Interview Only: ESPN Legal Analyst Ryan Smith discusses the witnesses at the Diddy.

Now onto the latest in the Sean Diddy Combs trial, where Diddy is facing five federal charges involving sex trafficking and racketeering. The trial is wrapping up a second full week of testimony.

This week, we.

Heard testimony from Combe's former personal assistant, David James, who testified he told Cassie Ventura, Comb's former girlfriend that she needed to quote get out end quote. Then Ventura claimed she couldn't because Combs controlled so much of her life.

Well, we know that's bad. We know that's bad, and.

I got a lot of stuff to say about that, but not at the expense of taking time away from my next guest, who is a legal analyst for ABC, obviously a sports set an anchor for ESPN, does an outstanding job for the Disney family. The one and only Ryan Smith Legal Analysts is straordinaire right here with stephen A.

How you doing, Ryan, how's everything?

I'm good. How are you doing?

I'm doing all right.

So you heard that intro and is there anything there that you believe is ultra damaging to Diddy? Considering the charge is sex trafficking and rack tearing. I mean, we know it doesn't look good for him. Domestic violence and how people feel it for their lives, we get that part, but I'm still waiting to hear about sex trafficking and racketeering. Is there anything that you've heard over the last week or so that would indicate such a charge is valid?

Yeah?

Absolutely, But I think the way people have to look at it is they have to look at it as a very broad.

Puzzle that's being put together.

I think when people look at cases like this, Steven and they look for that smoking gun. Oh, this is the thing that proves that did he ran a criminal enterprise and he had all these people involved to facilitate this criminal activity over a period of year.

That's essentially the racketeering parts. But you have to put it together methodically.

So what you have is Cassie talking about what happened to her, other people talking about what they experienced. You have people coming in talking about being flown in doing freak offs in different states.

That gives it a federal aspect.

And then you have assistance talking about cleaning up people telling Cassie different things. But she's feeling coerced to stand to relatelationships. That's part of the sex traffick case. Sex trafficking case. So all of this, as hard as it might be for people to seem, all of this are pieces of a puzzle that are slowly coming together to prove the case the prosecution's offering.

I'm wondering how damaging her mother's testimony was to Diddy as opposed to herself herself. I mean you're her mother, What do you mean you was worried about your daughter's safety? But still, you know, you allowed the situation to continue for a lengthy period of time, spanning years. I don't know how believable the mom comes across when you suddenly say you were so worried about your daughter's safety.

Nevertheless, we don't see was.

There any effort whatsoever to relieve your daughter from being in that situation.

You know, that's part of the defensive case right there.

They're going to make the argument that, hey, she was voluntarily in a relationship and.

You didn't help get her out.

But I like that you use the word allowed, because that's what the prosecution is really trying to hook onto. They're trying to take onto the idea that there was no allowing because the tentacles were so deep into Cassie, the coercion was so strong it was almost as if she wasn't able to get out. And I know people are going to hear that and say, look, she had free will. She was in this relationship for so long,

Well, here's the interesting part too, because David James, the form of personal assistant, said that he had told Cassie to get out excuse me, But she says she couldn't get out.

Why because she couldn't.

She couldn't because Combs controlled so much of her life. So now we get into a tricky portion of it. Ryan, there's bosses. There's always if you're in a subordinate role, there's always someone who could have some degree of control over your career. But that control is relatively subjective. Like certain situations you walk away from say hell, no, I'm not dealing with that.

Bye, I'll walk out. I'll walk out.

So one could easily argue, what do you mean control, Because if he wasn't stopping you from walking out the door, if he wasn't stopping you from walking on with your walking on with your life, but you just may not have enjoyed the level of success that you're.

Having right now.

Yeah, that's not great, But in the same breath, a lot of people in America have to deal with circumstance.

Not obviously the sex acts and all of that.

Stuff, but I'm talking about the level of control of your individual with power may have over somebody's career.

What do you say to that.

Yeah, I say that what you're talking about essentially is consent.

You're talking about a situation where people can walk away, And I think that's a great point. But the flip side of that is, is she in a situation And I'm not making the case for it, but I'm kind of coming from where the prosecution is coming from. It's so deep in some ways, and this is where things come in, like the drugging and the threats and the violence.

It's so deep.

The coercion and the control that the person feels like there is not a way out of the situation, despite what assistants are saying, despite what the mother is talking about people urging her.

To get out.

That's part of the case they're trying to build, and that's how it broadens out to the commercial, to the criminal, to the rico enterprise that they're alleging, and the sex trafficking. That in many of these cases, people are in a situation they're being engaged for this sex act, and that the coercion, the threats, all of that, the violence, it's so powerful. Hey if you I'm giving example, Hey, if you leave, I'm gonna do this.

I'm gonna do that. The drug age.

