people would you know, you guys had your hits and stuff like that. For me, I would wait till the end of the night because I know that, you know, once traditional media gets the story out, everybody time everyone

What was the hair? What did the outfit give?

Like?

What was the posture?

You know, And let's really have the conversations that once we read the article, once we see what they say on the news, what are we sitting around the table and how are we discussing what we've actually consumed or

Now let's really get into it.

And you know, this case, for me, a lot of people kind of they had mixed feelings about how I was reporting it, but I felt like it was such a dark and kind of like sexual case that at some point like we had to kind of make light of it just a little bit because all of the stuff, even though it was kind of creepy, it was funny, you know what I mean, in an interesting way.

And so I thought that, you know, for the people back.

At home, you know, sitting in court every day, it's not the funnest thing, you know, and reading a bunch of paperwork, a bunch of words on the paper on your screen, that's boring. So my thing was I didn't want people to feel like they were sitting in court again with me.

So the idea was, all right, I'm gonna sit.

In court, y'all read the news or y'all read your articles, and then when we come back, we're gonna have fun with this story, and I'm gonna tell you the little things that I noticed that I seen or you know, things that may I feel like other people may have left out. And so I think that I think that I grew a lot, and I think that I gained a lot of confidence to where, you know now, I'm not intimidated to say, yeah, I cover trials in the past. I will be well, I'm not a reporter. I don't

Thank you.

I want to open it up now to Q and A if you guys had any questions and I'll come out to you.

And tell us who you are.

Okay, Hi everyone, my name is Asia Alexander.

This is really inspiring.

Great panel, by the way, But I was wondering if you guys ever had any like death threats or like anything come to you guys while covering this case, because I know that could be a real big thing when you're talking about like mafia's.

And all that kind of stuff.

Oh, well, I can jump in there.

I'll just say for me, I don't know if it's necessarily well, I did get some death threats. Well, there was a woman who attacked me outside the courthouse.

I don't know.

She came and started attacking me out of nowhere for Diddy. She was harassing me, following me. Everybody was telling me to go inside. It was just really really weird. And this is the thing about the cases too, because it made me feel a little bit uncomfortable about going to cases because it's such a public place. You do have to watch when you have visibility, people will try to get cloud off of you.

It's really really weird.

So they have people that are looking for moments, and then they have people that are just kind of crazed fans, So you always have to protect yourself out there because people really will get over stimulated and try to attack you. I mean I've been I was harassed, Lauren was harassed. It was crazy out there.

Yes, I go, are you gonna tell?

Well?

I was gonna just I mean really quickly.

People actually came down to the court to see people. Yeah, Like people came to visit Lauren.

People came to visit on my and I was surprised.

People would say, hey, you're that girl from TMZ right, and I'm like, and I couldn't say no because my phone had a big TMZ on the back of it. But people, and honestly, even people who I didn't have communication with in years, came to visit me at the court, and I don't really know how I felt about that. So that's the one thing I didn't love about the court was having people show up just to like see what's going on.

And what the hype was about.

Even though the police were there, I didn't feel like they were going to help them help people jump or get off me if if somebody did jump on me, so whatever.

But yeah, I will say I did speak to a content creator who had been threatened. They threatened sexual violence against her and physical violence. And one thing I told her, I said, this is New York City. You go report that to the NYPD. You keep track of that. So I was happy to be that voice. And I would tell anyone in this room listening, if you are threatened, don't brush it off, report it immediately. Just don't play

Did Hi?

You guys?

My name is Chelsea.

I am and while you graduate student, this is my professor right here. I am also a freelance production coordinator and social video manager for one of the public affair sials at ABC seven. And the question that I have is what did this teach you about the algorithm or how people engage with your content. I hear a lot the way you report things on TikTok is different than Instagram.

So there's one thing that it taught you.

What would it be?

I think it taught me that that whole it's saturated conversation doesn't matter when you get at what you do because the first day, from like the jewelry selection to the first day of trial to the last day, the number of content creators and people they're covering it grew. Some days it was like kind of chill when certain things weren't going on. But we literally in real time watch the world realize, oh, we're not gonna get this

Trial really.

