Federal prosecutors narrowed the racketeering conspiracy charges against Sean “Diddy” Combs, removing the claims of arson and kidnapping Wednesday just one day before closing arguments begin in the blockbuster sex trafficking trial.
The music mogul faces five federal counts of racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking and transportation to engage in prostitution. He’s pleaded not guilty.
Under the racketeering conspiracy charge, prosecutors accused Diddy in the indictment of “creating a criminal enterprise whose members and associates engaged in, and attempted to engage in, among other crimes, sex trafficking, forced labor, kidnapping, arson, bribery, and obstruction of justice.”
In a letter to the court, the government proposed dropping three theories related to the racketeering conspiracy charge as a way to “streamline” jury instructions. They still intend to pursue the racketeering charge but removed instructions related to attempted kidnapping, attempted arson and aiding and abetting sex trafficking.
“The Government is no longer planning to proceed on these theories of liability so instructions are no longer necessary,” prosecutors wrote in the letter.
All of the five federal charges against Diddy remain.
The move comes after Alexandra Shapiro, one of the 55-year-old mogul’s defense attorneys, passionately argued in court on Tuesday for a judgment of acquittal on all counts. She claimed there were “deficiencies” to each count and then walked through each charge, outlining why it should be dropped.
Shapiro argued that two of the three of the government’s examples of kidnapping were “insufficient.”
In one kidnapping allegation, Capricorn Clark, Diddy’s former employee, testified about being driven by Diddy’s then-head of security to a dilapidated building where she was subjected to lie detector tests for five days in a row. If she failed, a man told her she would be thrown in the East River, she testified. But Shapiro argued there was no evidence that Diddy knew this was happening or that a co-conspirator had kidnapped her.
The arson allegation stems from a claim by Scott Mescudi, better known as Kid Cudi, that Diddy firebombed his Porsche in early 2012 after he discovered the rapper had dated his longtime girlfriend Cassie Ventura. Shapiro argued that there was no evidence that her client was involved, noting that Mescudi didn’t witness the incident. She added that there was female DNA found on the bottle used for the Molotov cocktail.
Prosecutors plan to focus the racketeering conspiracy charges instead on proving forced labor and sex trafficking.
The judge said he would reserve a decision on the defense’s motion. Closing arguments are set to begin Thursday morning.
