Newly released video shows a woman, identified by prosecutors as Courtney Clenney, 26, berating her boyfriend Christian “Toby” Obumseli, 27, and demanding to hit him.
Prosecutors in Miami, Florida, argue that Clenney subjected him to a pattern of abuse in the weeks and months prior to stabbing him to death in their apartment on April 3. The defense has argued it was Obumseli, not Clenney, who was the abuser in the relationship, and that she killed him in self-defense.
Obumseli secretly recorded some of his encounters with Clenney, an Instagram star and OnlyFans model also known online as Courtney Tailor. The recordings were made through a cell phone, though only audio is usually clear because Obumseli apparently hid the device. Only one clip shows consistently clear visuals.
In one incident, Clenney said she needed her phone.
“Don’t touch me!” she yelled. The video is pitch black so it is unclear what happened.
The argument continued over something. Obumseli apologized.
“So shut up and let me fucking slap your dumb ass,” Clenney said.
She demanded her phone. He said she had her phone. She said she didn’t have it anymore. She repeatedly yelled at him to find it and charge it. Obumseli repeatedly apologized.
“Find my fucking phone and charge it,” she said.
This goes on for some time, with Clenney berating Obumseli while he attempts to placate her.
He laid out his version of events for her: That he said hi to another woman during a bike ride. He said he did not tell Clenney about it, and that Clenney called him the N-word.
She then called him the N-word on the audio.
Clenney is white. Obumseli was Black.
“My bad,” Obumseli said, apparently exasperated. “I said, ‘Hey, what’s up?’ I’m going on a bike ride, and I forgot to tell you that I ran into somebody. Is that going to make you act like this?” Then he said under his breath, “Fucking crazy bitch.”
In another clip, Obumseli pleaded with her to get in the car. He apologized for calling her stupid.
She claimed he was not protecting her.
“Somebody was being horrible to me,” she said. “You defended them.”
It appeared to be daylight, but the video recording was blocked by an apparent fabric. The argument continued. A male bystander got involved and attempted to defuse the situation.
“I saw you banging your head,” the man said, apparently addressing Clenney. “That’s not good. I don’t want you to hurt myself.”
“You know what that is like, though?” she said. “It means I want to kill myself.”
Clenney said Obumseli had dumped her, and she suggested he was being manipulative in the moment.
“No, you are making yourself look good in front of people!” she yelled at Obumseli.
The dispute appeared to originate from Obumseli telling Clenney to apologize to someone, who Clenney referred to as a “lowlife.”
A Clenney attorney did not immediately respond to a Law&Crime request for comment. Defense lawyer Frank Prieto previously took issue with prosecutors releasing a February surveillance footage of his client berating and striking Obumseli in an elevator. He argued it was out of context.
“The video does not depict the events leading up to what was captured in the elevator,” he said. “Obumseli was the abuser, the worst kind of abuser. He would manipulate and abuse Courtney in private when he thought nobody was around. Do not forget that the initial investigation from the City of Miami Police Department uncovered an independent witness who saw Obumseli hitting Courtney in the head while he thought he was in the privacy of Courtney’s apartment.”
Body cam footage from April 1 or 2 showed officers responding to the couple’s apartment building.
“We get down here to the lobby area, and her boyfriend comes charging towards her,” a security guard explained to the responding officers.
Clenney told cops Obumseli had been “stalking” her and she said she wanted a restraining order against him.
She is charged with second-degree murder. Both sides of the case are geared to struggle over the precise nature of the relationship. It’s crystal clear that this was a tumultuous relationship going back years. Neighbors reportedly complained about the couple’s arguments, and that was just in Florida. They had recently moved to the Sunshine State from Austin, Texas.
“Behind closed doors, we just started hearing some shouting, yelling,” downstairs neighbor Aidan Nesvisky told Austin FOX affiliate KTBC in an August report. “We don’t know who was starting what. We didn’t get a lot of context. Occasionally we would hear some glasses break and some banging on the walls, floors. Not sure who was doing it.”
A third newly released video essentially epitomizes the constant back and forth between the couple — with Clenney yelling at Obumseli, Obumseli trying to placate her, and Clenney accusing him of “gaslighting.”
“Decide whether or not you’re done gaslighting me,” she said, over his audible protests. Unlike the other videos, the visual recording is unobscured. “Decide whether or not you’re done gaslighting me.”
“I am mad that you told me to come—” he said, before she cut him off.
“Decide right now,” she said.
“That’s a fucking threat,” he whispered through gritted teeth. “I asked you so many times that I don’t know, and I apologize, but you hit me.”
“Shut the fuck up, bitch,” Clenney whispered.
[Screenshot via Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office]
Have a tip we should know? [email protected]
