Suge Knight Says Diddy Belongs in Prison for Assaulting Cassie: ‘Never Disrespect a Woman Like That’ (Exclusive)

For weeks, Marion “Suge” Knight — rap’s infamous former Death Row Records kingpin — stood out as one of the most unlikely defenders of Sean “Diddy” Combs, even as a storm of explosive allegations erupted inside a Manhattan federal courtroom over the past month.

Now 60 and serving a 28-year sentence for a fatal hit-and-run, Knight’s name echoed through the courtroom dozens of times during Combs’ sex-trafficking and racketeering trial. Yet when it came to the bombshell accusations brought by Combs’ ex, Casandra “Cassie” Ventura, Knight kept mostly quiet — publicly backing his longtime rival and insisting Diddy deserved his freedom.

But that’s changed. In a series of free-ranging phone calls from San Diego’s Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility, Knight now tells PEOPLE he believes Combs is right where he belongs — behind bars.

“I never said he should walk away a free man. He does deserve [prison],” Knight says bluntly. “I don’t mean like… ‘Oh, you beat the sh– out of Cassie, so, oh well.’ No, she’s a woman. You should never disrespect a woman like that,” he adds, continuing: “What I am saying is how do we fix this? I think everyone should be held accountable — even myself. I don’t care who it is. Anybody who does those horrible things to women deserves their issue.”

Knight, once synonymous with the brutal power dynamics of ’90s hip-hop and volatile underbelly, says testimony and surveillance footage of Ventura shook him to the core. “I had never really seen a woman get dragged, beaten and disrespected like that before,” he says, referring to video that implicates Combs in violent abuse.

Ventura, now 38, was seen in a state of shock after Combs, now 55, holding a towel around his waist, hit her, kicked her while she lay curled on the floor and dragged her by the sweatshirt back to their room in the now-infamous attack at the InterContinental Hotel in Los Angeles on March 5, 2016.

As Ventura gathered some items from the floor, Combs returned and is seen shoving her — then sitting in a chair, pulling an object from a table and throwing it toward her. Not only was the R&B singer in pain from the black eye and other injuries Combs left her with after the beating, she was reeling from the fury the hip-hop mogul unleashed on her when she ran out of room 602 after a violent Freak Off session, she testified in federal court last month.

Yet, just days after the disturbing incident, Combs texted her, “I’m so horny for you!!!” jurors heard on Friday, May 16.

“You are? What made you feel that way?” Ventura replied.

On the witness stand, while 8-and-a-half months pregnant with her third child with husband Alex Fine, Ventura testified that she thought it was “a little strange” that Combs would say he desired her sexually after brutally assaulting her days before.

For Knight, the moment marked a turning point. “As for the things he did, the way he beat Cassie, that’s unacceptable, period,” says Knight. ” I would never support any man to beat a woman like that. When he came around that corner, Puff did beat the dog s— out of her.”

“Then we hear he’s having sex with Cassie and all this other crazy stuff with male prostitutes, and when he walks out of the room, Cassie stops,” Knight continues, rehashing Ventura’s testimony from court. “She don’t let that escort do nothing because he’s on pause. When Puff walks back in the room, action [allegedly] starts back up, right?” he asks rhetorically. “Then he’s [allegedly] threatening people not to tell anyone, the blackmail. And people still make excuses, they don’t judge him as much because he was the guy with lots of money that wears shiny suits and be dancing in the videos.”

Combs, long hailed as a visionary force and the world’s most boisterous showman—worth as much as $1 billion just three years ago — spends his days moving with little fanfare through the maze of hallways and rooms that make up the federal justice system, his once-black hair and beard faded to gray. His name now spoken in the same breath as Harvey Weinstein, R. Kelly and Bill Cosby — men once considered by some to be untouchable, now toppled by their convicted abuse.

And to Suge Knight, watching it all unfold, it’s no surprise. He believes the industry enabled it all.

Although Diddy initially denied Ventura’s allegations of assault and slammed her 2023 civil lawsuit and its claims as “riddled with baseless and outrageous lies,” Diddy released an apology addressing the physical abuse once it went public. In a video posted to Instagram on May 19, 2024, he called the 2016 attack “inexcusable” and said, “I was disgusted then when I did it, I’m disgusted now.” The video was captioned: I’m truly sorry.

His attorneys tried to have the footage that CNN originally released excluded from the trial, arguing it was “substantially” edited — a claim the network refuted. Combs’ legal team could not be reached for comment.

