The Hip-Hop Magnate Sean “Diddy” Comps arrived on the court for the opening comments of his trial for sexual trafficking, in which prosecutors will argue that the founder of Bad Boy Records used his fame and fortune to abuse women and in which the defense will argue that there is nothing criminal in a “liberal” lifestyle.
The mother of combs, Janice Comink, sat in the first row of the room with six of her grandchildren. Com combs wore a beige sweater on a white neck shirt and ruby pants. He smiled at his family and kissed them before sitting with his lawyers.
In the course of a two -month trial, the jury members are expected to listen to the testimony of three and possibly four of the rapper accusers, as well as their former employees who, according to prosecutors, helped organize and cover up their actions.
Combs, 55, has declared himself innocent of five serious conspiracy crimes to extort, trafficking and transport to exercise prostitution. If he is convicted of all charges, he faces a mandatory minimum penalty of 15 years and could be sentenced to life imprisonment.
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The jury of 12 members and six alternates was expected on Monday, which would pave the way for the initial allegations of the government and then the defense. The accusation would then call his first witness.
The accusations of sexual abuse in the criminal charges filed against Combs by the Office of the Federal Prosecutor of Manhattan last year, as well as more than 50 civil demands presented since November 2023, they added to other powerful men of the entertainment industry that have been accused of inappropriate sexual behavior due to the #Metoo movement, which encouraged women to talk about the abuse.
Who is they are ‘Diddy’ Combs?
Combs is known for making rap and Rhythm and Blues artists stars as notorious Big and Mary J. Blige and, incidentally, raise the general attraction of hip-hop in American culture in the 1990s and early 2000s.
Born in the Harlem neighborhood, in Manhattan, and raised by a single mother, combs lived in mansions of Miami and Los Angeles and organized lavish parties for the cultural elite in destinations such as the Hamptons and Saint-Tropez.
Prosecutors say their success concealed a dark side. For two decades, combs resorted to violence and threats to force women to participate in sexual shows of several days with male workers, known as “Freak Offs”, according to the accusation.
ComBs often looked at the actions, masturbated and filmed them, sometimes using recordings as blackmail to make sure that their alleged victims did not report their abuses, prosecutors say. In an incident of 2016 that was captured in hotel surveillance images that prosecutors plan to show the jury, combs was seen kicking and dragging a woman when she tried to get out of a “Freak Off”, prosecutors say.
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The CNN issued images last year that seemed to show combs attacking her ex -girlfriend, Rhythm and Blues Casandra Ventura singer in 2016 in the hall of a Los Angeles hotel. Comink apologized after the emission of the video.
With Reuters information
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