Sean Diddy Combs faces a federal sex trafficking investigation following police raids described as military-level ambushes, prompting legal experts to note the Department of Homeland Security's likely involvement due to civil lawsuits. Commentators debate if this signifies a "Me Too" moment for hip-hop, contrasting Combs' alleged selfishness with the presumption of innocence in an era where social media narratives rapidly shift against figures like Kanye West and Travis Scott. Ultimately, the discussion underscores the tension between maintaining legal innocence amidst intense public scrutiny and the complex legacy of power dynamics within the music industry. [Automatically generated summary]
Transcriber: nvidia/parakeet-tdt-0.6b-v2, sat-12l-sm, and large-v3-turbo
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Diddy's Empire Under Siege00:04:06
His rap royalty and the king of a seemingly bulletproof billion dollar empire.
For Sean Diddy Coombs faces losing it all.
After a series of lawsuits accusing him of sexual misconduct, Police this week raided two of his properties as part of a federal investigation into sex trafficking.
The rappers lawyers called it an ambush and a gross use of military level force.
Ten years from now, we'll still be on track.
Diddy says he'll fight to prove his innocence.
But many are speculating that he's the thin end of a big wedge even foreshadowing a me too moment for rap was he a misogynist?
In a way, he's selfish.
He's a very selfish individual.
He wants the spotlight on him.
It's very much a shot.
It's something that I have a hard time believing in.
Diddy's always surround himself with young people that basically go out and do whatever he asked them to do.
Abusive relationships go both ways, but of course when you're a man, you're always seen as the villain, even if a woman attacks you first.
They did not need to come in guns blazing.
Remember, even though he may be a billionaire, he also deserves a presumption of innocence.
He's facing very serious allegations.
Well, join me now to discuss all this at the DJ and Digital Media Mogul, DJ Vlad, and Mark Curry, the former Bad Boy Records artist who worked closely with Sean Diddy Coombs.
So welcome to both of you.
DJ Vlad, a lot of people have wondered for a while, since the Me Too scandal first erupted with Harvey Weinstein and enveloped various industries, why rap and hip-hop pretty well emerged unscathed.
Do you think that what's going on now with Diddy is indicative of a sea change moment for rap and hip-hop?
Well, I don't think hip-hop has gone unscathed.
I mean, R. Kelly is essentially hip-hop, although he sings, but he is overlapping with hip-hop.
So this has been happening in hip-hop for a while.
You're seeing it happening with Russell Simmons.
So yeah, hip-hop has not been free and clear of this, something that everyone's had to deal with.
What do you make of what's happening with Diddy?
I mean, it's hard to say.
He hasn't been charged with anything.
I mean, it looks bad.
I mean, social media is having a field day.
They're calling him the diddler and they're saying no Diddy whenever they say something questionable.
But at the end of the day, it's not really up to social media or the public.
It's really up to the authorities.
And unlike an R. Kelly, Puffy has hundreds of millions of dollars and he's going to be able to get the absolute best defense.
And, you know, ultimately, we'll see what happens in the courtroom.
Mark Curry, you worked at Bad Boy Records.
You know Diddy well, worked with him for him.
Are you surprised by the revelations and by the FBI involvement?
To me, it took me by shock because it's almost like karma.
It's almost like what he's been doing, a lot of people accuse him of putting him through in life.
It's actually his time to honestly have to go through the same things.
So during those tribulations, what we had to learn was to just stay and fight and just do what you got to do.
And so if he has the fight in him, like Velaz says, then, you know, we're going to say that he's guilty until he's proven guilty.
I mean, he's innocent until proven guilty.
And we let the justice system do what they have to do because it's people that's in place that get paid to actually investigate these things.
So it was a shock, but it's very much a shock.
It's something that I have a hard time believing in.
What was he like to be around when you were working with him?
You know, it's his way of the highway, you know, very controlling.
He's a strong-headed person.
Respect and Gender Dynamics00:02:46
You know, it's cool working with him, but it doesn't create, it doesn't create, you know, like working with him and being famous with him and not having everything to go along with the show is just the thing.