It just really taught me just I guess, like the importance of social media. Like I knew that when I left TMZ, I told myself that there was no one on social media who was actually vetting certain things but also able to kind of like be out get with certain things, understand what's happening culturally, really be outside right and know what's happening, like not be disconnected from the world and people and things. So I was like, that's it, Like that's me naturally, I'm going to lean into that.

People were looking for certain people.

So it just made me realize, like I mean, people say, oh, social media is so saturated and this and that, and I'm like, you can go at what you do and you cutting through that's what you doing, Like none of that matters.

People will come and find what they need.

To chime in on that.

I think it taught that the algorithms really don't matter really, just like Lauren and everyone else has said. For example, I had no idea what I was doing when Seleia taught me. But I know that some of the shorts that I did based on your tutelage, they were like part of the YouTube top five shorts globally based on whatever.

To add.

It's it's about giving value. That's it.

Like I'd never worried about the algorithm one time. I never chased it. Like I was saying before, everybody was going live and getting hundreds of thousands of views during the day. I literally went live once a day at six sometimes nine clock at night, and I didn't I gained hundreds of thousands of followers, and my numbers were always up, like we had twenty thousand and thirty thousand people, like every single day. It didn't matter what happened throughout

I'm not gonna lie.

There were people that were running out of the courtroom trying to be as soon as something would be said, they would run out of the corporroom to try to be first.

I never got flustered with that because I.

Knew what I knew and knew where my power landed, and I knew that I was gonna be able to deliver. I don't chase the algorithms because that's when you don't get that double meaning of that algorithm, or you don't get that initial hit that you've maybe gotten it once before. If you don't get it again, you don't feel like you're good enough. And so for me, I just get on camera. I'm gonna do my thing.

Can I say one thing too.

I come from TMZ and I was there for eight years when I started, as I was on the tour bus.

When I left, I was seeing news producer.

Right.

So when you have been in a newsroom like that, you are literally trained to go like you are a sniper. I swear like I don't know nothing but to be first and to live brief, starve or you don't eat period. Literally they will fire you. That has been my life for eight years. And then I come to breakfast club and things still are there, but it changes because your

I'm going to do.

That, but like, I also think you're here too, because it's like culturally, you want to kind of understand where my mind is like as a person, and I really want to process what I just heard, so there'd be some nice where Like my podcast is supposed to be live at six, I might not even do a pot guest episode that day. I would wait and literally tell

Right, yeah, no exactly.

So from my experience, I would say that I use the skills that I acquired from legacy media, like my twelve year career, about using a hook, framing the story so that people can digest it, giving the details that matter, not giving every single detail, but like what is this adding to the story? And so I kind of framed all my tiktoks like that. But then I've been on TikTok for a few years now and so I know, cut out the braths.

Don't start by.

Saying okay, guys today, we got no like really at them with the hook. And so mixing those two I realized that it would just trigger the algorithm. And then the people want to hear because you're concise, you're giving the facts. You're giving them details that they didn't have in court, you know, was he rubbing his hands? They wanted to know, was what were the jurors doing. Were they laughing, were they smiling, were they crying? And giving those details.

I feel like was.

The advantage the fact that we were in the courtroom, that we were there and they were there every day, and that you could be reliable.

Also the consistency. You knew that every night I was going to.

Give you at least three to four videos, and if I didn't immediately in the morning I would as well. I think where some of the other reporters struggled, like if you were with CBS, NBC, ABC, is that it was such a hard shift to now like okay, well now you guys need to go make TikTok videos And it was just like okay, and they're fixing their camera and starting the sentence with like okay and many words too many brass like we gotta we gotta jump right

Right?

The why of it all is important, and that's things that you know, whether you're reporting on the five o'clock news or you're sharing a TikTok. Don't change and they're transferable.

Skills really really quickly ten seconds. I think social media wise, TMD dominated because we constantly stay true to TMZ. We didn't try to switch up because we're covering case. No, it was we're gonna get you walking in, We're gonna chase you down the block. And literally when the lawyers would come out, people would laugh at me. At first, I would go, I would be walking backwards. What do

Just wanted to add something and then, you know what, let's hear your question.

