Damning new text messages were revealed Wednesday in the sex-trafficking case against Sean “Diddy” Combs — as a Manhattan judge ruled the hip-hop mogul would remain behind bars pending trial.
Manhattan federal Judge Andrew Carter, Jr. said Combs’ proposal for home detention and electronic monitoring on $50 million bail were “insufficient” – upholding a magistrate judge’s Tuesday ruling to remand him.
Prosecutor Emily Johnson, during the hearing on Combs’ bail request, used messages between the Bad Boy Records founder and his alleged victims to bolster her argument that he should remain jailed.
One victim allegedly messaged Combs on Nov. 19 after reading allegations in Cassie Ventura’s Nov. 16 lawsuit against the rapper, saying Ventura’s claims sounded like her own.
“I feel like I’m reading my own sexual trauma,” the message, read in court by the prosecutor, said
“It makes me sick how three solid pages word for word is exactly my experiences and my anguish,” the alleged victim wrote.
Johnson said prosecutors have recordings in which Combs “gaslit” the woman and “attempted to convince her that she had willingly engaged in sex acts with him.”
She also read out messages Combs allegedly sent to Ventura after the infamous caught-on-video attack that he unleashed on his ex-girlfriend, an R&B singer once signed to his label.While Ventura’s name was not said in court, it was clear who the parties were referring to when referencing the March 5, 2016 assault, footage of which was made public by CNN in May.
“Call me, the cops are here,” Combs texted her, according to Johnson. “I got six kids. You, please call. I’m surrounded. You gonna abandon me all alone.”
She replied: “I have a black eye and a fat lip. You are sick for thinking it’s okay to do what you’ve done. I still have crazy bruising.”
Johnson also read messages an unnamed victim wrote to Combs that said, “You always want to show me that you have the power, and you knock me around. I’m not a rag doll. I’m someone’s child.”
If Combs were freed, it could keep witnesses from testifying against him, the prosecutor said.
“Witnesses have expressed to us their extreme fear of the defendant,” Johnson told the judge.
Combs’ defense attorney, Marc Agnifilo, assured the judge his client would make all of his court appearances and would abide by their proposed bail conditions — including the promise he wouldn’t have women over in Miami, Florida home where he proposed the detention take place.
“A jury of 12 New Yorkers found him not guilty,” Agnifilo said, referencing a 2001 shooting incident in Manhattan.
Peoplesmind
