Cardi B testified Tuesday that she never touched, scratched or spat at a security guard who is suing her over an alleged assault by the pop star outside a Beverly Hills obstetrician\u2019s office.<\/p>\n
The rapper, whose real name is Belcalis Marlenis Alm\u00e1nzar, took the witness stand in the second day of the civil trial in an Alhambra court and vigorously denied assaulting Emani Ellis on Feb. 24, 2018. Cardi B was visiting the 5th-floor office of the obstetrician at the time and was four months pregnant with her first child.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a verbal incident,\u201d insisted Cardi B. \u201cShe didn\u2019t hit me. I didn\u2019t hit her. There was no touching. So, to me, it wasn\u2019t no incident.\u201d <\/p>\n
The rapper did say that they went chest to chest in the hallway outside the doctor\u2019s office, and that she called the guard a \u201cb\u2014\u201d because she believed Ellis was recording her with a cellphone. <\/p>\n
\u201cWas there spitting?\u201d the security guard\u2019s lawyer, Ron Rosen, asked. <\/p>\n
\u201cAbsolutely not,\u201d Cardi B replied. <\/p>\n
\u201cDid you call her the N-word?\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cNo,\u201d the performer replied, noting that she considers herself \u201cAfro-Caribbean.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cDid you take a swing at her?\u201d Rosen followed up.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo,\u201d replied Cardi B, who insisted it was a \u201cverbal fight. … It did not get physical at all.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rosen delved into the difference between a fight and a verbal altercation, asking whether he and the pop star were then having a verbal altercation. Cardi B replied that they were debating, a statement that was greeted with laughter in the courtroom.<\/p>\n
The lawyer countered, \u201cWe\u2019re debating about whether you assaulted and battered Ms. Emani Ellis?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI guess so,\u201d replied Cardi B. \u201cBut I didn\u2019t touch her. She didn\u2019t touch me.\u201d The recording artist said there were no videos of the incident. <\/p>\n
Ellis filed suit in 2020, alleging assault, battery and intentional infliction of emotional distress as well as negligence and false imprisonment.<\/p>\n
Ellis, who worked as a security guard at the building where Cardi B had her medical appointment, said during testimony on Monday that she was doing her rounds when she saw the celebrity get off the elevator. She testified that she was overcome with excitement and declared, \u201cWow, it\u2019s Cardi B.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ellis said the performer then turned to her and said, \u201cWhy the f\u2014 are you telling people you\u2019ve seen me?\u201d Cardi B then accused her of trying to spread news about her being at the doctor\u2019s office, she testified.<\/p>\n
Cardi B cursed at her, used the N-word and other slurs, called her names, threatened her job, body-shamed her and mocked her career, Ellis said. She alleged Cardi B spat on her, took a swing at her and scratched her left cheek with a 2- to 3-inch fingernail.<\/p>\n
Cardi B said when she turned around after getting off the elevator, she heard Ellis say her name and then saw Ellis with her cellphone and said, \u201cWhy are you recording me?\u201d The performer said the guard said, \u201cMy bad,\u201d but continued to follow her and said she had the right to follow her. <\/p>\n
Cardi B said that they went chest to chest and that she did curse at Ellis but that she never touched the guard, who was physically larger. When the obstetrician\u2019s receptionist finally came out, the guard alleged the singer had hit her \u2014 something that Cardi B said never happened.<\/p>\n
The rapper conceded she never saw proof that Ellis was recording her. She said her appointment was both sensitive and confidential; she was seeing a doctor because of concerns about her pregnancy, which wasn\u2019t yet public. <\/p>\n
For the second day of the trial, the rapper \u2014 who is known for her daring style choices \u2014 donned a blond showgirl hairstyle that contrasted with the black short hair she wore during the first day of testimony. Under questioning, she said they were both wigs and that she had 1-inch nail extensions.<\/p>\n
She refused to concede that she usually wore 2- to 3-inch nails, replying that sometimes she does and sometimes she doesn\u2019t.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cardi B testified Tuesday that she never touched, scratched or spat at a security guard who is suing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":99268,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[64,63,447,134],"class_list":{"0":"post-99267","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-celebrities","11":"tag-entertainment"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99267","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=99267"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99267\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/99268"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=99267"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=99267"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=99267"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}