I don't want to take time away from you.

So hi everyone. My name is Crystal and I'm a producer. I'm currently working in documentary. First, I want to say I love that you were collaborative with Darla and supporting each other in the field, but also as a producer, something you said kind of raised the red flag for me. So I did a documentary series in Dallas where I filmed with a judge, and you filming a judge in turning a building. It raises ethical concerns for me because the judge I filmed within Dallas, they have a separate

Set the record straight, just on one thing that this is a sticking point for me. It's not just local news, right, So I know some people move away. I'm very passionate about the fact that I've been in local news for twenty years, and I always try to dispel myths about what it is we do and how we do things. And you're absolutely right, there has to be a moment.

I just had to just jump in and say that, really.

Quous, Well, I do want to speak to it, so I'm not gonna lie like, of course the company I work for. Of course, sometimes people we've had a history, you know, but I cannot speak for them because I will.

Never do that. But overall there has been a history. I'll leave it at that.

What I will say is when I did shoot that clip, I wasn't sure how it was going to be received. But I also am not the person who approves those things either, so I sent it in like hmm, okay, let's see if they wanted, they'll use it.

If not.

Did I feel a little bit worried about.

It, Yes, but I also kind of felt like, Okay, okay, what's done is done. The next day, we continue to shoot the entire prosecutor judge, everyone coming in.

What we did not do was we did.

Not, of course shoot people who were hidden witnesses or try to find those witnesses. We also did not publicly say the names of witnesses that we probably didn't know who they were. And I stand by that. I feel like we did a great job. I feel like I did a great job. I do see where it does raise some ethically, maybe some immoral, but I feel like overall we set the tone for the way the rest

I also think there were already profiles on the judge as well too, Like so coming from TMZ and now being in a space where I have to make those same decisions because if not, I'm under fire. Right, it is a personal thing. That's number one will also say too, It's just that there's a job to do and how you do it, So there weren't profiles on the judge like I knew when I researched, and I read about this judge prior too, because I was trying to figure out what the case would be like, and the judge

I will.

But at the same time, that clip in that photo she got, he was wearing a backpack, he was listening to music. The conversation went from this is the judge, will he throw Diddy in jail for the rest of his life? To this judge is a person, he listens to music, he's young. It's set a different conversation, and I get what you're you're saying, but I think a lot of times in this people have to also have a conversation about There are certain stories that if Celia

I know her.

I'm a black woman as well, so I know her heart. They don't care about that, and a lot of times you don't have leadership that does. She's not in control of that. But at the same time, there are those moments where when you put those things out, it does kind of like the opposite of what you're saying. And that was that moment for that judge. I remember the shot that she's talking about, and it's just it's an

But lastly, I have.

I was told this, I have the most published clips out of any field producer ever at TMZ.

Let's put that on the table, right. I have been.

Able to constantly talk to people who have never talked to TMZ. Halle Berry, jay Z two weeks ago, people who would run from us come to us now. Jada Pinkett never talked to TMZ. I've been able to break down those barriers because I am a human being first, and even down with the diddy ks, I had phone calls from some people who I cannot mention, who are linked to the family, that said they love you and they love watching your clips because you are so nice

Yes, I think I'm glad that I didn't say what I had to say a few minutes ago, and I'm glad for your question because I think multiple things are allowed to be true at the same time. What is true a is that social media is built on viral moments, as opposed to the traditional training that Jureika, myself and Darla and Mona that you have where you know, we're in local news and our job is to tell the story objectively.

We're not supposed to insert our opinions.

We're supposed to just give you the facts and the spirit of Walter Cronkite. But social media is built on viral moments. So we heard Selena talking about, oh, you know, like what's going to be viral next? Waking up every day worrying about how are you going to feed the beast. We're all feeding the beast, just in a different way. So I think that, you know, we're talking around a

Here's an analogy.

Do you remember when you were a kid, you had tropicana orange juice in the frozen thing in the freezer.

I would eat that.

