Law&Crime Sidebar - 9 Major P. Diddy Updates from Explosive Bail Hearing

Episode Date: November 25, 2024

Defense lawyers for Sean “Diddy” Combs argued for the third time Friday that their client should be granted bail, this time in front of Judge Arun Subramanian. The government says he should stay locked up, accusing him of trying to intimidate witnesses and influence potential jurors. Law&Crime’s Jesse Weber has the most important updates from inside the courtroom.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW: If you’re ever injured in an accident, you can check out Morgan & Morgan. You can submit a claim in 8 clicks or less without having to leave your couch. To start your claim, visit: https://www.forthepeople.com/LCSidebarHOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokeVideo Editing - Michael Deininger and Christina FalconeScript Writing & Producing - Savannah Williamson & Juliana BattagliaGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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keep you on the edge of your seat. Don't let your fears take hold of you as you dive into this addictive series. Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. Could this be the last week, Sean Combs remains behind bars? After quite the bell hearing last week, we're going to break down what happened. Now what could be next for the embattled rapper who's currently sitting in detention as he awaits trial on federal sex crimes charges. Welcome to Sidebar, presented by Law and Crime. I'm Jesse Weber.

This could prove to be a very interesting week in the Sean Diddy Combs' legal saga. Why? Is it possible Sean Combs could be released from jail right in time for Thanksgiving? It's a possibility. You know, I would have said that seemed highly, highly, highly unlikely, But after what we saw on Friday during the most recent bail hearing in front of Judge Arun Sub-Romanian,

the current judge of Combs' criminal case, a judge, by the way, who hasn't heard this bail issue before, it seems a lot more probable I'm going to explain. So Combs has been sitting in the Metropolitan Detention Center, the MDC, out in Brooklyn, since his arrest in September. And of course, as you know, he's facing racketeering, sex trafficking, transportation to engage in prostitution charges, namely that from 2008 to 2024, he used force, threats, coercion to cause women to engage in sexual activity, including sex acts with male sex workers. That's what's known as the freak-offs, that he operated a criminal enterprise that was engaged in all sorts of illicit activity and acts of violence like kidnapping and arson.

Okay, we knew that. And now two previous judges, a district court judge and a magistrate judge, both previously denied Sean Combs' bail, siding with the prosecution's arguments that Combs was a danger to society, given these allegations, that he was a risk of flight, given his wealth, power and resources, that he engaged in potential obstruction by improperly contacting witnesses and victims in the case. And this, by the way, is despite the defense putting forth a very expansive bail package, $50 million bond, home confinement, no phone or internet use, 24-7 private security to monitor him,

limits on who can visit him and so forth. So a very expansive bail package, one that I really haven't seen. But leading into this hearing on Friday, again in front of Judge Arun Suburbanian, who hasn't decided this issue yet because he was the most recent judge assigned to the case, prosecutors were also armed with more,

more arguments, more evidence. Why? Because as we previously discussed on sidebar, they alleged in a letter to the court that while behind bars at the MDC, Sean Combs has been violating the Bureau of Prison's rules. Now, by the way, that in and of itself could be used to show, hey, if he can't follow the rules while he's locked up inside, what makes you think he could be trusted on the outside? But putting that to the side, not only that, prosecutors say he has been engaging. in unauthorized communications, such as three-way phone calls on a monitored phone, using other inmates' phone access codes to make phone calls, and using a third-party text messaging

provider. And they alleged he was doing all of this to instruct third parties to reach out to witnesses and even try to influence a potential jury pool. And by the way, influencing a potential jury pool, that's with respect to the allegation that he orchestrated a social media campaign. around his birthday. You might remember this. His family released a video of them, wishing him a happy birthday, good wishes while he's on the phone. He's on the other line. He's locked up, but you hear him on the other line. They're all happy. Everybody's happy.

And prosecutors say the aim for that was to influence potential jurors. They have evidence to say that was his intent, that he might have said something. We'll get to that. Now, there are many, many other items for both the prosecution and defense regarding this bail issue. but the best way to go through all of this is to actually go through what was said during that hearing. Now, something I have to mention about going over this hearing. There are no cameras in the courtroom, so we couldn't see this for ourselves. In fact, there's limited electronic devices that are allowed as well. So we're basing this off of reporting from those in the courtroom about what happened.

Now, the first issue that came up at this hearing on Friday wasn't even about bail, but it's about what happened a few days earlier. You see, the defense had accused the prosecution of improperly taking, photographs of potentially attorney, client, and work product privilege material in Sean Combs' detention unit. This was after there was a sweep for contraband at the MDC. I should say the defense claims this was actually a targeted operation at Sean Combs. The prosecutors have denied this.

