Judge rejects Diddy bid to toss prostitution conviction
Luc Cohen and Jonathan Stempel |
A US judge has rejected a bid by Sean “Diddy” Combs to overturn his criminal conviction on felony prostitution-related charges, after prosecutors said the hip-hop mogul should spend more than 11 years in prison.
US District Judge Arun Subramanian in Manhattan found “overwhelming evidence of Combs’ guilt” related to his treatment of two former girlfriends: rhythm and blues singer Casandra Ventura, and a woman known in court as Jane.
Prosecutors said Combs arranged for male prostitutes to travel across state lines to engage in drug-fuelled sexual performances known as Freak Offs with his girlfriends, while he watched, recorded videos and masturbated.
Ventura and Jane testified that Combs physically attacked them, and threatened to cut off financial support if they resisted the performances.
“The government proved its case many times over,” the judge wrote. Subramanian on Tuesday also rejected arguments that evidence used to support the more serious racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking charges, on which Combs was acquitted, had tainted the prostitution case.
Lawyers for Combs did not immediately respond to requests for comment. A spokesperson for US Attorney Jay Clayton in Manhattan did not immediately respond to similar requests.
Combs, 55, was found guilty by a Manhattan jury on July 2 of two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution, following an eight-week trial. He had pleaded not guilty to all charges and is expected to appeal his conviction.
Prosecutors asked Subramanian to sentence Combs to 11 years and three months in prison at the scheduled October 3 sentencing. Defence lawyers asked for no more than 14 months, which if granted could result in Combs’ freedom in 2025 because he would get credit for time served at Brooklyn’s Metropolitan Detention Center since his arrest in September 2024.
Combs founded Bad Boy Records and is credited with popularising hip-hop in American culture.
But in seeking a 135-month sentence, prosecutors cited evidence at trial that Combs led a different life outside the public eye, physically beating his girlfriends and giving them illegal drugs.
“The defendant tries to recast decades of abuse as simply the function of mutually toxic relationships,” prosecutors wrote. “But there is nothing mutual about a relationship where one person holds all the power and the other ends up bloodied and bruised.”
In a letter to the judge, Ventura, known as Cassie, said Combs used violence, threats and drugs to “trap” her into Freak Offs, starting when she was 19.
“Sex acts became my full-time job,” Ventura wrote. “His power over me eroded my independence and sense of self until I felt I had no choice but to submit.”
Subramanian rejected Combs’ arguments that the prostitution convictions under the Mann Act should be thrown out because Combs lacked a financial motive and did not engage in sex he paid for.
The judge said it was enough that Combs transported escorts who were financially motivated, and intended for them to engage in prostitution.
He also said requiring Combs to have taken part in the sex “would narrow prostitution almost out of existence,” shielding even owners of brothels from prosecution.
Subramanian also said a conviction did not violate Combs’ First Amendment constitutional rights as “an amateur pornographer and consumer of pornography”, and that conduct did not become legal just because he filmed the sex performances.
While agreeing with Combs that the Mann Act has evolved since its 1910 passage, Combs’ conduct “sits at the heartland of the Act’s legitimate proscriptions. Unsurprisingly then, his conviction raises no constitutional problem”.
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Reuters