My grandmother would be all over me, like she wait until I make the orange juice. You have to pour the water in it, like I just wanted to concentrate. And that's literally, it is right and by dating myself, but but that is literally what social media is. Everybody wants the orange juice concentrate. They don't want it diluted, they don't want it served to you in a glass. What is also true is there is an appetite for

The breakfast, you know, like Lord is on the air for how many.

Hours in the morning, three or four hours.

Four hours. It's not just about the thirty second hit. It's not just about the one minute clip. They will sit there and listen to what Lauren has to say for hours. They would sit there and listen to what Armand has to say for hours. Sixty minutes is still where it is because it's good television fifteen minute pieces.

So I think that, yeah, multiple things are allowed to be true.

At the same time, before we asked another quick question, I know Mona wanted to jump in in the car lit.

Jump in real quick because I think this is a conversation that goes beyond this table.

I feel like where before there were.

Gatekeepers, and this is a reason why a lot of people weren't able to get the opportunities that for example, I've been fortunate enough to have, because journalism is not easy. It wasn't easy to break into right and then getting our stories told was even harder. You had an uphill battle to fight. And so now with social media, it's allowed a new wave of people to enter the space

So I just want to add them in thirty seconds. Thirty seconds, I think to tie a bow on that. Thank you for that question, and I apologize.

No, no, no, no, no, no, I'm actually glad you asked the girl. You aren't well be acting like you can't do both.

Yeah.

Yeah, let me just just say, every day of my career, every day that I'm gathering, I always have to answer that question.

Right.

So when I did a story today about a Jersey City police officer who just got arrested for sexual assault with a miner who was incapacitated, and you know, I had to have that conversation. WHOA, I had a conversation. Okay, do I show his life and children?

Right?

So so I think, yeah, So what I what I say is every day, every decision as a journalist, whether your legacy, whether you're armand whether you're Celeiah, Celia, Celia, Celia Mona. And that's why, you know, we thank Dareka for putting this panel together, because this is the panel that you ask the questions too, because we all have our different platforms, but you know, cream rises to the

Right.

We all have to ask in this world, in the murky waters, the buck stops with us, and it's good to ask that question.

And sometimes it's just what it is.

Shante from Short and Sweet Well, the trial obviously brought up so many triggering topics. What did you do specifically to trigger or not trigger, but center yourself in your personal life.

I will go out for dinner and drinks with Arma and Celia a lot. And I also took a couple of days to just go to sleep and to not go to court like I needed to do that I was sleep It was one point I was sleepwalking so bad. I was at I was leaving a breakfast club and our EP was like, do you need me to call you a uber home? Like, I'm scared for you to

I'm'na be so delirious.

But also to community was a big thing.

At the end of the trial, me and our mom were talking about how it kind of felt like I went back to college, or like we went back to college, because we all got so close going through it together and we were able to talk to each other about it and be upset with each other about certain things, and you know, just and that was so important because unless you were at that courthouse every day, you really couldn't fathom the intensity of certain things that we were experiencing.

I missed the question, guys, can can y'all just tell me what the worst one?

What were you responding to the question was about things that were triggering and how folks processed it. Lauren was saying going out to drinks with you helped.

No, Oh, I have a triggering thing really quick. It wasn't until after the trial though.

I think a lot of people do.

Well, maybe you guys didn't experience, but I did, and I know a lot of like my peers kind of felt it. But after all of that, I think I fell into like a whole I don't know, I kind of got it. It was like a little week they were calling like a giddy depression.

I don't know.

It just kind of felt like ugh, Like once it was like all over, I had felt like it's what's next.

I didn't know what. I didn't know what I felt.

I felt like it was so much energy there, but I was like doing it for the to eight weeks that I was there. Then once it was over, like it was just this weird cloud over me where I kind of was like.

Sad, I was fatigued. I didn't really want to work.

I didn't know what was going on with me, and I think I didn't know what that was, but I started to slowly pull myself out, you know, like talking to my friends me, I would go to New York, hang out with Salid, we would go out, have dreams, running to Lauren, like, I would just start doing stuff and then I would find myself getting inspired to get

I will say the information is difficult to listen to. I mean there's a lot of things that came out and they was it was disturbing and you know information that was coming out. I will say my years of covering court has helped me compartmentalize things and not take things.