They've said that they didn't even take part in the search. But there was this sweep, and an investigator from the Bureau of Prisons apparently took photos of these notepads and these notepad pages from Sean Combs' unit. end, Judge Subramanian, after there was a hearing held, said the prosecution has to destroy 19 copies of pages of those photos, that they couldn't use evidence obtained from those photos in their bail argument. And one of the things that they wanted to say was that Combs was improperly reaching out to one witness in particular.

That would be shown by one of these photographed pages. And Judge Subramanian said that he would have to resolve at a later date if there was, in fact, a privilege violation. And if there was a violation, I'm not even sure what that remedy would be. Sean Combs' defense counsel has asked for the indictment to be tossed out. He's asked for the prosecution's team from the Southern District of New York to be recused. We shall see. Now, as we're sorting through these legal arguments, it just shows you how important having a great lawyer is, right?

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The whole process can be done straight from your smartphone. Seeing if you have a case can be done eight clicks or less. So if you're injured, you can easily start a claim at for the people.com slash LC Sidebar. But back to the hearing on Friday, Judge Subramanian, he had an issue with the defense. This is how it started off. You see, the defense had argued that Sean Combs' legal pads clearly had the word legal handwritten on the top of the binders, you know, to indicate that this is privileged. Don't search through this.

These are materials that prosecutors cannot have access to. Well, Judge Subramanian said, hmm, the legal pad that defense counsel gave to this court an intact legal pad with legal written on the binding. But when you look at the photos of two of the intact legal pads that were taken at the time of the sweep at the MDC, there's no writing on the pad. There's no legal. So why is that? He wants to know why, meaning, was legal only written on that pad after the fact?

That wouldn't look so good for Sean Combs or his lawyers. And during the hearing, one of Combs' lawyers, Mark Ignifalo, said, he wasn't sure when legal was written on the pads, and he did concede that during the sweep, not all the pads said legal. Judge Subramanian reportedly asked if the pad, you hand it up to me, did it say legal on it on November 1st, meaning when the sweep happened?

To which Agnifalo reportedly replied, I'm not sure. And that led the judge to warn the defense that moving forward, make sure all of your representations to the court are true. Not a great way to start, but that's how it started. and from there we get into the bail analysis. And the main concern from prosecutors when talking about bail is they don't trust Sean Combs to follow the conditions of pretrial release.

And they highlight, as I mentioned before, the allegations of what he was doing in the MDC. Now, Judge Suburbanian pressed Assistant United States Attorney Christy Slavic. Well, what do you say that you might not trust him, but trust his 24-7 private security that would monitor him on home confinement? Her response, this security team, she claims one of them is a co-conspirator of Sean Combs, that this person's phone was taken away. The other is a defense investigator in this case, and she alleged that that investigator has been contacting witnesses.

In other words, this 24-7 private security team works for Sean Combs. Now, Agnifalo responded that later in the hearing, suggesting that they are proposing an independent security team. And he also highlighted that Sean Combs would be living in significantly more restrictive conditions on home confinement than in the MDC. Judge Subramanian asked Prosecutor Slavic, you cite his wealth as an issue for pretrial release. So can't he use it? That's a key point. That was made by both sides. You see, the prosecutor said it's because he has the wealth, the power, the resources to do what he wants on the outside and flout the rules that he shouldn't be granted bail, whereas the defense has said, okay, we have to create such

an expensive and expansive bail package to mitigate those perceived dangers because of his wealth. Slavic reportedly responded that they are seeking continued detention not because of his wealth, but because of his dangerousness, his risk of flight, his obstruction. So Sub-Romanian asked her to explain the obstruction argument further. And while she highlighted what I had mentioned before. He did ask her whether running a PR campaign from behind bars is obstruction, like the birthday message campaign. Now, according to Prosecutor Slavic, Combs allegedly said he wanted to reach the jurors and said something along the lines of, presumably on a recorded phone call while in the MDC, something along the lines of,

