A new, cold-blooded voice has been added to the cacophony of charges against Sean "Diddy" Combs, and this one is from across the pond. Now Kathi Steininger, a former Austrian television presenter, has come forward with a chilling account of what she says took place in March 2000, when she was only 19.
Steininger alleged to Austrian outlet PULS 24 that the music executive had drugged and raped her on his tour bus while on the European portion of his tour. The attack, she said, took place in Vienna, and it had been buried for almost a quarter-century.
"I'd never go to bed with that man," Steininger said bluntly. She remembered taking a drink from Diddy and quickly felt something was wrong. "There was 100 percent something in it," she said, her words sketching an image of a young recrutée trapped in a submissive nightmare she had not asked to be part of.
Diddy allegedly raped Steininger in a bedroom at the back of his tour bus. The trauma, she said, caused her years of struggle with post-traumatic stress disorder and, in the end, drove her out of her broadcasting career. "I was humiliated by what had gone down," she said.
Her decision to speak now follows a tidal wave of allegations against Diddy in the US. A flood of searing atomic allegations has washed across the news over the past few months, with more than a hundred women coming forward with stories of abuse, coercion, or violence, and, more still, silencing. Steininger said hearing about their courage is helping her open up, too.
But one thing still seems to escape justice, or at least outside justice's grasp. Steininger had tried to join an American class action, but her case was thrown out on grounds of jurisdiction. She filed a criminal complaint in Austria, only to see prosecutors close the case in June 2025 on grounds the statute of limitations had expired.
But there's a small glimmer of hope: Austrian officials have said they would reopen her case if Diddy were to be convicted in the United States.
"You sure want some kind of punishment, of course," Steininger said quietly. "Some kind of punishment, because of what he did to me."
Diddy, 55, has denied all the charges and is now dealing with a barrage of legal woes in the US Federal prosecutor's charge that he ran a criminal enterprise based on sex trafficking, drugging women, and maintaining his power through violence and intimidation. He was arrested in September 2024 and is still in federal custody. He could face life in prison if convicted under RICO laws.
The list of accusers keeps getting longer: singers, models, and journalists. And though Steininger's story unfolded overseas and long ago, it serves as a reminder that trauma has no borders, and silence is not consent.
For many survivors like Kathi, speaking out is not for the news. It's about taking back power that was cruelly stolen. And in a world that is finally listening, her voice may also perhaps be the one heard the loudest.
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