Sean Combs faces federal racketeering and sex trafficking charges, with prosecutors alleging witness tampering via prison phone abuse and a shadowy campaign to intimidate influencers. Legal experts note his potential $50 million bail and proposed Manhattan confinement contrast sharply with allegations of manipulating testimony regarding Shyne's 1999 shooting fall and past violence against Cassie Ventura. Comparisons to Jeffrey Epstein highlight how Combs' vast celebrity network could be leveraged by prosecutors, suggesting that despite his family-focused video message, the severity of these crimes and his history of endangering specific individuals complicate any path to release or leniency. [Automatically generated summary]
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Why Bail Was Denied00:14:26
There's a famous picture that's going around of a girl who's allegedly underage.
Plenty of well-known celebrities right there in the picture.
If you're a big star who used to get a lot of Diddy parties right now, you are sweating.
Diddy got a ton of money.
He got a ton of influence.
The reason people have been quiet so many years is because I believe they're afraid for their lives.
I mean, he can get hitman and come out and touch you.
He has a lot to lose.
And people that have a lot to lose will do crazy things.
It does look ridiculous in light of other well-known defendants who are charged with similar types of crimes.
They are getting out.
They are posting large multi-million dollar bails.
It doesn't seem reasonable that he wouldn't be given that same consideration.
A federal judge will decide this week whether Sean Diddy Combs can be released on bail as he awaits charges on racketeering and sex trafficking.
Even behind bars, Diddy is facing claims of foul play.
Prosecutors say he's attempted to corruptly influence witness testimony by asking his family members to contact potential witnesses.
Diddy has also reportedly issued a cease and desist order over a new documentary about his one-time protege, Shyam.
There are also reports of a shadowy campaign to intimidate influencers who've reported on Diddy's downfall.
Last week, Amala Ekpunobi told us this.
Before we finish, I want to talk to you just completely separately about P. Diddy.
Just yesterday, we had two private investigators, sorry, the day before yesterday, go ahead and visit an old resident of mine trying to figure out whether or not they've been paid by a certain institution, company, entity to discuss P. Diddy's lawsuits and his connection to other celebrities.
They also let me know that had they found out I was paid by a certain company, entity, client, they would offer to pay me to disclose exactly who that was.
And they'd like to know the business deal that I made with them in order to pay me more to promote the opposite narrative.
Well, joining me now for a whistle-stop update on the latest criminal defense attorney Stacey Schneider, Brandon Tatum, host of The Office of Tatum, and the rapid producer and commentator, Lord Jamal.
Welcome to all of you.
Stacey Schneider, let me talk with you.
From a legal perspective, obviously Diddy's in deep trouble, but all these extra things that have been bubbling around, talk of, you know, maybe corrupting potential witnesses, et cetera, et cetera.
How much worse is that all potentially making his situation?
A whole lot worse, Piers.
That type of conduct, if it's really going on, can be introduced into the trial in front of the jury, and it shows indicia or consciousness of guilt.
Someone trying to corrupt the proceedings, allegedly.
Now, this has been alleged, but they're saying the prosecution brought up in his past bail hearing last week that he was abusing his phone privileges in prison.
Now, he has a set list of people he can call out to, and he allegedly was using other inmates' phone lines or phone time to call out to people he wanted to speak to.
And they were alleging that could be witness tampering.
And that's a really bad move on anyone who is incarcerated pending trial.
Officer Tatum, I mean, it just seems to be a scandal that with every week gets more fuel, more fire, more names enter the kind of rumor mill about this.
Do you think we're looking at something that could just be a lot, lot bigger than people realize?
Maybe Pierce, I think a thousand percent.
If you listen to the lyrics of P. Diddy and some of these other people over the years, they are telegraphing some of the things that P. Diddy is accused of.
And I'm not shocked.
I mean, you know, you talk about him calling witnesses and tampering with witnesses.
Are you shocked?
This guy is a mogul and he's not going to, he's going to do his best to not spend the rest of his life in prison.
And of course, he's going to try to make his image look better, calling his kids, having them put it online and all of the other stuff.
But we all know that this guy has been doing this for a long time.
Cassie is not the first and she wasn't, in my opinion, she was with him when he was doing this to other women.
And then you go off and look at the totality of circumstances with the industry and how many people are involved.
I think TDJs could be involved.
There's a whole bunch of people that have been to these Diddy parties that are probably going to be implicated.
Lord Jamar, we've spoken a few times since this scandal broke.
I presume you're hearing a lot of stuff from people in the music world.
How panicky are people getting?
There are reports from a TMZ documentary called The Downfall of Diddy inside the Freakoffs, where it claimed that high-profile celebrities are reaching out to victims and offering them money in exchange for avoiding any public exposure.
