In a courtroom sketch, Sean Combs (left) listens alongside his attorneys Marc Agnifilo and Teny Geragos as Assistant U.S. Legal professional Christy Slavik (heart) makes her closing arguments as U.S. District Choose Arun Subramanian presides throughout Combs’ intercourse trafficking trial in New York Metropolis.
Jane Rosenberg/Reuters
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Jane Rosenberg/Reuters
A federal prosecutor delivered the closing arguments of the federal government’s case in opposition to Sean Combs on Thursday (June 26) in a decrease Manhattan courtroom, explaining to the jury how testimony and proof offered over the past month and a half provides as much as prices that embody intercourse trafficking and racketeering conspiracy.
For greater than 4 hours, prosecutor Christy Slavik argued that this internet of proof proved that Combs ran a legal enterprise that facilitated and hid intercourse crimes for years. He used “violence, energy and concern to get what he wished,” the prosecutor stated.
Combs faces two counts of intercourse trafficking, two counts of transportation for prostitution and one rely of racketeering conspiracy. He has pleaded not responsible to all prices.
On the heart of the federal government’s case are two ex-girlfriends of Combs — the singer Cassie Ventura and a girl recognized as “Jane” — who testified that the hip-hop mogul pressured them to take part in highly-orchestrated sexual performances with male escorts. These nights, which have been known as “freak-offs,” “resort nights” or “wild king nights,” have been described as being fueled by heavy drug use and lasting a number of days. Each ladies stated Combs would direct, movie and masturbate throughout these encounters, and that he coerced them to proceed taking part even after they informed him they did not need to have intercourse with different males. This coercion included monetary management, violence and threats of blackmail to launch the express movies.
Slavik emphasised that although their relationships with Combs have been years aside, the similarities in these ladies’s testimonies depict a throughline of troubling and unlawful conduct.
“They don’t seem to be separate tales,” Slavik informed the jury. “They’re chapters of the identical ebook.”
Ventura and Jane spent a mixed 10 days on the witness stand — jurors heard them element many of those encounters, which they stated occurred too many instances to rely over the course of the a number of years they dated Combs. However Slavik clarified to the jury that they needn’t consider that every one of those nights have been nonconsensual to search out Combs responsible.
In an effort to convict Combs of intercourse trafficking, Slavik defined, jurors have to consider that every sufferer was pressured into taking part in simply one among these encounters because of “drive, threats of drive, fraud or coercion.”
“It is time to maintain him accountable,” Slavik informed the court docket. “It is time for justice. It is time to discover the defendant responsible.”
Cassie Ventura
Cassie Ventura started relationship Combs in 2007, shortly after signing to his document label. In her testimony throughout the trial’s opening week, Ventura, who’s 17 years youthful than Combs, stated that throughout the first yr of their relationship, Combs began controlling just about each side of her life. He additionally grew to become bodily abusive, usually leaving her with seen accidents that have been proven to jurors by way of quite a few pictures.
Ventura testified that when Combs first launched the concept of “freak-offs,” she agreed to check out his fantasy as a result of she wished to make him joyful. However she stated over the following decade they have been collectively, she informed Combs a number of instances that she didn’t need to have intercourse with different males — and that he pressured her to do it anyway, “a whole lot of instances.”
Throughout closing arguments, Slavik targeted on three particular cases that the prosecution describes as trafficking. A type of happened on the InterContinental Lodge in Los Angeles in 2016. Ventura testified she was in the course of a “freak-off” when Combs grew to become violent and hit her, main her to flee the resort room. Lodge safety cameras captured Combs operating up behind Ventura close to the elevators, hitting, kicking and dragging her again within the route of the room, the place she stated a male intercourse employee was ready.
Jurors have seen this resort safety footage, which CNN obtained and broadcast final yr, repeatedly all through the trial. However throughout closing arguments, Slavik narrated as a compilation from totally different angles confirmed the occasions unfold chronologically. Whereas Combs’ protection has argued that he was on medication and performing irrationally on this specific day, Slavik identified his composed demeanor as soon as a resort safety guard arrived.
“At each step, he was in full management of himself,” Slavik stated. “Offended, however in management.”
Combs’ protection has admitted the resort video is damning proof of home violence, however they are saying it is not proof of intercourse trafficking. As she walked jurors by what Ventura had described as Combs’ decade-long sample of abuse, Slavik argued that the 2 can’t be separated. The motive behind the violence, she argued — each within the resort incident and lots of different assaults she reminded jurors of — was to make Ventura compliant with Combs’ sexual calls for.
