New York — NEW YORK (AP) — Hip-hop mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs will remain behind bars after a judge on Wednesday denied the mogul’s bid to await his sex trafficking trial at his lavish Florida mansion. Instead, he will be held in the grim Brooklyn federal prison.
U.S. District Judge Andrew L. Carter ruled that Combs’ plan — which included a $50 million bail offer, GPS monitoring and strict restrictions on visitors — was “insufficient” to ensure the safety of the community and the integrity of his case.
Carter agreed with prosecutors who fought to keep Combs in prison, ruling that “no condition or set of conditions” stipulating his release would prevent him from posing a risk of threatening or harming witnesses — a central allegation in his case.
Combs’ attorneys made their second attempt in as many days to free Combs from the Metropolitan Detention Facility, where he has been held since pleading not guilty Tuesday to charges that he physically and sexually abused women for years.
Combs has been in federal custody since his arrest Monday night at a Manhattan hotel. On Tuesday, a federal judge denied Combs’ initial request for bail. On Wednesday, he and his attorneys parted ways with Carter, the judge who will preside over the trial.
Defense attorney Mark Agnifilo said he will now ask the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to overturn Carter’s ruling and free Combs. In the meantime, he wants Combs moved from the Brooklyn Detention Center, where violence and horrific conditions abound, to a New Jersey prison. Carter said the decision on placement is entirely up to the Bureau of Prisons.
“I will not let him stay in prison one more day,” Agnifilo told reporters outside the court.
As the hearing began Wednesday, Combs looked at his family, patted his chest several times, and sat calmly as he listened to the arguments. Then, as federal agents led him away, his relatives solemnly hugged and clapped each other’s hands.
Combs, 54, is accused of using his “power and prestige” to drug female victims and male sex workers into elaborate sexual performances called “Freak Offs,” which Combs arranged, participated in and often recorded on video. According to the indictment, the events lasted for several days and Combs and the victims were often given IV fluids to help them recover.
The indictment alleges that Combs, with the help of a network of associates and employees, coerced and abused women for years, using kidnappings, arson, assaults and other violent acts and threats to keep the victims from speaking out.
In arguing to keep Combs in prison, prosecutor Emily Johnson told Carter that the once-popular rapper had a long history of threatening both accusers and witnesses to his alleged abuse. She cited text messages from women in which Combs allegedly forced them into “Freak Offs” and threatened to leak footage of them engaging in sexual acts.
Johnson said Combs’ defense team “minimized and grossly underplayed” Combs’ propensity for violence, and challenged his attorney’s portrayal of the 2016 assault at a Los Angeles hotel as a romantic altercation. Security video of the incident, released in May, shows Combs punching and kicking R, his then-girlfriend.&B-list singer Cassie is seen in the hotel hallway.
“What does that have to do with love?” Carter asked incredulously.
Johnson also seized text messages from a woman who said Combs dragged her down a hallway by her hair. According to Johnson, the woman told the rapper, “I’m not a rag doll, I’m somebody’s child.”
“There’s a long-standing pattern of abuse here,” Johnson said.
Combs’ Florida home is on Star Island, a man-made piece of land in Biscayne Bay near Miami Beach, accessible only by footpath or boat. It is one of the most expensive residences in the United States. Combs’ request is similar to those of wealthy defendants who have offered to pay millions of dollars in bail in exchange for house arrest in a luxurious setting.
If bail had been granted, Combs would have remained confined to his home, with visits limited to family, estate managers and friends who are not considered co-conspirators, his attorney said. After prosecutors said Tuesday they had obtained a search warrant for Combs’ private security director, his attorney suggested hiring a new firm to monitor him and ensure he complies with the proposed settlement.
Carter was unmoved and doubted whether the plan was a “perfect system.”
Many of the allegations in Combs’ indictment are similar to those in a lawsuit filed in November by Cassie, whose legal name is Casandra Ventura. Combs settled the lawsuit the next day, but the allegations have haunted him ever since.
The AP generally does not name people who allege sexual abuse unless they come forward publicly, as in Ventura’s case.
Without naming Ventura, Agnifilo argued that the entire criminal case was the result of a long-term, troubled but consensual relationship that was rocked by the affair. He argued that “Freak Offs” was an extension of that relationship and was not coercive.
“Sex and violence are completely separate and motivated by completely different things,” Agnifilo said, arguing that Combs and Cassie brought sex workers into their relationship because “that’s how two adults become intimate.”
Prosecutors have described the scope more broadly: They said they interviewed more than 50 victims and witnesses.
Like many older hip-hop figures, Bad Boy Records founder Combs cultivated a more genteel public image: a father of seven, he was a respected businessman whose annual Hamptons “white parties” were once a must-see for the jet-setting elite.
But prosecutors say he used the same companies, people and methods that brought him into power to facilitate the crimes. They say they will prove the charges with financial and travel records, electronic communications and videos of the “Freak Offs.”
Prosecutors said authorities raided Combs’ Los Angeles and Florida homes in March, seizing drugs, videos and more than 1,000 bottles of baby oil and lubricant. They said agents also seized firearms and ammunition, including three AR-15s with defaced serial numbers.
If convicted on all counts, he faces a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison, and a possible life sentence.
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This article has been edited to correct the spelling of Cassandra, Cassandra’s legal name. It’s not Cassandra.
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Dalton reported from Los Angeles.
