Last week, Stefon Diggs was hit with charges of strangulation and assault for an alleged incident with his private chef at his home in Dedham, Massachusetts, on December 2. According to a police report obtained by ESPN, the chef alleged the New England Patriots player had smacked her in the face during a dispute over unpaid wages, and when she pushed him away, he allegedly attempted to choke her with the crook of his elbow.
The chef apparently left her job after the alleged incident but returned to the home a week later to collect her belongings; she says an assistant to Diggs then told her she would need to sign a nondisclosure agreement in order to be paid. She reportedly declined and later reported the incident to police. Diggs’s attorney, David Meier, denied the allegations on his client’s behalf, calling them “unsubstantiated” in a statement to ESPN. “The timing and motivation for making the allegations is crystal clear: they are the direct result of an employee-employer financial dispute that was not resolved to the employee’s satisfaction,” Meier added. “Stefon looks forward to establishing the truth in a court of law.” Diggs is expected to be arraigned on January 23.
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On Wednesday, Cardi B — who had a baby with Diggs in November — defended her boyfriend against the allegations in a since-deleted tweet. Cardi shared a screenshot of a text message she suggested had been sent to her by the chef, who seemed to be asking Cardi to contact her through a mediator. The context of the text remains unclear. “Not once has that woman said anything to me about being touched.. NOT ONCE!!” the rapper wrote. “Mind you, we was talking every single day until she left that house and she JUST wrote me this.” Cardi said she would “let the courts handle” the matter, adding that people are “harassing [me] over a lie … and I put that on my two month old son in the name of the lord!! That’s how confident I am.”