She additionally displayed textual content messages and testimony of Ventura letting Combs know she didn’t need to take part in these nights. In accordance with Slavik, that is why Combs repeatedly used specific movies of Ventura as collateral, threatening to launch them if she did not do what he requested.
“All of this was designed to do one factor — to make Cassie afraid to say no to him,” Slavik stated.
“Jane”
The second alleged sufferer of trafficking testified utilizing the pseudonym “Jane” to guard her id. Jane dated Combs from 2021 till his arrest and indictment in 2024.
Slavik described Combs as taking a “carrots and sticks” strategy in his relationship with Jane. She stated Combs “love-bombed” Jane early on, showering her with presents, romantic journeys and date nights.
Slavik stated this was a option to “groom” Jane into taking part in Combs’ sexual fantasies. Like Ventura, Jane testified she went together with the encounters at first to please the person she beloved. However she stated as time went on, she felt she had “opened Pandora’s field.” In accordance with Jane, Combs repeatedly promised her high quality time and emotional intimacy, however as an alternative he stunned her with “resort nights” that finally took up most of their time collectively. These encounters, Jane stated, dominated her life — a lot in order that Combs started paying her hire as she struggled to take care of her earnings.
Throughout closing arguments, Slavik targeted on three particular incidents, every of which she stated constituted a separate occasion of intercourse trafficking. Considered one of these included a “sobriety occasion” during which Jane tried to get by the evening with out taking any medication. After having intercourse with two males, she threw up within the toilet — after which Combs allegedly informed her she ought to really feel higher, and that he anticipated her to maintain going with a 3rd intercourse employee.
All through Jane’s testimony and through closing arguments, the prosecution pulled up many textual content messages, notes entries and even cellphone calls recorded with out Jane’s information during which she stated she felt used and couldn’t hold having intercourse with strangers. Slavik argued that this was Combs utilizing coercive threats: He held Jane’s hire funds over her head — telling her in a single voice memo to “get on [her] job” as a result of he was doing his — and pressured her to proceed taking part even when he knew she did not need to.
Combs’ “legal enterprise”
Slavik argued that though Combs might have been one among three individuals within the resort rooms — together with a girlfriend and an escort — his crimes have been depending on a detailed inside circle doing his bidding. That is the place the legal enterprise and racketeering prices are available in. In accordance with prosecutors, this group consisted of Combs’ chief of workers, Kristina Khorram, and a number of other of his safety guards, together with a person known as D-Roc. In addition they relied on youthful assistants to do issues like purchase medication, arrange resort rooms and ebook journey for Ventura, Jane and a number of other escorts.
By textual content messages and cellphone information, Slavik tried to display that Khorram, D-Roc and different workers have been nicely conscious of Combs’ abusive conduct and alleged intercourse trafficking — and that they took each measure they might to cowl his tracks, monitor the victims and proceed facilitating Combs’ fantasies.
Slavik defined that as a way to convict Combs of racketeering conspiracy, jurors should consider he and his workers agreed to commit two or extra legal acts. These may very well be two cases of the identical crime, or two separate crimes altogether.
Slavik then stated Combs and his enterprise engaged in not less than eight varieties of legal acts over 20 years: distribution of medication, kidnapping, arson, bribery, compelled labor, witness tampering or obstruction, intercourse trafficking and transportation for prostitution. (The latter two are additionally standalone prices — if the jury convicts Combs of trafficking his ex-girlfriends or transporting intercourse employees throughout state traces, these convictions might rely in the direction of racketeering.)
Citing witness testimony, financial institution statements, cellphone information and different proof, Slavik gave a number of examples for every act she accused Combs and his workers of committing. This included kidnapping an assistant, setting the rapper Scott Mescudi’s automotive on fireplace after he started relationship Ventura and paying a resort safety worker $100,000 handy over the safety footage of Combs beating Ventura in 2016.
Slavik reminded jurors that Combs usually didn’t commit these crimes himself — however she offered proof suggesting he repeatedly directed his workers to interrupt the legislation as a way to fulfill his wishes, silence the individuals he victimized and defend “his kingdom.”
“Everybody was there to serve him,” she informed the jury. “He would not take no for a solution.”
As she completed delivering closing arguments, Slavik thanked the jury for listening to testimony and proof she stated may very well be troublesome to sit down by. She stated Combs spent 20 years utilizing his energy, fame and affect to evade any accountability for his actions.
“That stops now,” she stated.
