The team of federal prosecutors that oversaw Sean “Diddy” Combs’ sex trafficking and racketeering trial has recommended that the rap and fashion mogul be sentenced to 11 years and 3 months in prison and pay a $500,000 fine after being found guilty of two counts relating to the transportation of prostitutes.
The Department of Justice is asking the federal judge overseeing the case to throw the book at Combs, who was found not guilty of the more serious sex trafficking and racketeering charges the feds accused him of in a 2024 indictment that sent the once high-flying rapper into a downward career spiral.
In a 164-page sentencing memo sent to Judge Aron Subramanian, who oversaw the at times sensational federal trial, the prosecutors cited Combs’ unrepentant attitude and conduct while in federal lockup for the past 11 months in their filing regarding the recommendation. Also cited was the evidence presented at trial that he had allegedly physically beaten his girlfriends and given them illegal drugs during the so-called “freak off” sex sessions they held with sex workers.
“The defendant tries to recast decades of abuse as simply the function of mutually toxic relationships,” the prosecutors wrote in the memo. “But there is nothing mutual about a relationship where one person holds all the power and the other ends up bloodied and bruised.”
The rap mogul’s defense team argued in their sentencing memo that Combs should be handed no more than 14 months for the two guilty counts. After the rapper was found not guilty of three of the counts in the federal indictment, his attorney argued that he should be sent to home confinement. Prosecutors argued to the judge that, given his history of violence, Combs should remain in a Brooklyn federal lockup until he is sentenced on Friday, Oct. 3.
Judge Subramanian was convinced by this argument and other factors in play following the surprise split verdict and did not allow Combs to be sent home on bail. He has remained behind bars.
In a letter sent this week to Judge Subramanian, Combs’ partner of nearly a decade, singer Casandra “Cassie” Ventura, wrote that he used violence, threats and drugs to “trap” her into participating in freak-offs starting when she was 19 years old. Ventura was the star witness during Diddy’s trial, sharing harrowing details of the abuse she endured for years.
“He groomed me into performing repeated sex acts with hired male sex workers during multi-day ‘freak offs,’ which occurred nearly weekly. I was forced into lingerie and heels, told exactly how to look and plied with drugs and alcohol so he could control me like a puppet,” Cassie wrote. “These events were degrading and disgusting, leaving me with infections, illnesses and days of physical and emotional exhaustion before he demanded it all again. Sex acts became my full-time job, used as the only way to stay in his good graces.”
Another Combs girlfriend, identified as Jane Doe, also testified about abuse suffered at Combs’ hands over several years, including being chased from room to room by an infuriated Combs, eventually having to flee her home and wait nearby for him to leave. Testimony that she struck him before this incident seemed to weaken her credibility with the jury; this was also the case with instances of violence said to have been initiated by Ventura, as well. Both ex-girlfriends of Combs accepted gifts, rent payments and luxurious vacations from Combs over their years with him and at times, participated in the planning of freak-offs.
In her letter, Ventura wrote that she remains “very much afraid of what he is capable of and the malice he undoubtedly harbors towards me for having the bravery to tell the truth.”
Combs still faces several civil lawsuits for various alleged sexual assaults and other crimes; the suits flooded in from alleged victims after his federal indictment went public in September 2024.