“It bothers me. And you know I’m far from an angel. I ain’t the devil, but I’m not angel,” Knight says. “Simple facts: Cassie and these women can’t beat a man up. And I don’t believe no woman want someone pissing on them or their mouth,” he says, raising his voice.

“The only way [Combs] can even begin to take some of that pain away is if they have Puff Daddy on the stand,” Knight says. “And the truth come out,” he adds. “Puffy should get on the stand and look these people in the eye and say, ‘This what I did.’ One person shouldn’t be bigger than the community, one person shouldn’t be bigger than the culture and one person shouldn’t be bigger than the United States. Puffy can really make a right for his wrongs.”

As Knight explains it, back in the ’90s, the two were titans on opposite ends of hip-hop’s most violent era. Their entangled years-long feud helped ignite the East vs. West Coast war — a blood-soaked rivalry that took the lives of Christopher “Biggie” Wallace and Knight’s own superstar, Tupac Shakur. But in the early days, the pair had once been friendly; Combs even modeled Bad Boy after Death Row, he told Rolling Stone in ’97. But it wasn’t long before public jabs turned into personal vendettas — like Knight’s infamous 1995 Source Awards diss, widely viewed as a direct shot at Combs.

The grudge resurfaced in court on Tuesday, May 20, when Combs’ former assistant David James testified about a night in 2008, when he spotted Knight and his entourage eating at Mel’s Diner in Hollywood.

A short time later, James noticed four black SUVs pull into the parking lot, and a man allegedly handed Knight a gun. Per James, one of Combs’ security guards, Damion Butler (aka D-Roc) said, “We got to f–ing go,” and they escaped back to Combs’ house in the Hollywood Hills. He testified that Combs, upon hearing that, wanted to confront the rival group and instructed James to drive to the diner again. At one point, James saw Combs in the backseat with three handguns in his lap.

“I was really struck by it. I realized for the first time, being Mr. Combs’ assistant, that my life was in danger,” James testified. When they arrived back at the restaurant about 10 minutes later, Knight was gone. Combs told James to drive around the block, but Knight was nowhere to be found.

When asked about the incident, Knight doesn’t deny the heat. “Listen, I’m not going to call a grown man a liar,” he says. “We at Mel’s like we usually be, and if that was the tension of the room, that was the tension of the room. So I’m quite sure a lot of things we did and the way we was always ready to perform in those days was like that — but most of all, it was an incredible day for the culture of hip- hop that no one got hurt.”

Today, Knight sounds less like a rap-world villain and more like a weary prophet, but still fierce in conviction.

“If I could talk to Puffy, I would. But for me to convince him to do the right thing? They probably got to put me in a cell with him,” he says, laughing. “I would walk in that cell, I would pick Puffy up and throw him on his back. I’d say, ‘Look, man. I don’t hate you. I don’t wanna see you die in prison. ’ You know how big that would be if he told the truth? At the end of the day — this trial —everybody’s watching. Why not make this a healing process? So, if I can man up… Puffy, don’t be a bitch, my n——a. Go in there and man up.”

As for whether Combs will testify, his attorney has said it’s possible. “I don’t know that I could keep him off the stand,” Agnifilo said in the documentary The Downfall of Diddy. “He is very eager to tell his story.”

If Combs walks free or spends the rest of his life behind bars, one thing is certain: his federal trial has captured global attention, with minute-by-minute media coverage and even Knight, weighing in from behind bars, has joined the chorus. “I’m in prison right now and Puffy will probably get off,” says Knight.

“And guess what? When he come home, he gonna have another White Party. Then, as time go on, they goin’ say, ‘Puffy, we coming to the freak offs. Just don’t make sure you have no cameras.’ Nothing’s gonna change.”

As Knight’s voice lowers, his voice cutting through the static like a slow burn, he says, “Let’s stop watering this down. Let the s— smell the way it is. It stinks.”

But, in turn, he’s also conflicted. “I feel bad for Puffy. Don’t get me wrong, he not a victim when he’s beating up Cassie. I don’t feel bad for him with the [allegedly] bad things he did to the women, but I feel bad for the bad things that was [allegedly] done to him. I know the true stories.”

Still, Combs’ fate rests in the hands of the twelve jurors — eight men and four women — tasked with delivering a verdict. Combs has pleaded not guilty to all the charges.

If you or someone you know has been sexually assaulted, please contact the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673) or go to rainn.org.