Sean “Diddy” Combs faces sentencing Friday in a sordid legal case that might preserve him locked up for years.
The hip-hop mogul was convicted in July of flying folks across the nation for sexual encounters, together with his girlfriends and male intercourse employees, in violation of the federal Mann Act.
A jury acquitted Combs, 55, of extra critical racketeering conspiracy and intercourse trafficking expenses that might have put him away for all times.
Prosecutors say he ought to spend greater than 11 years in jail for his conviction on two counts of transportation to have interaction in prostitution. Combs’ legal professionals need him freed now, saying the lengthy sentence sought by prosecutors is “wildly out of proportion” to the crime.
U.S. District Choose Arun Subramanian, who will resolve the sentence, has signaled that Combs is unlikely to be freed quickly. He twice rejected bail for the rapper, who has been jailed at a federal detention middle in Brooklyn since his arrest a 12 months in the past.
The sentencing comes after an almost two-month trial that includes testimony from ladies who described being crushed, threatened, sexually assaulted and blackmailed by Combs.
A former girlfriend, R&B singer Casandra “Cassie” Ventura, mentioned Combs ordered her to have “disgusting” intercourse with strangers a whole bunch of occasions throughout their decade-long relationship.
The jury was repeatedly proven video clips of Combs dragging and beating Cassie in a Los Angeles lodge hallway after a type of multiday sexual marathons, which she known as “freak-offs” throughout her 4 days of testimony.
A girl who testified beneath the pseudonym “Jane” informed jurors she too was subjected to violence and felt obligated to carry out sexually with male intercourse employees at drug-fueled “lodge nights” whereas Combs watched and generally filmed.
To help their racketeering case, prosecutors additionally introduced on witnesses who testified about different violent acts. A former private assistant testified that Combs raped her. One among Cassie’s associates informed the jury Combs dangled her from a seventeenth ground balcony. The rapper Child Cudi testified that Combs broke into his residence after studying he and Cassie have been relationship.
Though the jury acquitted Combs of racketeering, the choose can nonetheless think about that testimony as he decides the sentence.
Subramanian can be contemplating letters submitted by Combs and a few of his accusers.
In his letter to the choose Thursday, Combs promised he would by no means commit one other crime if launched, saying, “The previous me died in jail and a brand new model of me was reborn.”
In her letter, Cassie known as Combs a manipulative abuser who has “no real interest in altering or changing into higher.”
“He’ll at all times be the identical merciless, power-hungry, manipulative man that he’s,” she wrote.
A former private assistant who mentioned Combs raped her in 2010 requested Subramanian to ship a sentence “that takes into consideration the continued hazard my abuser poses to me, and to others.” The previous assistant, who testified beneath the pseudonym “Mia,” is anticipated to talk at Friday’s sentencing.
Combs will deal with the courtroom, in accordance with courtroom filings. His protection workforce can be planning to play a roughly 11-minute video.
Combs’ legal professionals say the sexual encounters have been consensual and that being in jail has hastened Combs’ sobriety and compelled him to study from his misbehavior. They’ve mentioned there isn’t a want for him to stay behind bars as a result of he has already been punished sufficient.
At a courtroom listening to final week, Combs appeared buoyant, as he informed his mom and youngsters that he’s “getting nearer to going residence.”
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