Are you hearing stuff like that?
I haven't heard anything directly like that.
I've seen things online, but I will say, you know, behind the scenes, a lot of names are starting to be thrown around people that were close associates with Diddy.
And yeah, I think these people are very worried about what may be coming out in the very near future.
I want to play a clip.
This is from November the 4th, but it's where Sean Combs spoke to his children on the day of his 51st birthday.
Let's take a look at this.
Happy birthday, Dude, Daddy.
Yay!
I love y'all.
I love y'all so much.
We love you too.
We love you both.
I can't wait to see y'all.
Can't wait to see y'all.
And I'm telling you what I'm saying.
I mean, all of y'all, but just for being strong.
Thank y'all for being strong.
And thank y'all for being by my side and supporting me.
I love y'all.
I got the best family in the world.
Mr. AC Schneider, we saw that, obviously designed, put out on social media, designed to make him look like a good father, good family man, the last person who could possibly be guilty of these incredibly serious things he's been charged with.
We also, when he was at the bail hearing, and I'll come to that in a moment with you, you know, he seemed to wink and laugh at the media.
His own behavior here, how relevant will that be in the general mix?
So prosecutors raised that video we just saw with the family as him trying to allegedly tamper with the jury pool and create this image, but I don't really buy it.
And as a criminal defense attorney, I don't think there was much wrong with the family video.
He wasn't signaling to witnesses in the case.
He wasn't commenting on the evidence in the case.
He wasn't even declaring his innocence.
He was merely sending out a video of his family wishing him well for his birthday.
And when he goes to trial, there is no doubt in my mind.
And I know as an attorney, I would tell him to do this.
I would have his family sitting in the front row behind him showing their support.
It's very important that you show that people, you know, are vested in the outcome of the case, that you have family members involved.
And it's important.
This man is in media, and I don't blame him for trying to sway the optics and show he's a good family guy.
I think that has no effect on the outcome of the case, and it should not affect bail.
But he's done plenty of other things that are going to go against his getting bail.
And this should be the least of it.
Yeah, I mean, on the issue of the bail, the court rejected the idea that Diddy be kept under house arrest in his island home in Miami.
The district judge said that's not going to work.
However, the judge did seem to potentially open the possibility to confinement with around-the-clock security at a three-bedroom department on Manhattan's Upper East Side.
I mean, from everything you've gleaned from this case, Stacey, how likely is it that he will be let out on bail?
So I'm calling it 50-50 right now.
The reason they didn't want to use the Miami house is because it actually has a boat deck or a boat pier behind the house, and they were worried about people coming up behind the house.
The New York City apartment, which is this three-bedroom apartment in New York, which isn't that large for a mogul like that, which is interesting.
But that they're going to hire private people.
They proposed hiring private people to guard that, to monitor who comes in and out, who he can speak to from the home, what phone lines are available to him.
But the problem is, I don't know that the judge is going to give him that break, which most defendants would get with these types of charges.
I mean, such an unusual case.
This isn't like he's a danger to the community at large.
He's a danger to the limited number of people he allegedly engaged in.
But I think that the use of his resources, extending out and his alleged attempts while he's in prison to reach out to witnesses, potentially, is going to hamper the judge's decision to let this happen.
But in all fairness, they probably should give him that opportunity based on the charges.
Officer Tatum, I mean, during the hearing, the defense lawyer, Mark Agnifilo, disputed the prosecutor's contention, but a 2016 hotel surveillance video of Diddy assaulting his former girlfriend, Cassandra Ventura.
We mentioned this earlier, known as Cassie, obviously, so there was a risk he would act violently if released.
I mean, you know, it wasn't just that video.
We've had a lot of women come forward and talk about either what happened to them or to other people, other women, involving his, you know, his tendency to commit acts of violence against women.
This idea of whether he's a danger to the public, he's obviously a violent guy.
We saw it with our own eyes.
When you drag a woman through a hotel corridor, oblivious to the fact there are cameras and just start beating her up, that's a dangerous guy, as far as I'm concerned.
Well, I think he's conditionally dangerous, meaning that when he's in situations where his anger gets the best of him, he lash out on people and can really do some damage.
Obviously, we saw on camera one incident.
I'm sure he beat her all the time.
At least that's what she alleged.
So I think that when they're looking at whether or not he's consistently violent, it's not like he's in the streets doing drive-by shootings and got bodies on his record.
So they're not going to consider him to be a present dangerous person.
However, his financial means and the history of alleged things that he's been involved in, which using other people to commit crimes is the thing that I think they should be most worried about.
P. Diddy got a ton of money.
He got a ton of influence.
The reason people have been quiet so many years is because I believe, and this is my opinion, I think that they're afraid for their lives.
