A jury found NFL wide receiver Stefon Diggs not guilty Tuesday afternoon after a two-day trial over allegations from his former live-in chef, Jamila Adams. In the final hours before the acquittal, jurors watched a seconds-long video of Adams at a coworker’s home “days after” the alleged assault, footage the defense used to challenge her account.
The case matters for a simple reason: when prosecutors ask jurors to convict on serious charges, the burden is on the state to prove it beyond a reasonable doubt. And in this trial, the state’s own presentation seemed to hinge on whether jurors believed Adams, despite behavior the defense said didn’t line up with the claims.
The New York Post’s account of the courtroom testimony describes a prosecutor conceding the accuser was not a “perfect witness,” and it lays out why the video became such a focal point: it showed Adams in a casual setting not long after she said Diggs choked her.
Diggs had pleaded not guilty. The stakes were high: the Post reported he faced up to five years in prison on the strangulation charge and two-and-a-half years in jail for misdemeanor assault.
Adams testified the alleged assault happened on Dec. 2, 2025, at Diggs’ home in Massachusetts, where she worked as his live-in cook. She told jurors Diggs “slapped her ‘with an open hand’ and choked her,” the Post reported.
Adams also described a fight that began with text messages sent from her bedroom in Diggs’ house. She said she was upset he was not taking her to Miami for the Art Basel expo, and she testified she had planned to coordinate outfits with Diggs’ girlfriend, Cardi B, as the Post described it.
In court, Adams recounted Diggs confronting her before she says he struck her. As quoted in the Post, she testified he asked, “What was all that s, t you was talking?”
And Adams told the jury what she says happened next. She testified, “He took his arm and he came around my neck with his elbow... and he began to choke me,” the Post reported.
After the alleged assault, Adams stayed for a week at the home of coworker Xi Charles, who worked for Diggs as a hairdresser, the Post reported.
The last witness in the two-day trial was Natalia “Tally” Moses. The Post reported Moses captured the seconds-long video clip of Adams that was played for jurors “hours before” they cleared Diggs.
Moses testified about where and when the video was recorded: at Xi Charles’ home, in Xi’s room, with Adams present in the days after the alleged incident. The defense used it to argue Adams’ behavior did not match her claims.
Moses’ description was blunt. As quoted by the Post, she told jurors: “We were in Xi’s room there, goofing around, listening to music and dance and stuff,”
Video evidence can cut both ways. But when prosecutors ask the public to accept a life-altering accusation without the kind of corroboration jurors expect, every inconsistency becomes a referendum on trust, much like other cases that turn on footage and what it does (or doesn’t) show, including surveillance footage in a Secret Service-related case that became central to investigators’ accounts.
Prosecutor Drew Virtue tried to explain why Adams didn’t share her allegations with others around Diggs, the Post reported. Virtue pointed to Diggs’ status and financial power, and he asked jurors to interpret Adams’ decisions through that lens.
Virtue also conceded Adams was not the “perfect witness” and called the case “complicated,” the Post reported. Those words are revealing. When the state itself admits its star witness is flawed, jurors are being asked to take a leap, and the justice system is designed to prevent leaps.
Virtue’s explanation of the relationship dynamic came in a longer statement quoted by the Post: “[Diggs] was a sometimes lover, boss, landlord, athlete, celebrity, financially powerful, surrounded by people who were all on his payroll and who liked him. Her behavior does make sense,”
But the prosecutor also previewed the defense’s attack on Adams’ credibility. The Post reported Virtue told jurors that the defense would suggest “you should throw away everything she said.”
Diggs’ lawyer, Andrew Kettlewell, argued the prosecution’s case depended on Adams’ word and had little left if jurors doubted her, the Post reported. That is not a technicality; it’s the core of criminal law.
Fox News underscored how stark that reality was in Diggs’ case, reporting that prosecutors lacked corroborating evidence like injury photos, video, or eyewitness testimony and that the dispute came down to “Nothing but his word against her word.” Fox also reported the jury’s verdict on both counts: “On count one -- strangulation or suffocation: Not guilty. On count two -- assault and battery: Not guilty.”
When cases become that thin, they don’t just risk an acquittal, they risk eroding trust in the system for the next victim who comes forward with stronger proof and still gets treated with skepticism.
That same “reasonable doubt” standard has driven other high-profile acquittals in Massachusetts, too, including a separate case involving a standoff shooting where a judge found doubt in the evidence, as we covered in a former Massachusetts officer’s acquittal.
The Post reported Adams worked for Diggs from July through December 2025 and made $2,000 a week. Adams also claimed she and Diggs had a sexual relationship before he hired her, the Post said.
Then there’s the money question hanging over the endgame. The Post reported that, three weeks ahead of the trial, Adams “dodged inquiries” about whether her lawyer demanded $5.5 million from Diggs. The Post also noted uncertainty about whether that demand was made and by whom exactly.
The Associated Press added another layer to that financial dispute, reporting the defense argued the accusation stemmed from money and relationship tensions and pointing to a $19,000 demand that later became a $5.5 million claim. AP also reported the jury deliberated for less than two hours before acquitting Diggs after the short two-day trial.
On this kind of record, the unanswered questions aren’t gossip, they’re about process. The Post left key details unclear, including the exact court and jurisdiction, the precise dates for “Monday” and “Tuesday afternoon,” and whether the acquittal covered all counts or specific ones.
When the public is asked to process allegations in a headline-first culture, those gaps matter. The justice system can’t run on vibes or online consensus; it has to run on evidence in a courtroom.
The Washington Times reported the jury deliberated for less than two hours after the two-day trial and acquitted Diggs on felony strangulation and misdemeanor assault and battery tied to the Dec. 2 incident at his Dedham home. The paper also quoted Kettlewell’s blunt argument to jurors: “There was no assault, no strangulation, no incident at all on that day or any other day,”
That kind of categorical defense claim isn’t proof by itself. But it’s a reminder that prosecutors don’t get to bring a serious charge and hope jurors “split the difference.”
And in an era when surveillance footage shapes public narratives, it’s worth remembering how easily video can become the whole case, sometimes rightly, sometimes not. We’ve seen how fast a clip can drive assumptions in unrelated incidents, like a Kansas City arson attempt captured on video.
Breitbart likewise reported Diggs was found not guilty after the two-day trial, with the defense emphasizing that no physical evidence supported the accusations and that multiple defense witnesses said they saw no altercation or unusual behavior between Diggs and Adams on the day in question.
High-profile cases draw attention because the names are famous. But the rules should be the same for everyone: a presumption of innocence, proof beyond a reasonable doubt, and consequences for false claims as well as for real violence.
Even when celebrities and courtrooms collide, the standard can’t change just because the allegations make a gripping headline.