So he's selfish.
He's a very selfish individual.
He wants the spotlight on him.
He wants to be a rapper.
So really he's a rapper and not a business.
He wants Bad Boy is a business.
It's a label.
So he's a rapper on the label.
So he's not just a label.
He's a rapper.
So Russell Simmons is not a rapper.
Or you don't, you know, it's just one of those kind of situations there.
You know, was he, from your experience, was he a misogynist?
In a way.
And before we, let me ask you this.
Can we break that word down right fast, one time?
So I want everybody to understand what that word is.
You ask a question.
A misogynist?
What is it?
Misogynist, yeah.
Okay, explain that word for me, please.
Well, misogyny is where a man would be instinctively, inherently hateful towards a woman because she's a woman.
And a lot of people feel a lot of lyrics in rap music and rappers over the years have been brazenly misogynist because actually a lot of their fan base like them to be.
Yes, you know, when you can say something like that, when you think about being famous and then you think about a female, sometimes a female can get the same energy that you get from being famous just by having her sexual organ.
So yes, you have men that come in competition with women over their souls.
So yes, getting into a woman's soul is definitely an accomplishment for a lot of people.
They say, hey, the females like me.
I'm famous and I'm handsome, whatever.
And then you get to enjoy those things with females.
So yes, it's just something that comes with being a male, I think, and pursuing females.
But I guess my point about Diddy was from your experience, did he treat women with respect or with disrespect?
No one gets really the respect.
It's hard to get respect from someone who's on that level of such as the level that he's on.
To get respect is something that they call you have to earn the respect.
So in order to get that respect, you have to stand down on it and you have to earn that respect.
He doesn't give respect, not to females, not to a lot of men, not to producers, friends.
The Bigger Picture Context00:14:44
You can just tell by the way that everyone that's around him and what's going on in their lives, you have all of the artists that's been in prison, a lot of artists that are dead.
So it's like, what has he done to help those people's families?
And then when you look at that, that's what I would call respect.
DJ Vlad.
DJ Vlad, I just wanted to talk about sort of bigger picture here.
You know, Sean Coombs is one of the most successful music artists, business people in the music business we've ever seen.
I mean, he's a billionaire from a variety of different strands coming off his music.
He's, you know, for many people, I think he's a genius when it comes to both making music and for the business of music.
And we live in an era where because of social media, it's very hard when you get into the eye of a storm like this.
It's very hard for him, a man we've just heard so compellingly from Mark Curry there, likes to be in control.
you suddenly feel like you're losing control and it's quite hard to control any narrative and it's quite hard to keep that narrative fair.
You know, we all want to believe in innocent till proven guilty, but it's almost impossible, isn't it, with social media?
Yeah, I mean, absolutely.
You're going to get judged one way or another.
But then again, there's always just the news cycle of it all.
If you look at last year, Kanye was getting canceled by everybody.
He had lost a billion dollar deal with Adidas.
Every major corporation from Universal to even the hardware company he was working with to release his music dropped him.
And now look, he has a number one song in the country.
Right?
I mean, that's just undeniable.
The number one song in the country is Kanye West featuring Ty Dollar signed Carnival.
So, and that was put out independently.
So it just kind of shows that people have a short memory.
And if you put out something that people enjoy, they'll forget and forgive and just enjoy whatever art that you have.
Just like, for example, Travis Scott, you know, when the whole, you know, concert happened and the kids died, his album was put on hold, Nike delayed a sneaker, everything else like that.
A year later, he put out his album once again and went number one, huge concert, huge merch, everything else like that.
People have a short memory.
So it's really going to be what ultimately happens.
And the only way he could really get canceled is if he gets put in prison like R. Kelly.
Mark, where does he rank Sean Coombs?
Purely on talent.
Where does he rank?
Purely on talent.
I think he comes in probably around a six on scale from one to ten.
He's not talented because he's not much of a great creator.
You know, he's a great spokesperson or a person to just be in the place of a thing, but not great as far as talent is concerned.
And, you know, I wanted to reiterate one thing that you just was talking about.