I mean, he can get hitman to come out and touch you.
And he's rapped about it.
He's been involved with situations like that.
People think he has something to do with Tupac's death.
And so I think that they should consider that him being out could cause him to use other people to act on his behalf to do violent things to get him out.
He has a lot to lose.
And people that have a lot to lose will do crazy things.
Yeah, I mean, Lord Jamar, I mean, look, he's always portrayed himself, yes, as a mogul, but also as a bit of a gangster.
And I always think when people show you who they are, you should believe them.
You know, I do think that what Officer Tatum said there has got merit.
I think this is a dangerous, violent character who's used to control, whose life is currently spiraling out of control.
And as such, I would think he might represent a danger to people, particularly those, as Officer Tatum said, who might want to testify against him.
I mean, you know, as someone that knew him, like coming up as a teenager, he didn't have a gangster type of background.
But I must say, once you get money and influence and all this type of stuff, it will feed people's ego and make them feel, you know, more brazen and bolder than they are.
I just want to comment, though, on the bail thing that's kind of curious to me as to why they wouldn't give him bail, but they would give somebody like Michael Jeffries bail, 10 million or something like that.
I couldn't agree with you more.
Yeah, sorry, I couldn't agree with you more.
I was shocked that they wouldn't give him bail.
He has the resources to put up an enormous bail.
Prosecutors offered his Miami home, which they say is worth $48 million.
They offered to post a $50 million bail.
They can restrict his movements.
They can put an ankle bracelet on him.
I don't understand why he didn't get bail either.
This is such an unusual indictment to begin with, racketeering for the purposes of sex trafficking.
It just seems odd.
I agree with you on that.
And Lord Jamar, look, one of the things that's also bubbling over here in terms of legal maneuverings, Diddy's reportedly sent a cease and desist letter over this new documentary about his one-time protege Shine.
Now, it was 25 years ago, for those who don't know this story, that Shine reportedly took the fall for Diddy over a 1999 nightclub shooting.
Sources close to him say he wasn't attempting to block this film, but wanted to ensure factual accuracy after Shine alleged that he took the fall for Diddy in this shooting.
What do you think the reality is about this?
Is Diddy just panicking that stuff like that in his back catalog from a quarter of a century ago, which is sort of he'd moved on from, may now all come back to haunt him?
I think there's a bunch of things that Diddy did in the past, a bunch of snips and interviews where he revealed certain things about his personality and the things that might have been going on.
You know, you see little videos of him and Justin Bieber and he's talking about, oh, yeah, the parties get really wild and all this type of stuff.
I think all of that stuff is going to come back to bite him in the end, you know?
I mean, somebody knew him.
I mean, how will he be dealing with incarceration?
This is somebody used to the high life, you know, mansions, private jets, all the money he could possibly want and the glamorous parties and so on.
How will he deal with being in a cell and potentially, as he knows, facing never coming out?
I mean, he's not going to enjoy it.
Leverage and Witness Amnesty00:07:04
But as somebody with money, you can maneuver much better in jail than someone that doesn't have money.
This is why he has the ability to get other inmates phone time.
And, you know, you can get extra food and all that.
I'm sure he's paying COs to go out and get him outside food and all that type of stuff.
That, you know, that exists.
And when you have money, you can kind of maneuver, but you're still in jail.
And for someone like him with a massive ego and just the massive appetites and the type of lifestyle he's been living so long, it's still got to be a hell for him.
Yeah.
And Stacey, the other hell for him is that every day seems to bring new allegations.
And with all of these cases, when someone's as famous as this, you know, some of them will be true and some of them will be people trying to scam the system.
And it's, you know, the authorities have to try and wade their way through all of this and work out the wheat from the chaff in terms of credibility.
You know, there's one story of a singer-songwriter, Tania Wallace, who said that at a 2018 party, she saw miners, this is a Diddy party, miners dressed up, she said, like Harajuku Barbies, red lipstick, looking real sexy.
Diddy's lawyer said she has no credibility.
Her claims about free costs and minors are completely categorically false.
But it comes at the time when a lot of other people have come forward to also suggest that minors were involved in these parties.
Yeah, you know, prosecutors have a huge advantage over Sean Combs in this case and his lawyers because there are so many civil lawsuits pending now against him.
Prosecutors, that's a mine of evidence for them to use.
They can go to all those lawyers.
They can sift through whatever documents or videos or text messaging they have.
Can they?
Okay, that's it.
Okay, let me stop you there.
I'm very interested by that.
I didn't know that.
So if they're waging a criminal prosecution, do they have unlimited powers to go to all the civil actions and get all that discovered evidence?