Home because it will wreck you.

It is why I kind of distanced myself from hard news and started getting into entertainment news because after years of that, it is difficult, right, But I will say the amount of work that I was doing, all of the you know, the long days in Core trying to get all the content out all this stuff.

At the end of it, I was beat. I was burnt out.

And it was something that I realized our newsrooms are demanding so much of us these days. Like when I first started, it was one hit, and then it was like, oh, we added a four o'clock show, and then now you got to produce yourself, and then you have to now do something on social media.

And so I feel like a.

Lot of the reporters that were out there can can agree that we are being stretched really thin. And at the end of it, by summer, I'm like, first of all, my summer was gone because you look up and it's mid July. We started this in like May, so you look up and you're like, oh my gosh, I didn't go on vacation. I was in this courtroom and and processing all this difficult information. But also the workload was so much that by August I was burnt out and how to just keep going?

And so I think trying to figure out how to navigate.

This and the demands and you know, more content and great people want it, but we're only just one person trying to produce all of that as well.

Hello.

My name is Cynthia Horner.

I'm on the board of New York Association of Black Journalists, and I want to thank you all for having such wonderful comments. And we've learned so much from what you've had to say. There's so many diverse viewpoints. My question is what was the most difficult moment for you in

Said, I don't know if I can keep doing this.

And if one person wants to take that, because we got one more question and then we have announcements, so we got like five minutes left. Sorry.

I think with every story you try to approach it as a person. I'm a father of two daughters, so hearing stories of domestic violence in that graphic nature was hard. But at the same time, compartmentalizing is key to be able to tell the you know, the audience, what's happening without getting personally emotionally involved to the point where you can't do your job.

All right, I'll respect all you ladies, and I don't feel like I respect black journalists. I love black journalism. Lonald Rossa, Dollar Miles, Jerika ducclan, I love y'all. Don't suppress anything that y'all do. I'm from Jersey, and if y'all feel suppressed or threatened by any way, I got a hundred goons that will protect yourup, keep your foot on.

Donald Trumps. I'm not here to tear puff down or none.

I don't.

I don't got nothing to do with that.

I do know the dude that dropped the book, Courtney, that dropped the book with Kim Porter book.

I do know where.

I don't know how legit that book is, and I don't know if y'all read the book or.

Whatever, whatever, but keep your foot on Donald Trump net.

You know what I'm saying, and know.

Where you were going with that conversation. Brother, I said, wait a minute, wait a minute.

So I thank you for your support.

Now support you.

No, I appreciate hard.

I support y'all whole heartedly. I support y'all whole horribly. I respect y'all journalism. I love black journalism. You know what I'm saying, Like our story needs to be told.

I appreciate that.

What joy read to the fullest?

I got you. You know, we got five now, we got like three minutes.

Oh, I support you all right.

I appreciate what we got like, we got you all.

Right, thank you.

The one thing I want to end with appreciate you. Appreciate that. You know we'll get your number outside. So I heard the same question twice. How did we deal with it? And I don't think.

You know.

I didn't address it.

I don't know if you got the answer that you were looking for from a woman's perspective, from a black woman's perspective, from my point of view, right, I mean, I think we've addressed it. The only thing I will say because I do get that question a lot. Let me just land a plane. You know, we're coming back over from your But you know, I've seen a lot.

I've seen a lot in New York City.

I've covered a lot, and I kind of feel like we're second responders.

So like first responders, they go.

Out and they compartmentalize, they compartmentalize and they just go home. And so we're kind of like second responders and we, whether we know it or not, we do compartmentalize in that way. And I'll say, just to Lawrence's point, the community of us who kind of like we're pledging the Diddy trial together, you know, really made it great. Jay and I would talk about Armand's show in the morning,

And I'll say that that's not the worst I've ever covered.

That's how I felt.

So I've covered so much more that was also horrific. It really wasn't the worst that I've ever covered. And I was very happy that they didn't show us the tapes because I didn't want that in my brain. I'm very particular about what I put in my brain. So I was happy that they kept some of the stuff away from us and I protected my brain and we just were second responders and we comportmentalized blast.