And we're talking about this system that's called the black ball system, where what happens is if you don't agree with someone like Puff, then you're up against a big system that won't.
Like, for an example, when I first released the book in 2009, it was very difficult for me to get an interview on my own radio stations here in Atlanta because they said that he was spending so much money on marketing, promoting Sirock and his liquors and his brands.
So they was like, it would be, it would be a conflict of interests.
So it's a lot of people who are in positions, such as Vallad.
Vallad, I'm glad to be on this platform with you today, but I've always been waiting for you to reach out to me to say, Mark, let's do an interview.
I've done one with Sean Press, but I was waiting on you.
And those kind of things that we put in place that prevent from us spreading this information, we have to know how to not do that.
So a lot of the things that I see in that system, I see within you and I as well, or you and other platforms as well.
And that's just something that we need to change.
We should also stand by Puff during these times.
We're not going to hold him accountable or guilty or say he's guilty until he's been proven guilty.
And I think that social media has a very powerful play on the outcome of this situation.
And if the situation comes out wrong and it's on the behalf of the social media's fault, then how do we address that?
Because we should not let him go down just for what we think.
Well, yeah.
No, no, I think that's an opinion many people share.
It's an ongoing problem.
We see it time and again.
Mark Curry, thank you very much indeed for joining us.
We're going to be joined now by someone who might be able to answer some of the more legal questions, Mark Garagos.
He's joining us in a moment.
Vlad, just a reaction to what Mark was saying there.
It comes back again to the innocent until proven guilty being so hard in the modern era that we're in.
If you were advising Sean Coombs, what would you advise him to be doing right now?
I think the best thing to do is just stay quiet and let the lawyers do their job.
I think trying to interject and defend yourself in any type of way usually just backfires.
So let the lawyers do their job.
He has the budget for the best lawyers in the country, and they're going to fight vehemently on his behalf.
So ultimately, if he just stays quiet and lets things happen, the uproar will start to die down.
I remember the uproar over the whole Cassie lawsuit when he settled right away.
It was just insane.
But then, you know, over time, people kind of started to forget about it a little bit, and then this happened again.
But ultimately, it's going to be up to him.
He's still going to be rich.
He still has a huge catalog.
I actually disagree with Mark Curry.
I think that Puffy is extremely talented to be able to take someone like a Biggie who is just an underground rapper, is overweight and has a lazy eye, and to turn him into a superstar and to be able to do this with artist after artist decade after decade.
That's a huge talent.
Just like a Quincy Jones.
Quincy may not have played all the instruments on Michael Jackson's thriller, but look what he helped put together.
So, yeah, that's my disagreement with Mark.
Well, I agree with you.
And actually, I've met Diddy a few times.
I've got to say, he was always extremely courteous and respectful when I met him.
And I was quite surprised about how critical Mark Curry was, really, about him as a person, basically implying he's disrespectful to everybody.
He's a control freak, etc.
I mean, that's quite a critical picture he painted there.
Let me bring in Mark Garagos, who's one of the top criminal defense lawyers in Hollywood.
Mark, great to see you again.
Where are we with this case?
FBI now made a move on Sean Diddy Coombs.
How significant is that?
And why do you think they've chosen now?
Well, I think that they're using, if you will, the civil lawsuits.
And when I say they, I'm talking about the Department of Justice and specifically the Southern District of New York.
They're using those as kind of a roadmap.
And this was, frankly, a very daring move by them and a very quick move.
Normally, with the feds, they move at a glacial pace.
This has been at warp speed.
And I think this is sending a message to potential witnesses that they better cooperate now or it's going to get dangerous.
I would believe that there are a number of people who are in the crosshairs.
That's the way the feds operate.
So this is serious business.
And for those who've not been following the detail of his case, what are we talking about here?
What is the crux of the case against him?
And what is the potential jeopardy for Diddy in this?
Well, by reverse engineering it, you've got the Department of Homeland Security as apparently the lead agency here.
If that's the case, then the allegations that are in the civil lawsuits that talk about trafficking and things of that nature are probably front and center.