Yes, it would be by request, but if the government has cause to believe that some of the civil actions that there's evidence in there that they need for their case, they can subpoena that.
They can also subpoena celebrities as witnesses in this case.
If they're watching videos and there are celebrities in there and they feel that their testimony is relevant, they can do that.
So the government's going to be very interested in looking at all the evidence in those civil cases, in addition to the evidence that the government already has.
Now, when I say evidence, obviously it has to be tried in court.
But don't forget, the FBI raided both of his homes in Los Angeles and Miami and sealed, I'm sorry, seized all kinds of alleged evidence, which they named in the indictment, which was allegedly rifles with serial numbers that were etched out.
And I think you might have heard about a thousand tubes of lubrication that they alleged for at the freak off parties.
There's all kinds of damning alleged evidence that the government already has, but there's so much out there with all these lawsuits and additional allegations against him that it's just a free-for-all of evidence that could be brought in.
You know, it reminds me of a Taylor, it reminds me a bit of Harvey Weinstein, where he was deemed too big to fall in Hollywood, you know, one of the biggest beasts in Hollywood in every sense, it turned out.
But he was a guy, you know, he won more Oscars for his company than I think any other person in Hollywood history and so on.
You know, he seemed untouchable until he wasn't.
And now he's never coming out of prison, quite likely.
I'm getting that same kind of feeling about P. Diddy that we may actually never see him come out of prison.
This might be it.
Yeah, I agree.
I mean, there's a lot of things operating here to the point that was brought up earlier.
The defense will have to try to make these things not admissible in court, right?
Some of these civil suits, if they can try to get it to where they cannot bring any of these things up in court because they're civil issues and they're not relevant, that can work for P. Diddy on his side.
But I think that P. Diddy is like Jeffrey Epstein, man.
These guys are untouchable and they have so much money and that at some point it all comes crashing down.
And there's two ways of it crashing down.
One is that they have so many different people that were involved in these Diddy parties and they've seen things and they've been involved in things and they can leverage those witnesses against him and give them amnesty or whatever, not amnesty, but give them the ability to not be prosecuted in order to testify against him.
They did the same thing with Donald Trump and they're going to do the same thing with P. Diddy.
And it's a lot of it there.
There's so many people that went to these parties.
Luke Craig, who's a Christian rap artist, made mention that he went to a Diddy party and he didn't name Diddy, but he described a Diddy party and said he saw a whole bunch of behavior that was unbecoming, that he had to at some point leave.
So you got people that are in the gospel music industry.
You got celebrities who are artists.
You have athletes.
You have a plethora of people who have been involved in these nefarious parties.
And that's going to be very difficult for him to be able to fight against all of these people who have an eyewitness testimony of something nefarious that have happened that could be related to human trafficking or sex trafficking to minors.
Yeah.
I mean, Lord Jamal, I mean, that's the thing, isn't it?
That she's tantalizing everybody in terms of the drama of this story is which other dominoes are going to fall.
You know, we've all seen how many massive stars hung around Diddy all the time and went to these parties quite regularly.
I'm not going to get into naming them all now because it's sort of unfair as well, because just because you're there doesn't mean you were party to either seeing or participating in any criminal activity.
But, you know, if you're a big star who used to go to a lot of Diddy parties right now, you are sweating.
Listen, there's a famous picture that's going around of a girl who's allegedly underage on a table naked where different celebrities are eating food and sushi off of her body.
And, you know, there's plenty of well-known celebrities right there in the picture.
And I saw actually an interview of this young lady.
And if this, if it's true, what she's saying, it's some really horrible stuff that took place at these parties.
And some of your most favorite actors, athletes, all kinds of people were participants in what was going on, allegedly.
Well, it seems that there were different stages of these parties.
There was like a very glamorous, you know, straightforward drinks party.
Then there was a second one.
And then at like three in the morning came the freak out stuff.
And that's the stuff which clearly was deeply unsavory.
It might well have been deeply criminal.
We'll find out.
Stacey, final question for you.
I mean, I think I asked you this earlier.
You said you're the 50-50 about bail, but does your gut tell you we're going to see Diddy out in the streets again, again?
Stages of the Parties00:00:56
Or is that it, do you think?
The judges have been so rough with the bail arguments and not accepting anything that the defense was offering.
But I think this time it does look ridiculous in light of other well-known defendants who are charged with similar types of sex trafficking crimes.
They are getting out.
They are posting large multi-million dollar bails.
It doesn't seem reasonable that he wouldn't be given that same consideration.
However, the judge reviews the recorded calls from prison in chambers.
And if he got on those calls and there was any semblance of alleged witness tampering from prison to the outside, then there is no way that he will be granted an opportunity for bail.
So the judge will signal what that is based on the decision.