I need only one. So that kind of looks like he is trying to impact the jury. And she claims that this is impacting the integrity of the proceedings, and this is his intent to obstruct. Now, from there, Judge Suburbanian gets into a really key point. This is something that he actually had advised the prosecutors to be prepared to discuss. The fact that former Abercrombie and Fitch CEO, Mike Jeffries, was just arrested on federal sex trafficking charges in New York, albeit the Eastern District, not the Southern District, where Combs is, but on the face of it, very similar allegations to Sean Combs. And guess what? Mike Jeffries was released on a $10 million bail. So Judge Subramania

is essentially asking, why shouldn't Combs be released then? To which prosecutor Slavic references the letter that the prosecution had filed with the court in anticipation of this hearing. And in that letter, they say, well, okay, yes, Jeffries is accused of paying dozens of men for travel to engage in commercial sex acts, that he used a security company to surveil and intimidate witnesses, but these are superficial similarities with Sean Combs. First, unlike Sean Combs, Mike Jeffries is not accused of committing violent acts that were separate and apart from the sex trafficking allegations, and also, he didn't use firearms. Also, they say, Jeffries is not accused of racketeering like Sean Combs is. Combs, they say, is continually

engaging in obstruction. Jeffrey's allegations of obstruction ended in 2015, and also Mike Jeffries is 80 years old, Sean Combs is 55, two different dangers. Now, interestingly, Sean Combs' other lawyer, Alexandra Shapiro, she jumped in at one point during the hearing and she actually argued to Judge Subramanian that the Jeffries case is actually worse than Sean Combs case. Why? Because there prosecutors are alleging an international sex trafficking business and that the victims were raped and sodomized. And she also said, Combs, Guess what? He's not that young either. Now, moving on from that point, I thought that was an interesting back and forth.

There was another point in the hearing I want to highlight. And this centered around once again the infamous 2016 videotape that was published by CNN earlier this year of Combs purportedly beating his ex-girlfriend Cassandra Ventura in a hotel hallway while he was just wearing a towel. And prosecutors have suggested that Sean Combs attacked her as she was escaping a freak off, a clear example of sex trafficking. And again, to prove that he is a danger. Dangerousness, key factor in a bail analysis. Now, Judge Suburbanian did something actually interesting. He pressed the prosecution about something the defense had brought up, that that video may not be exactly what it is because CNN may have spliced it or edited it together. Slavic responded, it was a bit puzzling

that the defendant brought this up because there's really no dispute as to what actually happened during that incident. In fact, the defendant admitted to it and apologized for it in a public Instagram post. That's true. Combs apologized two days after that video was released. And she went on to say, whether the video was slowed or spliced or edited by CNN, there's really no dispute about what the video shows. It shows the defendant shoving, kicking, and dragging a female victim. That is true. Actually, when Sub-Romanian was questioning Mark Agnifalo, he asked him about these text message conversations between Combs and victim one in the case, who we believe to be Cassandra Ventura. And whereas the prosecution has highlighted the messages to show that she was a victim of

physical abuse and non-consensual sex acts, Agnifalo suggested that they had more information that provides more context to the relationship and to that 2016 video. He said it really is purely consistent with our view of this being a consensual, long-term, loving, fraught relationship that had a breakup, and the breakup wasn't because, of course, sex or for sex. He even suggested that there was regrettable physical conduct going both ways in this relationship. Now, when it came to the allegations of whether Sean Combs was improperly contacting or trying to contact people, Ms. Shapiro distinguished other cases, like where a defendant told someone to lie by phone, she said that's not happening here.

Plus, when it comes to posting on social media, she says, Sean Combs, her client, has a First Amendment right to speak up when there is a barrage of negative media coverage out there and defend himself. And Judge Suburbanian said, well, why can't he just do that through his lawyers? In other words, why does he have to go through these other third parties to do that? Now, Shapiro reportedly responded, well, we're happy to do that, but we're lawyers. It's not really what we do. Subramanian also pressed her on the communications regarding victims or witnesses, and she denied that this was evidence of obstruction. And she assured the judge that Sean Combs will listen to his lawyers.

If they tell him not to do something, he won't do it. The problem, as reemphasized by Prosecutor Slavic, is she says he has reached out to a witness an alleged participant in multiple freakoffs, and he allegedly ignored his lawyers when they told him not to do the social media campaign around his birthday, but he wanted to do it anyway. And also, even if it is common, as the defense suggests, for inmates to share their codes to make phone calls, the Bureau of Prisons Handbook prohibits this. The main idea, he doesn't follow the rules on the inside.

He can't be expected to follow the rules on the outside. Now, this moves into arguably the most interesting and pivotal moment in this hearing. This is when the judge inquired as to where home confinement would exactly be. Now, Mark Agnifalo indicated that it would be in Miami, that there would be a dock but no boat, And the judge heard that and said, that's not going to work. Where in New York could he stay? So, Agnifalo responded that there is an apartment in the Upper East Side, three bedrooms. There would be two security guards in the apartment, one downstairs.