And I say that because it looks to me at least based on, and I'm piecing it together, based on what I've seen, it looks like that's what they're running to ground to make sure that if that's what's happening, that they've explored it and at least have given witnesses an opportunity to respond.
It really is somewhat over the top in some sense, because I don't think that at any point he was going to flee or do anything else.
They did not need to come in, guns blazing, so to speak.
I know that there's allegations of guns and drugs and things like that.
But to give you a perfect example, yesterday they were reporting that they had arrested somebody at the airport.
He was fleeing in a private jet.
of that stuff that was coming out my understanding is is that he was planning on going on spring break with his daughters and so that's why the airplane was uh there and that the gentleman who was arrested and variously described as a mule so to speak it was nothing more than allegedly personal use so before we get all overheated let's try and put it in context and remember even though he may be a billionaire he also deserves a presumption of innocence.
Yeah.
And in fact, just before you joined us, we were talking about the problem of social media and how difficult it is to control stories like this when conspiracy theories run wild, whether it's to do with Diddy now or whether last week it was the Princess of Wales and what was wrong with her and so on.
And that brings me to an odd part of this story, Mark, which is Prince Harry being named in the lawsuit because apparently Coombs is said to have drawn guests, it says, to his infamous parties through VIP associations with celebrities like famous athletes, political figures, artists, musicians, and international dignitaries like British Royal Prince Harry.
That's got a lot of attention, a lot of headlines.
What's the purpose of them including Prince Harry in that way, do you think?
I think it was clearly because they wanted to try to titillate.
I mean, look, anybody who knows Sean knows he's been throwing a white party for as long as I can remember.
I've actually attended the white party and met a number of people there.
There was nothing untoward going on at the parties themselves.
He's done them in LA.
He's done them in the Hamptons.
There's, you know, part of what is hard to reconcile here is some of these wild and frankly outlandish allegations with what you actually have as evidence or no.
And I've been around and in full disclosure, I've represented him on multiple occasions, and I haven't seen anything that would suggest kind of the titillation or the outlandish kinds of allegations that I've seen floating around.
But Pierce, you make a great point.
10 days ago, we were seeing some of the most outrageous things about the princess being floated around on social media.
And it turns out all of those were dead wrong.
I can't tell you how often I see that with clients and situations I'm involved in.
I mean, Prince Harry's front page of a few newspapers over here in the UK.
If you were him, how would you be feeling about being dragged into this on such what appears to be such a spurious context?
Well, when you see one of the lawsuits that was filed where they compare one of Diddy's employees to the version of Delane Maxwell, so they're trying to draw that.
And then if you throw in Prince Harry, then you get the reminiscent of Andrew with Epstein.
So I understand what's being done.
It's a very creative use of the legal process in order to draw the attention.
And to some extent, it has worked so far because you now have the feds going full bore in his direction.
DJ Vlad, talking about Diddy's circle, the people around him, he's obviously very rich, very successful.
What kind of team does he has, to your knowledge?
I mean, Diddy has always surrounded himself with young people that basically go out and do whatever he asked them to do.
I remember when I was on Drink Champs recently, I talked about an incident years and years ago where we were at a club and Diddy was there as well as me.
And a guy that was working with Diddy approached me and said that Diddy really liked my jacket and asked if he could buy it off me.
I said, no, thank you.
But that was people's job.
You're wearing it now?
No, I'm not wearing it now.
I don't have the jacket anymore.
I do like that jacket, so I'm just asking.
It's available.
Thank you.
I dressed next.
But yeah, no, Diddy offered it.
He said, hey, you know, Diddy loves the jacket.
He's asking if you want to sell it to him right now.
And I remember it was like winter outside.
And I said, ah, no, thank you, man.
You probably could have got a good price in that moment.
Maybe, maybe.
But I think just taking off my jacket and selling it to another man right then and there just felt a little too weird for me.
What is your sense about what kind of person he is now, Diddy?
Now he's made his money, made his wealth, made his fame, made his fortune.
Has he changed from what you hear?
Is he still the same guy?
