Sean “Diddy” Combs is facing criminal charges as a grand jury has been selected to hear evidence against him in a federal investigation.
The Justice Department is gearing up to potentially file criminal charges against Diddy as the mogul’s accusers have been notified that they could be called to testify before a grand jury in New York City, CNN reported Wednesday.
The rapper and producer have been named in eight lawsuits accusing him of sexual assault and human trafficking.
The potential witnesses are not yet prepared to testify for the prosecution as Homeland Security investigators are reportedly still gathering evidence in the case.
A source told CNN that investigators want their charges against Diddy to be “bulletproof.”
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs faces criminal charges as a grand jury is selected to hear evidence against him in a federal investigation
The charges are not believed to be related to Diddy’s filmed attack on his ex-girlfriend Cassie in a Los Angeles hotel hallway in 2016.
Cassie, whose legal name is Cassandra Ventura, sued Combs in November for years of sexual, physical and emotional abuse, including assault and rape.
The charges alleged that he gave her drugs, forced her to have sex with other men and raped her in her home when she tried to end the relationship in 2018. Diddy ‘vehemently’ denies the allegations through his lawyer.
The lawsuit was settled the next day but led to intense scrutiny of Combs, and several more lawsuits were filed in the following months, along with a federal criminal sex trafficking investigation that led authorities to search Combs’ mansions in Los Angeles and Miami to invade.
Combs’ sons, Justin and Christian “King” Combs, were handcuffed during the raid on their father’s Los Angeles home.
The charges are not believed to be related to Diddy’s filmed attack on his ex-girlfriend Cassie in a Los Angeles hotel hallway in 2016
Sean Combs and Cassie Ventura attend the premiere of ‘The Perfect Match’ in Hollywood, California. Two days earlier, Combs attacked Ventura in a hotel hallway
Two more women accused Diddy of sexual abuse in lawsuits filed on the eve of the expiration last November of the Adult Survivors Act, a New York law that gives victims of sexual abuse a year to take civil action regardless of the limitation period.
The lawsuits, filed by Joi Dickerson and another unnamed woman, allege sexual assault, battery and forcible drugging in the early 1990s by Combs, then a talent director, party promoter and rising figure in New York City’s hip-hop community. .
In December, another woman alleged in a lawsuit that Diddy and two other men raped her in 2003, when she was 17. The lawsuit filed in federal court in Manhattan says she lived in a suburb of Detroit and was flown to a studio in New York, where she was given drugs and alcohol that left her unable to consent to sex, and the men took turns raping her.
The same day, Diddy posted a statement on Instagram broadly denying all allegations in the mounting series of lawsuits.
Diddy’s mother of two sons, Misa Hylton, shared footage of the raid on the rapper’s Los Angeles mansion, calling it an “overtly militarized force.”
Armed agents entered luxury properties on both the east and west coasts of the United States
Law enforcement officers removed boxes of evidence and a laptop from Diddy’s Star Island mansion in Miami Beach
“I didn’t do any of the horrible things alleged,” the post says. “I will fight for my name, my family and for the truth.”
In February, a music producer filed a lawsuit claiming Diddy forced him to recruit prostitutes and pressured him to have sex with them.
The lawsuit provides a long list of potentially illegal drug and sex activities that the producer says he witnessed. A lawyer for the rapper called the allegations “pure fiction.”
The rapper is one of the most influential hip-hop producers and managers of the past thirty years.
Formerly known as Puff Daddy, he built one of hip-hop’s largest empires, blazing a trail with several entities tied to his famous name.
He is the founder of Bad Boy Records and a three-time Grammy winner who has collaborated with a host of top artists including Notorious BIG, Mary J. Blige, Usher, Lil Kim, Faith Evans and 112.