Sean “Diddy” Combs was in a New York federal court on Friday, days ahead of his sex trafficking and racketeering trial.
Prior to Combs’ trial on May 5, there will be a pretrial conference. Judge Arun Subramanian made a ruling in the latest hearing allowing an expert witness to testify about a secret medical procedure undergone by one of the alleged victims. This testimony aims to demonstrate the severity of Combs’ actions and the extent of his control. However, the judge will have the final say on what questions prosecutors can ask on the day of the testimony, as per USA Today.
Furthermore, prosecutors have been granted permission to present a video allegedly depicting Combs assaulting his then-girlfriend, Cassie Ventura, at a California hotel in 2016. Despite the video being made public months before Combs’ arrest, it will be shown during the trial. Ventura, who will testify against Combs, is expected to do so under her real name, forgoing the use of a pseudonym.
In addition to the aforementioned evidence, federal prosecutors are seeking to restrict access to certain videos labeled as “freak off.” They are exploring options to limit the viewing of this footage to only the jurors during the trial, shielding the public and the press from its contents.
“These are extremely sensitive videos, they are going to involve videos of ‘freak offs,’” Assistant U.S. Attorney Madison Smyser said on Friday, according to Business Insider. “They involve other parties, victims, and, in some videos, Mr. Combs.”
On September 16, 2024, Combs was arrested outside a Manhattan hotel on federal charges of racketeering, sex trafficking, and transportation to engage in prostitution. Combs has been denied bail twice, as Judge Andrew L. Carter determined there was a “serious risk” of witness tampering in this case.
Combs’ legal team sought home detention with GPS monitoring. In exchange, they offered to post $50 million bail and to use Combs’ home as collateral.
“The government has proven the defendant is a danger. The bail package is insufficient even on risk of flight,” Carter said while denying Combs’ bail a second time.
In March 2024, federal authorities raided Combs’ homes in Holmby Hills, California, and Miami. Reports indicated that the raid was connected to an ongoing sex trafficking investigation that resulted in his arrest months later.
The reported raids also occurred four months after Ventura accused him of sex trafficking and abuse. In a multimillion-dollar lawsuit, she alleged that Combs drugged her and forced her to have sex with other men. The pair settled the lawsuit a day after its filing.
However, in May, a video surfaced showing Combs assaulting Ventura at a California hotel in 2016. After the video was released, Combs put out a video expressing remorse for his behavior.
Two more accusers came forward a week after Ventura’s lawsuit. One of the women claimed Combs drugged and raped her at Syracuse University in New York in 1991. Combs denied those allegations before a third accuser, Liza Gardner, levied similar allegations against him.
In that case, Gardner claimed Combs and singer-songwriter Aaron Hall drugged and raped her and a friend following an Uptown Records event in 1990. Gardner said she was 16 at the time of the incident. She also accused Combs of choking her a day after the assault
Days after footage of the 2016 assault was publicized, two more women filed lawsuits against Combs. One of those women was April Lampros, a New York Fashion Institute of Technology student who reportedly met Combs in 1994. Lampros accused Combs of sexually assaulting her on four occasions between the mid-1990s and the early 2000s.
Lampros claimed Combs promised to mentor her and connect her with executives in the fashion industry. Instead, Combs allegedly forced her to drink before raping her in a hotel room. Lampros recalled another instance in which Combs forced her to perform oral sex on her in a parking garage while a parking attendant watched.
Combs has been accused of committing or facilitating sexual abuse in at least 30 other lawsuits — including one, filed in October, which alleges he and Jay-Z raped a 13-year-old girl in New York in 2000. The accuser in that case had her lawsuit dismissed in February.
[Feature Photo: Mark Von Holden/Invision/AP, File]
