For the second time in as many months, Sean “Diddy” Combs has been indicted on felony prices by the Division of Justice.
Heading in direction of a trial subsequent month that would see the Grammy winner in jail for the remainder of his life if discovered responsible by a jury, the 55-year-old Combs on Friday lashed out on the feds as soon as once more, claiming with the newest superseding indictment that they’re attempting to show his kinky intimate life into crimes.
“These usually are not new allegations or new accusers,” a spokesperson for the Dangerous Boy Data founder’s Marc Agnifilo- and Teny Geragos-led authorized group stated as we speak of the 2 new prices which have raised the whole prices in opposition to Combs to 5. “These are the identical people, former long-term girlfriends, who had been concerned in consensual relationships. This was their non-public intercourse life, outlined by consent, not coercion.”
Out of luck on three events attempting to get out of being incarcerated at Brooklyn’s Metropolitan Detention Middle, Combs’ already delayed trial is about to start out Might 12.
A second indictment handed down by a grand jury March 6 that included pressured labor claims outdated the unique indictment in September, when the much-accused Combs was arrested by LAPD and federal officers in a New York Metropolis resort foyer. That first indictment included one declare every of racketeering, intercourse trafficking and transportation to interact in prostitution.
Combs has beforehand denied all prices.
Backed up partly by the rapidly settled ($30 million) assault and abuse swimsuit and extra from Sufferer-1, aka former Combs girlfriend Cassie Ventura, the federal government claims Combs and his inside circle coerced ladies into marathon sexual encounters known as “freak-offs” that includes female and male prostitutes, drug use, threats of violence and imprisonment within the resort rooms the place the motion was staged and videotaped.
Sean “Diddy” Combs through the 2004 CFDA Style Awards on the Sean John/Zac Posen After Occasion in NYC
Johnny Nunez/WireImage
Within the now third indictment, the U.S. Lawyer’s workplace for the Southern District of New York is centering on an unnamed Sufferer-2 over the 2 further prices on Combs of intercourse trafficking and transportation to interact in prostitution. Between 2021 and 2024, the “I Want A Lady” performer “recruited, enticed, harbored, transported, and maintained Sufferer-2, and tried, aided and abetted, and willfully brought on Sufferer-2 to interact in industrial intercourse acts, figuring out and in reckless disregard of the truth that Sufferer-2 was partaking in industrial intercourse acts because of pressure, fraud, and coercion,” the brand new indictment says.
The doc filed Friday morning by the SDNY in Choose Arun Subramanian’s docket, the brand new parts of the newest indictment provides: “From a minimum of in or about 2021, as much as and together with in or about 2024, within the Southern District ofNew York and elsewhere, SEAN COMBS, a/ok/a “Puff Daddy,” a/ok/a “P. Diddy,” a/ok/a “Diddy,” a/ok/a “PD,” a/ok/a “Love,” the defendant, knowingly transported people in interstate and overseas commerce with intent that the people have interaction in prostitution, and tried, aided and abetted, and willfully brought on the identical, to wit, COMBS transported, aided and abetted, and willfully brought on the transportation of a number of people, together with however not restricted to Sufferer-2 and industrial intercourse staff, in interstate and overseas commerce on a number of events with the intent that they have interaction in prostitution.”
The SDNY had no remark when contacted by Deadline concerning the new indictment.
Prosecutors are hoping to make use of a beforehand schedule April 25 pretrial listening to to take care of Combs’ third arraignment. Nonetheless, it will be comparatively easy for the protection to throw up not all collectively unwarranted roadblocks of needing extra time to evaluate the brand new indictment or one thing alongside these traces. The end result may derail the feds’ anticipated timeline, and even push again the already as soon as pushed again trial begin.
Throwing one other potential spanner within the works, the protection could be very more likely to push again in opposition to the prosecution’s want to have measures put in place by the court docket to “defend” the identities plus the “dignity and privateness” of three of the 4 victims set to testify. Ventura has lengthy let it’s identified she intends to take the stand beneath her personal identify. Nonetheless, with allegations of intimidation and even witness tampering being revamped the months in opposition to Combs, the feds are attempting to alleviate the fears the opposite ladies have expressed about displaying up in court docket.
As Performing U.S. Lawyer Matthew Podolsky stated Friday in a closely redacted submitting:
To guard their privateness, the Authorities respectfully requests that the Court docket take sure narrowly tailor-made measures at trial which might be in step with the protections a number of victims of intercourse crimes have been afforded in latest federal trials inside this Circuit. Particularly, the Authorities requests that (1) Sufferer-2, Sufferer-3, and Sufferer-4 be referred to at trial utilizing solely pseudonyms; (2) the Court docket preclude the protection from eliciting personally figuring out particulars of these witnesses; and (3) the Court docket seal displays that include the primary and/or final names of Sufferer-2, Sufferer-3, and Sufferer-4, with redacted variations to be made accessible to the general public. This case has already obtained an distinctive quantity of media protection, which is able to presumably solely enhance as trial proceeds. Allowing these measures will forestall pointless public disclosure of the victims’ identities, and the harassment from the media and others, undue embarrassment, and different hostile penalties that may nearly actually observe if these ladies had been pressured to disclose their true names publicly at trial.
Up in opposition to dozens of civil actions (most from Houston-based lawyer Tony Buzbee) claiming assault and abuse by Combs, the as soon as mini-mogul has claimed earlier than that the actual difficulty at play in his felony trial is the prudishness of the federal government. Earlier this yr, Combs and his authorized group stated prosecutors are utilizing “racist” legal guidelines in opposition to him and wanting to “police non-conforming sexual exercise.” On February 24, the protection took a swing at “unconstitutionally broad” search warrants that had been used on Combs in raids of his Los Angeles and Miami properties, units, digital storage and extra.
Extra lately, Combs has sought to discredit the stunning 2016 video that CNN obtained final yr of the White Occasion host half-naked chasing Ventura down an L.A. resort hallway, beating her and dragging her again to his room the place allegedly one in every of his so-called freak offs was taking place. On March 13 this yr, CNN strongly denied Combs’ claims that they altered the timestamp and basically re-edited the violent footage.