Every woman, black, white, Asian.

Everybody talked about every little detail being flewed out. I mean, you had Emmy award winning.

Journalists that you see on TV that are like, well, I was flewed out. I don't remember that experience. We were all comparing that was not me. I'm just saying, it's like I never.

Been flewed out.

The thing women got together of all different racist ethnicities and we're like, well, I don't know. I mean when I looked that this could have been me, we were all like wow, Like it was like stories.

Anybody staring sharing stories. It was insane.

And then people kept telling me that TMZ loved Diddy, which really was weird, and I was like, that's not true, and I felt like I had to defend myself and it was just weird. But so there was so many different components, but yeah, everybody got together and talked about it and it was a great bonding experience.

Can I follow up that question? Sure, it's it's real fast because you know, we gotta.

All live through our felly and now the ditty trip.

I just wanted to follow up usively that do you guys.

Think that as a society we're talking about sexual violence and the next like our conversation around this GB's sexual violence, is it evolving?

Because it just seems like, you know, no, no, yeah, Epstein files, No no, no.

Yeah.

Ten years ago, we wouldn't this conversation now, yes, yes, yes, our kick off the.

Conversation good night.

I remember when r Kelly and Alijah came.

Out and to my night he could when the whole marriage story broke, I thought it was a marketing floor.

I was speaking to myself at the time.

Her uncle was her manager. Might there's no way her parents were coach signs.

I truly thought it was a marketing ploor to sell age.

Ain't nothing one enough. It wouldn't have occurred to.

Me at that time that it was a real thing.

Yeah.

So I think my answer, and I can't speak to anybody, but I will say my answer is yes.

Because again, ten years ago, we wouldn't be having the conversation we would have it now. You're right, I mean, I think the conversation with me too has advanced the discussion. I think to quantify my earlier knee jerk reaction is and maybe that is my perspective as a woman, because I don't think justice has caught up with a conversation.

Hmmm, no, no, And you know, really quick social media. We've said it before. It's about everybody wants to see the car accident, so you know, the most graphic details that you can imagine that we were not discussing ten years ago, because everyone wants the you know, the most salacious details on their feed that they can just scroll through. A lot of it is falling through the cracks into

I love seeing armand Win. And I told Armand that to his face.

You know, I it's so now you put me on your show. I did.

I did, And you know what my producers are like, who is that and why is he a guest on your show. But as the managing editor and the creator of it and the co producer of it, I get to call the shots and who's on the show man, And I said, I want armand on my show. And so, you know, to have people who look like us carry us into the next generation about of what is going

I just yes, thank you guys. I know this went by so fast. I wish we had more time. Mona, you had one more thought? Did you want to say one more thing.

Just quickly, about the conversation about sexual violence and if we're having these conversations. I think we've come a long way since the days of normalizing R. Kelly and making jokes on the Chappelle Show about what he was doing. But I also think that what was complicated about this case is you had it. We were almost saying that it was, you know, a test for the me too movement? Is a me too movement done, and I don't think that one case dictates if the Me Too movement is effective.

Hopefully with a reporting that everybody here did you get to make that decision, We're not here to tell you how to think so, and then.

Lastly the real quick, real quick. Okay, but I think too.

Because I always got to add the LGBTQ factor into I think people also were having conversations they were so interested in is.

D D gay? What about the men? What about the escorts?

So you know, they people were becoming desentitized because they were so infatuated with whether.

Or not he was interested in the men or not.

So it's just a lot of things that kind of went into that when we get into the sexual stuff.

So you make sure you follow everybody on this panel. Check out our Moms Show Jay's show, Darla, all of us please, we need to support you.

Thank you guys so much for joining me for this conversation. Look, I always say I can't ever be afraid to answer a question because I'm the girl that's gonna ask him. I know y'all hate the way I say ask. I'm also never going to learn how to say that the correct way. But thank you guys for joining me in this episode. You know I tell y'all every single episode. I appreciate you guys because y'all could be anywhere with anybody, having these conversations, and you choose to be right here