Sean ‘Diddy‘ Comb’s lawyers claim federal prosecutors are ‘polluting’ the Bad Boy mogul’s trial even before it begins and asked the court to block other witnesses from testifying.
The rapper’s attorney asked the judge to exclude ‘prior bad act’ witnesses from taking the stand in court, according to court documents obtained by DailyMail.com.
Combs’ attorney argued allowing potentially dozens of witnesses outside of the four victims tied to the rapper’s criminal indictment would be the ‘worst abuses of the character evidence rule in the history of American law’.
They also claim prosecutors do not plan to divulge the growing witness list until April 18 — just two weeks before jury selection for the high-profile case to begin in Manhattan federal court.
‘The allegations implicate dozens of unidentified witnesses and alleged co-conspirators around the world — and some of the key witnesses to the supposed incidents are dead,’ the defense attorneys wrote.
‘Collectively, these new allegations require many months if not years to investigate, and if admitted, would require a series of mini-trials certain to double the length of a trial the government originally said would last ‘three weeks’.
Attorneys for Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs claim it will be impossible for their client to get a fair trial because prosecutors plan to pack the witness list with people who will testify to ‘incendiary’ allegations
Defense attorney Teny Geragos, pictured on the right, has said there are ‘no celebrity sex tapes or minors’ connected to the criminal case against her client Sean Combs
The defense attorneys continued: ‘The Court should require the government to try the case it charged and prove that case to the jury beyond a reasonable doubt. The government should not be permitted to pollute the trial with decades of dirt and invite a conviction based on propensity evidence with no proper purpose by painting Mr. Combs as a bad guy who must have committed the charged crimes’.
Prosecutors filed a superseding indictment last week and added two more charges in his criminal case.
The updated indictment accuses Combs, 55, of one count of racketeering conspiracy, two counts of sex trafficking by force, fraud or coercion and two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution.
Combs has denied all the charges and claim the alleged victims were ex-girlfriends, who consented to the alleged incidents.
Four witnesses, including former girlfriend Cassie Ventura, have been named as victims in the indictment.
Combs allegedly forced the victims into ‘freak off’ sex parties, sometimes with male prostitutes, that lasted for days.
Prosecutors have said Ventura plans to testify under her name, while the other alleged victims will be referred to by pseudonyms during the trial.
They have asked their identities not be revealed to the press or the public.
Ventura and Combs were in a decade-long relationship. The pair is pictured here during the ‘Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop: a Bad Boy Story’ film premiere in Los Angeles on June 2017. Prosecutors said in a court filing last week that Cassie Ventura will be testifying under her own name
The new sex trafficking count claims Diddy allegedly caused ‘Victim 2′ to engage in commercial sex acts’ knowing they only did so due to ‘force, fraud and coercion’.
The transportation to engage in prostitution count claims he ‘willfully caused the transportation of multiple individuals with the intent they engage in prostitution’.
Prosecutors blasted defense attorneys and said testimony of ‘non-statutory victims’ should be included during the trial because it proved Combs’ intent to commit the charged crimes.
‘Given the graphic testimony that the Statutory Victims will collectively give about years’ worth of beatings, drug-fueled coercive sex marathons, and multiple rapes, the Non-Statutory Victims’ testimony will be no more inflammatory than the evidence that the jury will already have before it at this trial,’ prosecutors said in their April 7 response.
Prosecutors added that the law allows them to call ‘prior bad act’ witnesses to show Combs’ propensity to commit sexual assault.
Diddy appeared with gray hair during a March 14, 2025 appearance in Manhattan federal court before Judge Arun Subramanian
Prosecutors filed a superseding indictment on April 3, 2025 and added two more charges in Diddy’s criminal case
Prosecutors said the evidence that will be presented in court will prove Combs and his alleged co-conspirators ‘carried out a pattern of racketeering activity that included ‘persistent and pervasive’ abuse’ that ‘fulfilled the disgraced moguls sexual desires, while protecting his reputation’.
‘Victim testimony is at the heart of this trial, and for that reason the Government expects that the defendant will attack the credibility of the testifying victims, including through claims of fabrication, motive to lie, mistake, and faulty memory,’ prosecutors wrote in the affidavit. ‘Evidence of other sexual assaults by the defendant answers those attacks, lending credibility to the victims behind the similar accounts’.
Combs’ attorneys said a preliminary hearing is necessary on whether the prior bad act witnesses and other evidence should be allowed before the trial begins with jury selection on May 5.
‘At this point, there is no way of knowing whether the government possesses sufficient evidence such that a reasonable jury could find by a preponderance that each act happened,’ the defense argued in an affidavit. ‘And Mr. Combs expects to be able to establish beyond any doubt that at least some of the incidents never happened at all.
‘These are, quite simply, fabrications.’
Meanwhile, Combs faces dozens of lawsuits in New York, California, Nevada and Florida civil court from alleged victims who claim the disgraced Bad Boy mogul drugged and sexually assaulted them, and then used his power and influence to keep them quiet for years.
Combs also has denied all allegations against him claimed in the civil suits.
