A viral video features Casandra ‘Cassie’ Ventura emotionally hugging her husband Alex ‘Poonie’ Fine after he finished a 50-mile marathon. This clip gained attention while her former partner, Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs, faces a federal sex-trafficking court case. Watch the video here.
The 38-year-old Cassie was about six months pregnant with her first child with Alex, a 32-year-old fitness trainer, when he completed the Ultra Marathon in Los Angeles on August 30, 2019, shortly after their wedding in Malibu.
Alex impressively raised over $50,000 benefiting the Compton Cowboys Youth Program and Haven Homes of Detroit, a charity providing safe homes for women escaping human trafficking.
‘When I got the news that my mom had been the victim of domestic abuse and violence, I really didn’t know how to handle it. I was angry – part of me wanted to hurt the person who did this to her and the other part of me felt paralyzed,’ Fine wrote on his Almost Home blog in 2020.
‘Watching the trial drag on for three years, and seeing my mom have to relive the memories of that violence over and over again over those three years was one of the most helpless feelings I’ve felt.
‘I didn’t want to give in to those paralyzing feelings. So, I decided to channel my anger and feelings of helplessness by running 50 miles to bring awareness and hopefully raise some money.’
The heavily-tattooed trainer ‘broke my ankle from a stress fracture’ and ‘tore my hip’ around mile 11 of the marathon and he later ‘gained 9lbs from the inflammation in my legs.’
‘I felt like I made peace with my anger and feelings of helplessness,’ Alex wrote without revealing Cassie’s secret ordeal.
‘As parents and leaders, we need to teach our children that domestic violence and abuse is unacceptable. I brought my daughter into this world and I want her to feel safe, loved, and encouraged to be the greatest she can be.’
On social media, X users like @AbigailJoyFloat reacted to the clip by commenting: ‘You can see in her face she was still holding a lot of trauma here.’
‘The pain in her eyes, the comfort in his arms,’ X user @sunnytwitxx marveled. ‘I’ve never seen a hug say more.’
X user @gigibonxy tweeted: ‘You can literally feel the raw emotion radiating from them this was a hug for the ages.’
‘The way that hug carried the weight of pain, survival, and unconditional love had me in tears,’ X user @pinkmimia wrote.
‘This wasn’t just a moment,’ X user @liliantwx tweeted. ‘It was a silent testimony of strength resilience and healing together.’
X user @Ruemu25 commented: ‘I’m so glad she found someone to trust and who treats her the way she deserves after all she’s endured.’
Fine was originally hired by the 55-year-old disgraced rap mogul to be he and Cassie’s personal trainer, and they went Instagram official in December 2018 – two months after she ended their on/off 11-year relationship.
Next month, the Almost Home founder and the former R&B singer will welcome a baby sibling for their daughters Frankie, 5; and Sunny, 4.
Cassie was only 19 when the then 36-year-old Diddy signed her to a 10-album deal under his Bad Boy Records label in 2005.
It wasn’t until 2023 when the Connecticut-born stunner filed a lawsuit alleging rape, abuse, and sex trafficking – which the three-time Grammy winner quickly settled for an undisclosed amount.
Diddy defiantly denied all the charges until CNN leaked a video of him last year violently assaulting Cassie at the InterContinental Century City back in 2016.
The Harlem-born hip-hop star was arrested September 16 in Manhattan after a grand jury indictment and he’s plead not guilty to racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, and transportation to engage in prostitution.
Cassie is now the prosecution’s star witness and she’s expected to complete her testimony by Friday for the trial that could send Diddy to prison for life.
The single father-of-seven’s lawyer Teny Geragos has tried to have Alex barred from the courtroom because he reportedly ‘sent several threatening texts to Combs that he’d like ‘to beat the F-word out of him.’
It’ll be up to the jury – consisting of eight men and four women – to determine whether Cassie was willing and consenting to the baby oil-smeared ‘freak off’ sessions with male escorts based upon past texts and current testimony.
