NEW YORK (AP) — Sean “Diddy” Combs faces federal intercourse trafficking and racketeering prices in an indictment, unsealed Tuesday, claiming he hit and abused girls for over a decade and presided over a sordid empire of sexual crimes.
The music mogul “engaged in a persistent and pervasive sample of abuse towards girls and different people,” in response to an indictment unsealed Tuesday.
The indictment particulars allegations relationship to 2008 that he abused, threatened and coerced girls for years “to meet his sexual wishes, defend his fame, and conceal his conduct.” He’s accused of inducing feminine victims and male intercourse staff into drugged-up, generally dayslong sexual performances dubbed “Freak Offs” within the indictment. It additionally refers obliquely to an assault on his former girlfriend, the R&B singer Cassie, that was captured on video.
Combs was arrested late Monday in Manhattan, roughly six months after federal authorities conducting a intercourse trafficking investigation raided his luxurious houses in Los Angeles and Miami. He was due in court docket Tuesday to face the fees.
Over the previous 12 months, Combs has been sued by individuals who say he subjected them to bodily or sexual abuse. He has denied a lot of these allegations, and his lawyer, Marc Agnifilo, stated exterior the courthouse Tuesday morning that Combs would plead not responsible and that he would “battle like hell” to attempt to get his shopper launched from custody.
Of Combs, Agnifilo stated, “His spirits are good. He’s assured.”
The indictment describes Combs, 54, as the pinnacle of a prison enterprise that engaged or tried to have interaction in actions together with intercourse trafficking, compelled labor, interstate transportation for functions of prostitution, drug offenses, kidnapping, arson, bribery and obstruction of justice. He’s accused of placing, punching and dragging girls on quite a few events, throwing objects and kicking them — and enlisting his private assistants, safety and family workers to assist him conceal all of it.
Combs and his associates wielded his “energy and status” to “intimidate, threaten, and lure” girls into his orbit, “typically underneath the pretense of a romantic relationship,” the indictment says. It says he then would use pressure, threats and coercion to get the ladies to have interaction in with male intercourse staff within the “Freak Offs” — “elaborate and produced intercourse performances” that Combs organized, directed, masturbated throughout and infrequently recorded.
He generally organized to fly the ladies in and ensured their participation by procuring and offering medication, controlling their careers, leveraging his monetary help, and utilizing intimidation and violence, in response to the indictment.
The occasions might final for days, and Combs and victims would typically obtain IV fluids “to get better from the bodily exertion and drug use” from “Freak Offs,” the indictment stated. It stated his workers facilitated “Freak Offs” by arranging journey, reserving lodge rooms the place they’d happen and stocking these rooms with provides, together with medication, child oil, lubricants, additional linens and lighting, scheduling the supply of IV fluids, after which cleansing the rooms afterward.
Throughout a search of Combs’ houses in Miami and Los Angeles this 12 months, legislation enforcement seized narcotics and greater than a thousand bottles of child oil and lubricant, in response to the indictment. Brokers additionally seized firearms and ammunition, together with three AR-15s with defaced serial numbers, the indictment stated.
It alleges that, unbeknownst to his victims, Combs generally saved his movies of them partaking in intercourse acts and used the recordings as “collateral” to make sure the ladies’s continued obedience and silence. He additionally exerted management over victims by promising profession alternatives, offering and threatening to withhold monetary help, dictating how they regarded, monitoring their well being data and controlling the place they lived, in response to the indictment.
As the specter of prison prices loomed, Combs and his associates pressured witnesses and victims to remain silent, together with by trying to bribe them and offering them with a false narrative of occasions, the indictment says.
All of this, prosecutors allege, was taking place behind the facade of Combs’ international music, way of life and clothes empire.
Combs was acknowledged as probably the most influential figures in hip-hop earlier than a flood of allegations that emerged over the previous 12 months turned him into an trade pariah.
In November, Cassie, whose authorized title is Casandra Ventura, filed a lawsuit saying he had overwhelmed and raped her for years. She accused Combs of coercing her, and others, into undesirable intercourse in drug-fueled settings.
The go well with was settled in sooner or later, however months later, CNN aired lodge safety footage exhibiting Combs punching and kicking Ventura and throwing her on a flooring. After the video aired, Combs apologized, saying, “I used to be disgusted once I did it.”
The indictment refers back to the assault, with out naming Ventura, and says Combs tried to bribe a lodge safety staffer to remain mum about it.
Combs and his attorneys denied comparable allegations made by others in a string of lawsuits.
Douglas Wigdor, a lawyer for Ventura, stated in an announcement Tuesday that “neither Ms. Ventura nor I’ve any remark.”
“We admire your understanding and if that modifications, we will definitely let ,” he added.
A lady stated Combs raped her 20 years in the past when she was 17. A music producer sued, saying Combs compelled him to have intercourse with prostitutes. One other girl, April Lampros, stated Combs subjected her to “terrifying sexual encounters,” beginning when she was a university scholar in 1994.
The AP doesn’t sometimes title individuals who say they’ve been sexually abused except they arrive ahead publicly, as Ventura and Lampros did.
Combs, the founding father of Dangerous Boy Data, has gotten out of authorized bother earlier than.
In 2001, he was acquitted of prices associated to a Manhattan nightclub capturing two years earlier that injured three folks. His then-protege, Shyne, was convicted of assault and different prices and served about eight years in jail.
Related Press writers Jennifer Peltz in New York and Andrew Dalton in Los Angeles contributed to this report.
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