No access to phone or internet except calls with his lawyers. And Combs would avoid all contact with anyone who would be a witness in this case. And I have to tell you, this could be a sign that Judge Subramanian is entertaining the idea. of pretrial release in home confinement. I will say though, Judge Sub-Romanian also heard from pretrial services. This is the office that ensures federal criminal defendants appear in court and monitor their activities

so they don't pose a danger on the outside. And the representative from pretrial services sided with the prosecution and reportedly said that we maintain the bail conditions are insufficient. However, this representative seemed to acknowledge that there aren't any cases they're aware of where private guards would be enlisted, this is unique. So what did the judge decide?

Well, he said he will make a decision promptly next week on bail, meaning this week, and he did suggest that both the prosecution and the defense submit letters to the court by Monday today at noon. And one of the questions is what can Sean Combs say or not say right now? And those letters just came in. So the defense pointed to the recent case of United States. versus Donald Trump when it comes to what Combs can say about his own case. Because Mr. Combs is, quote, a criminal defendant and is presumed to be innocent,

he has a, quote, greater constitutional claim than other trial participants, including counsel, to criticize and speak out against the prosecution and the criminal trial process that seek to take away his liberty. Accordingly, the court should apply Trump's heightened standard when considering Mr. Combs' speech here. The defense also argued again that what Combs had to say was protected under the First Amendment, free speech. Alexander Shapiro cited multiple court cases in her letter. The cited examples do not even remotely implicate the types of possible prejudicial speech that courts have previously considered. This is not speech about witness testimony or cooperation that imperils the

availability, content, and integrity of witness testimony, nor does the speech target known or reasonably foreseeable witnesses concerning their potential participation in the criminal proceeding. Mr. Combs did not make public statements in an attempt to discredit testimony for the prosecution or make evidence available to the news media. The speech does not concern any attempt to publish court order discovery, and this is not a case where the party's expression was itself obstructive. The government is essentially arguing for a standard in which the entire press community and civil plaintiffs and the government itself can wage war against Mr. Combs' reputation,

but Mr. Combs can't even try to influence public opinion himself in response. That is simply not the law. and clearly she's referencing the multitude of lawsuits that he's facing. Now, the defense says that none of the examples the prosecution gave hold water, and they should not be used as reasons to keep Sean Combs behind bars. So what did the prosecution have to say about the bail hearing on Friday? Well, they got straight to the point on page one of their letter. The defendant's history of obstructive conduct is part and parcel to his decades-long pattern of violence,

which must be considered, along with his obstructive conduct, to fully assess his dangerousness under the bail reform act. view of his obstructive and violent conduct, conduct that is still happening presently, makes clear that there is no way to rebut the applicable presumption of detention in this case. The bail package presented by the defendant does not come close to ensuring the safety of the community, including from the defendant's ongoing efforts to obstruct this case, nor does it adequately protect from risk of flight. For all of these reasons, the defendant's renewed application for bail must be denied.

So the fact that Judge Sumbermanian did not immediately deny Combs bid for bail like the other two judges did and has entertained what home confinement would look like, it is possible he could make bail. It is possible Sean Combs can make bail. Now, to be clear, should he violate any conditions if he's actually released, he will go straight back to the MDC and probably absent some extraordinary circumstance, he will never get another chance at bail again. So if he does get released, he most certainly better be on his best behavior. Now, doesn't mean that the government won't file obstruction charges against Sean Combs and let's say a superseding indictment based on what he allegedly did in the MDC. They could still do that. Remember, the government acknowledged they are submitting evidence to a grand jury in New York right now.

They could also use evidence of what they say is obstruction, not even in additional charges, but just as additional evidence in the racketeering charge that he currently faces. And if he is released and violates his bail conditions, they could also file additional charges to them. Now, what happens if Subramanian denies Sean Combs bail? Well, it seems that Sean Combs has one final attempt to take this issue up to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, a higher appellate court. In fact, his legal team had submitted a legal brief in support of bail previously with this court, but then they asked the court to pause a decision on that while they petition Judge Subramanian first. Okay, so with that, let's see what Judge Subramanian decides. And if he decides soon enough, is it possible?

Sean Combs could be released and reunited with his family right in time for Thanksgiving. Let's see. Thanks so much, everybody, for joining us here on Sidebar. As always, please subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Jesse Weber. Speak to you next time. You can binge all episodes of this law and crime series ad free right now on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.