Diddy’s accuser speaks for first time about his sexual assault allegations: ‘I felt helpless’

An anonymous John Doe sat down with CNN on Tuesday to share, for the first time, what he described as the traumatic toll of the alleged abuse Sean “Diddy” Combs suffered and took his own life.

Doe initially filed her complaint against Combs on October 14, alleging that she was drugged and sodomized by the embattled music mogul at one of the infamous. White parties almost two decades ago.

Speaking anonymously on camera about his claims in his civil suit, the accuser said this week that he had kept his alleged abuse a secret since 2007 — not even telling his then-wife because of the shame she associated with the alleged incident.

“The whole gravity of it lives with me to this day,” Doe told CNN in an interview at his home in New Jersey. “It affects everything you do for the rest of your life.”

Doe is the first civil accuser of Combs to speak publicly to the media in an interview.

According to his lawsuit, Doe was employed by a private security firm in 2007 when he was asked to work one of Combs’ White Parties at the producer’s property in East Hampton, New York.

Combs gave Doe two alcoholic drinks throughout the night that he believes were laced with GHB and ecstasy, the complaint states. After consuming the second drink, Doe began to feel “extremely ill,” according to the suit. Combs allegedly approached Doe at this point and expressed what Doe “initially interpreted as concern,” the lawsuit states, before forcing him into an empty vehicle. Inside the vehicle, Doe claims Combs held him down — despite his pleas for help — and sodomized him. In his lawsuit, Doe is seeking compensatory and punitive damages.

There were a number of inconsistencies between the details Doe shared in his interview with CNN and the original complaint filed in October. The original lawsuit says the assault happened in 2006, not 2007, and that Doe had never been married. In 2006, Combs’ White Party was held at St. Tropez; in 2007, it took place in the Hamptons, where Doe’s allegations take place. After CNN highlighted the discrepancies, Doe’s lawyers filed an amended complaint with the court, changing those details and acknowledging mistakes made in the rush to file.

“I couldn’t take it,” Doe told CNN of allegedly being high with the two alcoholic drinks, which he said “felt more like 15 drinks.”

He added: “It was just an amazing level of incapacitation that I’ve never experienced before and I felt helpless.”

After the alleged assault, he said he struggled to leave the party because of the effect of the alleged drugs in his system and the pain his body was in. Doe then reported what happened to his supervisor, according to his lawsuit. Speaking to CNN, he said he was never asked to work for the security firm again after reporting Combs’ alleged abuse.

“He brushed her off and said, ‘I’ll talk to him,'” Doe said, recalling a conversation in which he told his manager that Combs had sexually assaulted him. “After that, he stopped talking to me, cut me off from everything… I was totally blacklisted after that. I had to find another field.”

Today, Doe no longer works as a security guard. His marriage also ended as a result of the alleged abuse, he said, because of the trauma he suffered, which negatively affected his relationships.

In his lawsuit, he said he struggled with emotional pain and mental health issues in the years since.

For the first time, Doe also revealed that a celebrity witnessed the alleged abuse. Without naming the celebrity he recognized, he told CNN: “There was a high-profile person who saw what happened and thought it was funny.”

Combs’ representatives declined to comment on Doe’s allegations Tuesday. But at the time of the original complaint in October 2024, his lawyers issued a blanket statement to CNN about the complaint and others filed the same day: “Mr. Combs and his legal team have full confidence in the facts, their legal defenses, and the integrity of the judicial process. In court, the truth will prevail: that Mr. Combs has never sexually assaulted anyone – adult or minor, male or female.”

Doe’s complaint was filed along with a host of other anonymous accusers, who are all represented by attorneys Tony Buzbee and Andrew Van Arsdale. The attorneys said they represent at least 120 accusers who plan to file charges against Combs; so far, they have filed 20 civil lawsuits.

After CNN published this story, Combs’ attorneys responded to Doe’s amended complaint in a statement to CNN.

“After Buzbee was exposed this week for pressuring clients to file false cases against Mr. Combs, and after public records showed that — contrary to his claims — there was no white party in the Hamptons in 2006, Buzbee amended this complaint to drop the charges and now allege a different day and a completely different year,” Combs’ attorneys wrote in their statement.

Buzbee has previously denied allegations of pressuring customers to come forward.

“This allegation is patently ridiculous … What we will not do is pursue a case that we do not believe has merit,” he told CNN in an email. “We don’t put pressure on people, and we shouldn’t.”

Combs is currently in federal custody while awaiting trial on sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy charges. He has pleaded not guilty and denied all allegations of wrongdoing in about 30 civil lawsuits filed against him over the past year. Several of those lawsuits include allegations from accusers like Doe, who chose to file under pseudonyms.

Regarding his decision to remain anonymous, Doe said, “I have a semblance of a life, a very quiet life. I’d prefer what little is left of him to be left alone.”

“Nothing could give me back the person I was before that night.”

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