Cassie testified about how the drugging went on for a long period of time, as did the freak costs, that she's in this sort of fog, and it's Hayes, all of that stuff contributing to the fact that the aspect of control that some of us might feel like we have a say at a job where we're being mistreated and we want to leave and we just walk is different from this circumstance here. That's how they're trying to paint it.

So with that being said, I'm looking at Diddy right now and it doesn't look good for him. There's no way around that. However, I find myself asking Ryan, where are the other Where are the other villains in all of this?

Who are they?

Because sex trafficking and racketeering one man, one individual. I don't want to accuse the the the District Attorney of prosecutor of grant standing, but most.

People out here feel like we need to see more than just Diddy.

If it's as comprehensive as they're trying to make this all scene.

To that, you say, what.

Yeah, to that, I say, they're using assistance and other people they're giving immunity. So you've heard people talk who have immunity in this case, who've said, Hey, I was a part of this.

I cleaned up certain things. I tried to get her out of there. I saw some of this stuff go down.

And that's where the conspiracy aspect of this, that's where we start seeing as they see it, and enterprise being built operated by Diddy, Didty associated with it to try to make these things happen over a period of years. That's where we see the freak off context come in, but you're talking about a different situation. You're talking about the bigger names, the people who might have been involved. They're not approaching that just yet. Is that a part of where they might go in some ways?

Possibly?

But I think for them it's easier to get the people who they know or involved based on all the evidence they secured and say hey, we're going off you an immunity if you tell us what happened. And I think for many people this is going to be interesting for the jury because the jury is hearing all this, and just remember, when you hear all of this, it's important for the prosecution that the jury not here, did he as.

A bad guy or a weird guy or a.

Guy who does crazy things, but not criminal things. The criminal part comes in when you start bringing in the associates who talk about all the different levels of things that happened. One person testified about carrying a bag of cash there. Another person talked about the payoff that was made to the hotel, all these different things.

To sustain the criminal enterprise, it's those.

People, those underlings, all those associates that he had with them that they want to get to try to build that enterprise.

Not the big names that you might be thinking of.

What about the actual sex itself? And what I mean by that, Ryan, is this, if you were one of those individuals that engaged in the actual sexual activity, you are being somebody that was a participant. But isn't it possible that you may have had nothing to do with the actual sex trafficking and racketeering allegations. You were just a participant engaging in sexual activit That's right.

And they had a couple, they had some people testify like that.

They had a guy testify his nickname is the Punisher, talked about how he was hired to have sex with Cassie.

He's not somebody who's part of the enterprise.

Who he is is somebody who was engaged to come in and have this sex trafficking activity with Cassie. The other reason why you bring in a guy like that is he talked about how freak coughs happened in different states.

Now you're seeing the federal aspect.

Of this case, which is why it's a federal case and not a state case, which is why you can allege things like rico, which is why some of these charges which involve interstate commerce come into play because some of these activities they're alleging.

For the prosecution, they're saying, did he had these things?

He controlled this enterprise over multiple states, and he brought people in to engage in this sext to continue the means of what he wanted to do.

This He used all these this large Jesse had.

This power, this influence to create this criminal enterprise using these people.

But where are the other women other than Cassie who are alleged to have been participants in all of this.

I think they're going to start trying to weave some of those people in because it's not just about Cassie. There are other people I think the prosecution is going to try to bring into this case to say they were involved in this in some way.

But stephen A. For them, Cassie is the star witness. She is everything in this case.

You have to believe Cassie and what she went through and believe that she is coerced. Why because you have the video which sticks out more than anything.

When you talk about what juries see in a courtroom.

You can hear testimony for days that is harrowing, But when you see a videotape of somebody being abused. That is the one thing that sticks in your mind more than anything more than that. Also, it's the fact that she had this long standing relationship with Sean Ditty Combs, so she had a front row seat to the free costs to everything that happened to everybody else.

So she is the main player in all of this.

There might be other people weaved in who were subject to this, who did he coerced in some way, at least according to the prosecution to try to scilly tate this criminal enterprise.

But it all comes down.

To her and how the jury sees her, which is why it's so important for the prosecution that they don't see her as a voluntary, consensual partner, but rather someone who was worced into being in this relationship and could not get out.

Are we gonna see any videos of the freakofs because I know the media.

Has been asking for access to that. Is that going to happen?

I think it's going to be debatable. I'm interested, you know, it's one of those issues where I'm just not sure. I know the defense is gonna fight at tooth and nail, and.

They have good reason.

When you start seeing as I said, earlier, when you see a video that sticks with you more than anything else.

So if you see Hiddy in a video with a.

Bunch of people having sex for the defense, that's going to look to the jury like he's orchestrating the entire thing. Their whole point is these are parties, consensual parties.

This is not anything more than that.

So for them to have that video in the courtroom is extremely damaging. They're going to fight at tooth and nail, and it's all going to come down to the judge. Is it the kind of evidence that's important to the prosecution's case to help prove the case and won't have the prejudicial value of disrupting the defense's case on the other side.