You know, again, I come back to what Mark Curry was saying, painting quite a critical picture of this guy, you know, a control freak, disrespectful, treated everybody pretty much as lesser individuals.
Is that your sense of Diddy?
And is that what you hear about him?
Well, I don't really know Diddy.
I interviewed him 10 years ago when he was first launching Revolt.
I ran into him here and there.
You know, ultimately, people are going to be people.
I remember I had a conversation with Roger Bonds, who used to be his security guy.
And we were talking about the whole allegations of abuse with Cassie.
And what he said when he personally saw was that he'd be in the car with both of them, and suddenly Cassie would punch Diddy in the face.
And then Diddy would jump back there and they would start scuffling and everything else like that.
So, you know, I mean, he's going to have messed up relationships just like the rest of us.
Abusive relationships go both ways.
But of course, when you're a man, you're always seen as the villain, even if a woman attacks you first.
You know, you see what's, you know, 15 years later, Chris Brown still can't perform at NBA celebrity games because the whole Rihanna story.
Personal Relationships Exposed00:04:15
So it's one of those things.
I think ultimately he has calmed down quite a bit and he has mellowed out and so forth.
But I think men are going to be men and people are going to be people.
And if pushed to a certain direction, people are going to react how they're going to react.
Mark Garagos, you've acted for him.
What kind of person did you find him to be?
Look, he is intense and he is hard driving, but you can say that, Pierce.
And in fact, I was watching a little bit about one of the other people that you've talked about.
I mean, that goes with the territory.
I mean, you know, people who are successful share a lot of the common traits.
One of the things that the picture that is being painted is not something that I have seen or experienced.
And I've spent hours and hours over years representing him on various things and just haven't seen it.
I mean, it's almost a caricature.
Also, and to your question, the people that he surrounds himself with, I've known, met, and consider many of the people around him quality, the highest quality people.
I won't mention their names for fear of having them get into the crosshairs, but I can think of two or three off the top of my head who I just think the world of.
So I'm not so sure that the picture that is being painted has any relationship whatsoever to the reality here.
I understand that we live in an era where it is, you know, you mentioned Chris Brown, and I represented Chris Brown in that incident with Rihanna.
Rihanna quickly, for those who don't remember, actually came to court to support Chris during those proceedings.
I was there.
She was at my office.
We went to court.
And, you know, there's a forgiveness in the personal relationships that somehow doesn't seem to kind of spill over into other situations.
And in Diddy's case, Some of the things that I've heard are just so over the top and bear no connection to the things that I've seen personally that it's hard to, it's hard to reconcile.
If he is convicted of these kind of offenses, sex trafficking and so on, they're obviously very serious.
What kind of jail time could he be looking at?
Look, I always hesitate to speculate on things like that.
I remember a client once, when my father was alive, he was my partner, and the client asked him, how much time can I do?
And he told her, and she came running into my office, your daddy scare me.
And, you know, I don't want to answer honestly.
He hasn't been filed on.
I fully expect, based on what I've heard so far, that we aren't close to any kind of a filing.
So I'm not going to speculate because generally in these kinds of cases, the prosecutor holds all the cards.
I mean, that's one of the, I guess, the beauties and the detriments of the criminal justice system federally in America is that the prosecutor can stack charges in such a way that you can go away for the rest of your life.
It's a daunting amount of responsibility that a prosecutor has, and you always hope that they're going to exercise that responsibility in a way that they're not going to overshoot the mark, so to speak.
He's facing very serious allegations.
He's facing incredibly serious kind of daunting, if you will, charges if they end up being filed.
As of right now, the allegations are what are contained in a search warrant that is probable cause.
Probable cause, I've joked before, I think actually with you, Piers, many years ago, that it's devolved to the point where I just say, is my client breathing for probable cause?
So we're not at a situation where somebody has been post a problem cause proceeding where you've been able to test the witnesses and the evidence.
Probable Cause Explained00:00:12
So I would tell everybody, take a deep breath.
Let's see how it unfolds.
Yeah.
Mark Garagos, as always, brilliant analysis there.