After 34 witnesses and six weeks of brutal and graphic testimony, federal prosecutors rested their case against Sean “Diddy” Combs this week.
And his defense team took an unexpected tactic: opting not to present a single witness, including the hip-hop mogul himself.
In doing so, legal experts said they were taking a gamble and sending a message: That for all the evidence, the feds did not prove the slew of felonies including racketeering and sex trafficking.
From the beginning, Diddy’s legal team has said that for all the mogul’s flaws and questionable behavior, the charges went too far.
“The burden of proof is 100% on the prosecution, and so it’s not uncommon in criminal trials that the defense rests without putting on a single witness,” said Dmitry Gorin, a former sex crimes prosecutor. The defense team believes there is “reasonable doubt based on the prosecution’s case.” Jurors, he said, will likely endorse Combs’ not-guilty plea.
Jeff Chemerinsky, a former federal prosecutor, said the Combs’ lawyers believe the jury is listening to their narrative. “The theory of the defense seems to be that Diddy did really horrible things, but they don’t meet the elements of the crimes charged.” He said they did not call their own witnesses because “they had already made that point through cross-examination of the government witnesses.”
It’s impossible to know how the jury took in the prosecution‘s case, which included shocking testimony of violence, threats, payoffs and other bad behavior by Combs and his inner circle.
Prosecutors hammered home their case in closing arguments Thursday.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Christy Slavik told jurors Combs “counted on silence and shame” to enable and prolong his abuse and used a “small army” of employees to harm women and cover it up, according to the Associated Press.
Combs “doesn’t take no for an answer,” she added.
At the heart of the case are three women who described graphic sexual assaults, including Combs’ one-time lover, Casandra “Cassie” Ventura, who the defense acknowledged was a key witness for prosecutors.
It was Ventura’s lawsuit in 2023 that set off the unraveling of Combs’ enterprise with its details of sex, violence and freak-offs. Witnesses testified Combs gave the women ketamine, ecstasy and GHB to “keep them obedient and compliant” during the performances.
His last former girlfriend, referred to only as Jane in court, described how the freak-offs and coerced sex continued even after the lawsuit and a raid by Homeland Security Investigations in 2023 until his arrest last year. A former employee, testifying under the pseudonym Mia, also testified that she was sexually assaulted.
The federal indictment alleges that Combs and his associates lured two of the women under the pretense of a romantic relationship. Combs then allegedly used force, threats of force, coercion and controlled substances to get women to engage in sex acts with male prostitutes.
“By resting without calling a single witness, the defense must feel good about the case they built through cross-examination,” said Neama Rahami, a former federal prosecutor and defense attorney.
While the testimony against Combs was graphic and detailed, Rahami said the defense hopes jurors will question why those on the stand did not report the behavior to authorities at the time and in some cases stay in Combs orbit.
Combs’ alleged “criminal enterprise” threatened and abused women and used members of his enterprise to engage in sex trafficking, forced labor, interstate transportation for purposes of prostitution, coercion and enticement to engage in prostitution, narcotics offenses, bribery and obstruction of justice, prosecutors said.
On Wednesday, prosecutors dropped the charges of attempted kidnapping, attempted arson and aiding and abetting sex trafficking as they sought to streamline the jury instructions. The moves don’t change the underlying case theory and prosecutors can still argue he kidnapped Ventura and Cassida Clark, a former assistant, and orchestrated the fire bombing of Kid Cudi’s sports car.
Under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, known as RICO, there are 35 specific offenses, including murder, bribery, and extortion, and federal prosecutors need to show a pattern involving at least two overt acts as part of a criminal enterprise.
People typically think of the mob, street gangs or or drug cartels. But any loose association of two or more people is enough, like Combs’ entourage, Rahami said.
Prosecutors must also show a pattern of racketeering or two or more RICO predicate acts over a 10-year period.
That’s why the evidence of alleged bribery, kidnapping, obstruction, witness tampering and prostitution is important to the prosecution’s case, legal experts say.
In her closing argument, Slavik said racketeering law applies when someone commits crimes as part of a group, and in Combs’ case, “The defendant was a powerful man, but he became more powerful and dangerous because of his inner circle, his businesses — the enterprise,” she told jurors, according to AP.
It will be up to the jurors to determine whether federal prosecutors have proved the RICO charge.
R&B singer Ventura, who had a long relationship with Combs, testified early in the trial.
Ventura told jurors she felt “trapped” in a cycle of physical and sexual abuse, and that the relationship involved 11 years of alleged beatings, sexual blackmail and a rape.
She said Combs threatened to leak videos of her sexual encounters with numerous male sex workers while drug-intoxicated and covered in baby oil as he watched and orchestrated the freak-offs.
One of those freak-offs led to an infamous hotel beating, Ventura testified. Video from that March 2016 night shows Combs punching and kicking Ventura as she cowers and tries to protect herself in front of an L.A. hotel elevator bank. He then drags her down the hall by her hooded sweatshirt toward their hotel room.
A second angle from another camera captures Combs throwing a vase toward her. She suffered bruising to her eye, a fat lip and a bruise that prosecutors showed was still visible during a movie premiere two days later, where she donned sunglasses and heavy makeup on the red carpet.
A cover-up then ensued, according to prosecutors. Ventura stated that the police visited her apartment. She answered a few of their questions, but told the jury she still wanted to protect Combs at the time.
“I would not say who I was talking about,” she told the jury. “In that moment, I did not want to hurt him in that way. There was too much going on. It was a lot.”
Eddie Garcia, the InterContinental Hotel security guard, testified that Combs gave him a brown paper bag containing $100,000 in cash for the video.
Garcia said after his supervisor agreed to sell the video recording, he met with Combs, Combs’ chief of staff Kristina Khorram and a bodyguard. After Garcia raised concerns about the police, he said Combs called Ventura on FaceTime, handed him the phone and told Ventura to tell Garcia that she also wanted the video “to go away.” After that, Garcia said he took the money and split it with co-workers.
Capricorn Clark, a former assistant to Combs, recalled a 2011 violent incident with Combs. Clark told jurors Combs forced her from her apartment at gunpoint to go with him to musician Kid Cudi’s home in December 2011. Once there, Combs and Clark entered the empty house, and then Cudi, whose real name is Scott Mescudi, showed up.
To avoid getting law enforcement involved, Clark testified, Combs ordered her to call Ventura, who was at that time Combs’ ex-girlfriend, and said they needed to convince Cudi not to snitch to the cops.”If you guys don’t convince him of that, I’ll kill all you m—,” Clark quoted Combs saying.
Cudi testified that his Porsche was later firebombed in his driveway with a Molotov cocktail.
Bryana Bongolan, a friend of Ventura, testified that Combs dangled her over a 17-story balcony and tossed her onto balcony furniture in September 2016, saying, “I will never forget him holding me on that balcony.”
Combs’ attorneys, however, then provided evidence that he was across the country at the time of the alleged incident.
