Cardi B trial over 2018 Beverly Hills hallway confrontation

Cardi B appeared in a Los Angeles civil courtroom this week as a jury heard competing accounts of a 2018 hallway confrontation outside a Beverly Hills obstetricians office that a former security guard says left her spat on, slashed and traumatized. The lawsuit, filed in 2020 by Emani Ellis, names the rapper, Belcalis Marlenis Almánzar, and accuses her of assault, battery and intentional infliction of emotional distress stemming from the February 2018 encounter when Cardi B was about four months pregnant.

Ellis took the stand Monday and described a sudden, violent exchange after she recognized the star stepping off an elevator on the building's fifth floor. She testified that Cardi B became enraged when Ellis said, "Wow, that's Cardi B," allegedly accused her of broadcasting the singer's private medical visit and then berated, spat on and struck her. Ellis said she was cut on the face by a fingernail and later underwent cosmetic surgery for the injury, calling the episode "traumatizing."

Cardi B denied the physical allegations during her testimony, saying the encounter was a heated but entirely verbal dispute sparked when she believed Ellis was filming her without permission. "It...