Diddy's former assistant says he berated her in front of staff

Diddy was a 'walking nightmare' to work with at the beginning of his career as a young music executive and often abused his staff, according to former employees speaking exclusively with Daily Mail for its new podcast, The Trial of Diddy. 

Pam Lewis-Rudden, who worked for Diddy as his assistant at Uptown Records in the early 1990s, said no one was safe from his infamous outbursts and their regularity caused her to leave the company. 

Her comments - and those of a former LAPD detective and one of the rapper's musical proteges - become public today in the first episode of The Trial of Diddy. 

Podcast All episodes

'He called me b***h one time too many times,' she said.

'And it might not have been me, you know, just that word, and using it in addressing any and everybody in front of other people as well.

'It wasn't like you were in a room and he was saying it to you one-on-one. It was like in front of the whole office and any of the artists. 

'And it was just one time too many and then a friend of mine was working at, or she heard about, a job opening and, I was like, I'm out of here.'

At that point, Uptown had some of the brightest talents in America including Mary J. Blige, Jodeci, Christopher Williams, and Father MC. 

Lewis-Rudden said Diddy butted heads with just about everyone, including Uptown's chief executive Andre Harrell, who famously fired Diddy in 1993.

Harrell years later explained there was no malice in his firing of Diddy, he just knew it was time for him to run his own show. 

'Puff wouldn't really listen to anyone but me, so my full-time job became managing Puff... I didn't do it to hurt him, but I knew that it was time to let him grow,' he told the Wall Street Journal.

'The final straw for me was when MCA wanted me to not put out the Biggie Smalls album because they didn't like the subject matter and they wanted me to tell him he's gotta change his tone. 

'And I thought it wasn't up to me to tell a generation what they could and could not do artistically. 

'So I knew it wasn't going to work (because Diddy had the same style). I told him, I'm really letting you go so you can go get rich.'

Get rich he did, as his Bad Boy Records soon signed a massive deal, and became one of the most successful labels of the 1990s and 2000s.

'I was very passionate, and I didn't understand protocol or workplace politics,' Diddy later told Oprah Winfrey about being fired from Uptown.

'So I got fired because there can't be two kings in one castle. I wasn't trying to be disrespectful to Andre, but I was fighting so hard. He wanted to be more diplomatic and to make sure everybody felt involved.'

THE TRIAL OF DIDDY: Search and subscribe to The Trial of Diddy now to never miss an episode. Available wherever you get your podcasts.