The judge will have to decide that. But these videos, if they do.

Come out in that courtroom, extremely damaging for Diddy because his mere presence in the video while people are and I'm just making I don't know what's in them, but if people are presumably having sex with him being there, that's incredibly damaging because that's the very orchestration view that the prosecution is trying to get the jury to see.

Last question on this particular subject, and it's not necessarily a legal question. It's just your level of expertise because of what you know about this business, about the law, about the impact on a jury, et cetera, based on your expertise at this moment in time, even without the videos of freak offs being seen, just based strictly on

Far worse, far worse, because we know all the details now. It's more than just what we might have read in the papers. It's more than just the scuttle but that people heard. Now we know the details of what went down from people who actually experienced it, and it's just from the perspective of the kind of person he was, how he treated Cassie, how she tried to get out of it. Kid Cutty talking about the threats we had heard kid Cutty talking about did.

He before this trial, but what he said about him being.

A Marvel super villain allegations of fire bombing his car, far worse, far worse now.

But here's the key. Being a bad guy.

Does not make you a criminal, and so so for me, this case is not fully put together yet. It's just beginning. They're just starting to put the puzzle together, But the puzzle is not complete. I think having the threat, say, for example, kind Cutti shows things like obstruction.

We're trying to threaten.

Him to keep people silenced to say what's happening in this criminal enterprise?

But do we clearly see the enterprise yet? Do we clearly see the sex trafficking? Yet?

Are we clearly as a jury believing that this is a voluntary relationship and a consenting relationship. I think that remains to be seen. But no matter what, no matter how you come out of.

This, in no way does he look good.

He looks far hoarse, and he looks like a person who is completely out of.

Control to this jury.

I think, if I'm sitting in that jury box, the question I have if I'm a jury is is he just an extremely bad person?

Or is he a criminal?

Last question, I apologize that one thing you just said that made me think of this.

Yeah, what if they don't know whether.

Or not sex trafficking and racketeering has been proven, but they consider him so despicable and they consider his behavior criminal because of what he was seeing on video doing the Cassie and what have you, that they convict him anyway. I mean, if they find him guilty, it's not as if a judge or a defense attorney is going to be able to definitively say, you know what your case. You know, sex trafficking and racketeering was not why you

It's not like they're gonna be able to prove that.

If the jury comes back and says, we think you're behind needs to go to jail, I mean, what can you do.

You're making a couple You're making me think of a couple of things there. The first thing is, I think, no matter what happens here, they're going to appeal. So they're going to appeal and they're going to argue that the case wasn't proven. The defense is just gonna say they didn't prove the elements of the case, and they're going to try to get information to try to figure out what happens here. But more than that, they're going

Ryan.

Before I let you get on out of here, I need to switch subjects and I need your counsel on something here. Thursday, the Trump administration revoked Harvard University's ability to enroll into national students in its escalating battle with the Ivy League school saying thousands of current students must transfer to other schools or leave the United States of America.

It also accused Harvard or.

Coordinated with the Chinese Communist Party, saying it hosted and trained members of a Chinese paramilitary group as recently as twenty twenty four this morning, just this morning, Harvard challenged the decision, calling it unconstitutional retaliation for defying the White House's political demands. In a lawsuit filed today in federal court, Harvard said the government's actions violates the First Amendment and will have an immediate and devastating effect for Harvard and

Yeah, First of all, Harvard is looking at this like a First Amendment issue, and they're seeing this really as the government trying to come in and determine what they teach, who teaches it, and how they do it, and they're saying.

That violates their First Amendment rights.

The government on the other side is saying, hey, you are facilitating on campus anti semitism things of that nature, and that's why we need to take certain action against you.

But what this really is is an.

Ongoing fight between these two sides, and from Harvard's perspective, it's the government trying to control how they run their university, which, if you're a university, you have to look at that and say that cannot happen.

That's a slippery slope for us.

This day it's this thing, the next day it's the next thing. The third day, they're controlling exactly how we run our university and that can't happen. So how this plays out, I think right now, as you said, the tro it's been blocked, the order has been blocked. But this is I think the government in many cases has done this recently. The government has been testing the limits of the law, testing what they can do to exercise control over what they see at certain campuses, over how

It's been this idea of.

Hey, if it's not working the way we want it to work, or if we see something happening that we think is wrong, then we're going to try to put down.

A real heavy hammer on them. See if there's a pushback, and then let it go to the courts and see how it plays out. I would not be surprised if this ends up in the Supreme Court at the end of the day.

Ryan Smith legal analysts extraordinary for ABC Sports Center, anchor for ESPN, and a host of other things. The Brothers gifted. Make no mistake about it on it to have them on the show as always. Enjoy your weekend, my man. We will talk soon. You take care of yourself, all right, Thank you so much too, Man, take care