Prosecutors at Sean “Diddy” Combs’ upcoming federal intercourse trafficking trial can be allowed to current jurors with lodge surveillance footage that reveals the music mogul violently assaulting one in all his accusers in a Los Angeles hallway, a choose dominated Friday.
U.S. District Choose Arun Subramanian rejected efforts by Combs’ authorized staff to dam the explosive video, saying its evidentiary worth outweighs any threat of unfair prejudice to the 55-year-old defendant.
The ruling got here throughout a pretrial listening to in New York Metropolis because the court docket set key parameters for the trial, which begins Could 5.
Based on an AP report, Combs appeared in court docket wearing a yellow jail-issued uniform. His hair, as soon as jet black, has turned largely grey throughout his time on the Brooklyn federal detention heart, the place hair dye will not be permitted. He has been held there since his arrest in September.
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Through the listening to, prosecutors revealed that Combs had beforehand been provided a plea deal, which he declined.
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The surveillance footage, captured on March 5, 2016, on the InterContinental Lodge in Los Angeles’ Century Metropolis, reveals Combs, clad in a white towel, punching, shoving, and dragging R&B singer Cassie, identified in personal life as Casandra Ventura, his former girlfriend and protégé. He’s additionally seen throwing a vase in her course.
The video surfaced publicly solely in Could 2024 after CNN aired it. The community later submitted the footage to prosecutors following a subpoena.
Prosecutors have known as the video “crucial to the case.”
Based on Combs’ indictment, he tried to silence a lodge safety staffer with a bribe to maintain the incident beneath wraps. Cassie, who filed a now-settled lawsuit in November 2023 alleging years of abuse, claimed Combs paid $50,000 to acquire the footage.
Combs has pleaded not responsible to expenses together with racketeering conspiracy and intercourse trafficking. Prosecutors allege that over a span of years, he orchestrated a community of associates and workers to assist him abuse ladies, coercing them into sexual acts whereas deploying threats, violence, and intimidation ways equivalent to blackmail, kidnapping, arson, and bodily beatings.
Federal prosecutors say Combs exploited his fame and affect to lure ladies into drug-fueled, elaborately staged sexual encounters with male intercourse employees—ritualized occasions allegedly identified amongst his internal circle as “freak offs.”
A superseding indictment filed earlier this month added two new expenses, accusing Combs of forcing a lady into industrial intercourse acts between 2021 and 2024 by means of manipulation and intimidation.
Authorities count on 4 accusers to testify towards him at trial.
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Prosecutors consider the 2016 lodge assault proven within the footage occurred throughout one in all these “freak offs.” Combs’ authorized staff has countered that the video depicts moments from what they describe as a “complicated however decade-long consensual relationship.”
Following the video’s public launch, Combs issued an announcement on social media expressing regret, saying his habits was “inexcusable.”
“I take full accountability for my actions,” he stated. “I used to be disgusted then once I did it. I’m disgusted now.”
In a movement to exclude the footage, Combs’ lawyer Marc Agnifilo argued the video was “misleading” and misrepresented what really occurred. He claimed some segments have been artificially sped up or proven out of chronological order, making the footage unreliable.
Prosecutors responded that they’re collaborating with Combs’ authorized staff to finalize a mutually agreed model of the video for trial. That features consulting a video knowledgeable to sluggish the footage to its authentic pace, making certain jurors see an correct illustration of occasions.
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