Federal prosecutors have added two expenses to Sean “Diddy” Combs ‘ indictment, increasing on allegations that the jailed hip-hop mogul engaged in intercourse trafficking as not too long ago as final yr.
A superseding indictment filed Friday (Apr 4) accuses Combs of utilizing power, fraud, or coercion to compel a girl to have interaction in business intercourse acts from a minimum of 2021 to 2024.
The indictment, returned by a federal grand jury in Manhattan, additionally alleges Combs was concerned in transporting the lady — recognized solely as Sufferer 2 — and different folks, together with business intercourse staff, to have interaction in prostitution throughout the identical timeframe.
The brand new expenses are along with racketeering conspiracy and intercourse trafficking expenses filed towards Combs when he was arrested last September. They enhance the full variety of expenses towards him from three to 5.
Combs, 55, is scheduled to face trial Could 5. He stays locked up at a federal jail in Brooklyn. A message in search of touch upon the brand new expenses was left together with his representatives.
Combs denies committing any crimes and has pleaded not responsible to the primary set of expenses, which allege that he coerced and abused girls for years with assist from a community of associates and staff, whereas silencing victims by means of blackmail and violence, together with kidnapping, arson and bodily beatings.
His arraignment on the brand new expenses has not been scheduled.
Federal prosecutors allege the I’ll Be Lacking You singer and Unhealthy Boy Information founder used his “energy and status” as a music star to induce feminine victims into drugged-up, elaborately produced sexual performances with male intercourse staff in occasions dubbed “Freak Offs”.
Central to the case is a March 2016 video exhibiting Combs hitting and kicking his then-girlfriend, R&B singer Cassie, in a Los Angeles lodge hallway. Prosecutors contend the assault occurred throughout a “Freak Off”. Combs’ legal professionals argue the footage was nothing greater than a “glimpse into a posh however decade-long consensual relationship” between the 2.
Combs’ legal professionals contend the case ought to by no means have been introduced and are preventing to dismiss a cost involving allegations he transported a male escort throughout state traces.
“The federal government has concocted a prison case primarily based totally on allegations that Mr Combs and two of his longtime girlfriends typically introduced a 3rd social gathering — a male escort — into their sexual relationship,” Combs lawyer Alexandra A E Shapiro wrote in a February court docket submitting.
“Every of the three expenses within the case are premised on the speculation that any such sexual exercise is a federal crime,” Shapiro added.
Friday’s superseding indictment is the second filed in Combs’ case.
Within the first, in January, federal prosecutors disclosed that their case concerned a minimum of three girls whom they mentioned Combs compelled to have interaction in business intercourse acts. In trade, prosecutors mentioned, he offered them with cash, profession alternatives and cost of lease and housing bills.
