WARNING: This story contains allegations of sexual violence and may affect those who have experienced it or know someone affected by it.
Sean (Diddy) Combs was convicted of prostitution-related offences on Wednesday, but acquitted of sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy charges that could have put one of hip-hop’s most celebrated figures behind bars for life.
The mixed result came on the third day of deliberations in a New York City courtroom. It could still send Combs, 55, to prison for years, and is likely to end his career as a music executive, fashion entrepreneur, brand ambassador and reality TV star.
After hearing the verdict, Combs held his hands up in a prayer motion, looked at the jury and hugged defence lawyer Teny Geragos.
Combs was convicted of flying people around the country, including his girlfriends and paid male sex workers, to engage in sexual encounters, a felony violation of the federal Mann Act.
That 1910 law originally prohibited the interstate or foreign commerce transport of a woman or girl “for prostitution, debauchery or for any other immoral purpose.”
A 1986 update made the law gender-neutral and effectively ended the Act’s role in trying to legislate morality by changing “debauchery” and “immoral purpose” to “any sexual activity for which any person can be charged with a criminal offence.”
But the jury of eight men and four women acquitted Combs of racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking charges, related to allegations that he used his money, power and physical force to manipulate his girlfriends into hundreds of drug-fuelled sex marathons with the men.
Judge adjourns court
Combs and his defence team argued that the women were willing participants and that none of his violence justified the severity of the charges.
U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian adjourned the court while he weighs whether to grant Combs bail in the wake of the verdict.
Combs appeared overwhelmed as court adjourned for at least a few hours. He wiped his face, turning and kneeling at his chair, his head bowed in prayer. In the audience, his relatives stood and applauded as he faced them.
“I’ll be home soon,” he said.
“I love you, Mom,” he added.
Jurors deliberated for about 13 hours over three days before announcing their verdict. It came after they said late Tuesday that they had decided on four counts, but were stuck on the racketeering one. At that point, the judge told them to keep deliberating and keep the partial verdict under wraps.
Combs has been behind bars since his arrest in September. His lawyers argued that the acquittal on the most serious counts changed the legal landscape enough that he should get bail.
There’s no date yet for sentencing, when the judge will decide on Combs’s punishment for the prostitution conviction.
Combs did not testify at his trial, which featured 34 witnesses as well as videos of the rapper attacking his former girlfriend, the R&B singer Cassie.
Cassie, whose real name is Casandra Ventura, testified for four days about her turbulent 11-year relationship with Combs, which began after she signed with his Bad Boy record label.
Cassie said Combs became obsessed with voyeuristic encounters, arranged with the help of his staff, that involved sex workers and copious amounts of baby oil. During the sex events, called “freak-offs” or “hotel nights,” Combs would order Cassie to do things with other men that she found humiliating, she testified.
When things didn’t go Combs’s way, he would beat her, she said.
“I’m not a rag doll. I’m somebody’s child,” Cassie told Combs after he dragged her down a hotel hallway in 2016.
Another ex-girlfriend, testifying under the pseudonym “Jane,” told the jury she repeatedly told Combs she didn’t want to have sex with the men hired for their trysts.
“I’m not an animal. I need a break,” she told him. Nevertheless, she said she felt “obligated” to comply with his demands, in part because he paid her rent.
Witness testimony
The trial’s most famous witness, rapper Kid Cudi, said Combs broke into his home in late 2011 after learning he and Cassie were dating. After his car was firebombed a few weeks later, Cudi — whose real name is Scott Mescudi — said he knew Combs “had something to do” with it. Combs denied it.
Combs’s defence team acknowledged he could be violent, but argued prosecutors were intruding in Combs’s personal life. In his closing remarks to the jury, defence lawyer Marc Agnifilo said it wasn’t illegal for Combs to make “homemade porn” with his girlfriends.
“They go into the man’s bedroom. They go into the man’s most private life. Where is the crime scene?” Agnifilo said.
While Jane described violence — like a night when Combs choked her, punched her face, leaving welts and a black eye, when she resisted an encounter with a sex worker — she also acknowledged on the witness stand that her feelings are complicated.
She testified that she still loves Combs and had planned to meet him in New York for one last “hotel night” when he was arrested last September.
Support is available for anyone who has been sexually assaulted. You can access crisis lines and local support services through this Government of Canada website or the Ending Violence Association of Canada database. If you’re in immediate danger or fear for your safety or that of others around you, please call 911.
