Diddy’s lawyers request acquittal on all counts after prosecution rests case
Global News
After the prosecution rested, Combs’ lawyers asked U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian to halt the trial immediately and throw out the charges, arguing the charges weren’t proven.
The prosecution rested Tuesday at Sean “Diddy” Combs ’ sex trafficking trial, capping a more than six-week-long presentation of evidence against the hip-hop maven that confronted him with former employees and two former girlfriends who expressed regret at his treatment of them over the past two decades.
After the prosecution rested, Combs’ lawyers asked U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian to halt the trial immediately and throw out the charges, arguing the charges weren’t proven.
The government rested after defence lawyer Teny Geragos finished questioning the prosecution’s final witness: Joseph Cerciello, a Homeland Security Investigations agent.
Prosecutors have cited the “freakoffs” as proof of the sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy charges that resulted in Combs’ arrest last September.
Defence lawyers, though, say they were consensual sexual encounters consistent with the swingers lifestyle.
Combs, 55, has pleaded not guilty and has remained incarcerated without bail in a federal lockup in Brooklyn after multiple judges concluded last fall that he was a danger to the community.
The government’s case consisted of 34 witnesses, including former employees of Combs’ Bad Boy Entertainment companies, but the bulk of its proof has come from the testimony of two former girlfriends: Casandra “Cassie” Ventura and a model and internet personality known to jurors only by the pseudonym “Jane.”
Ventura, 38, testified for four days during the trial’s first week, saying she felt pressured to engage in hundreds of “freak offs” because the encounters would enable her to be intimate with Combs after performing sexually with male sex workers while he watched them slather one another with baby oil and sometimes filmed the encounters.
