Law&Crime Sidebar - Meek Mill’s Lawyer Speaks On P. Diddy Scandal: 'Get Ready'

Episode Date: March 27, 2024

Sean Combs, the music mogul often referred to as P. Diddy, is under investigation by federal authorities for possible links to a sex trafficking operation. Two of Diddy's homes were raided by federal authorities on Monday. Law&Crime’s Jesse Weber sits down with Brian J. McMonagle, attorney for fellow rapper Meek Mill, to discuss what we know so far about the investigation.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW: Get 50% off of confidential background reports at https://www.truthfinder.com/lcsidebarHOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokeVideo Editing - Michael DeiningerScript Writing & Producing - Savannah WilliamsonGuest 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.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this Law and Crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wondry Plus in the Wondery app Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Agent Nate Russo returns in Oracle 3, Murder at the Grandview, the latest installment of the gripping Audible Original series. When a reunion at an abandoned island hotel turns deadly, Russo must untangle accident from murder. But beware, something sinister lurks in the grand. View Shadows. Joshua Jackson delivers a bone-chilling performance in this supernatural thriller that

will 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. Who better to talk about the high-profile case of Sean Diddy Combs than the attorney who's represented some very high-profile celebrities like Bill Cosby and Meek Mill. Ryan J. McMonigle gives his take and advice for Diddy. Welcome to Sidebar, presented by Law and Crime. I'm Jesse Weber. So we have been talking to a lot of people about the latest developments in the Sean Diddy Combs story.

More specifically, I mean that federal agents, rated properties connected to the rapper this past Monday. Being reported, this is all in connection to an ongoing sex trafficking investigation, not clear if Combs is a target or subject of the investigation. certain outlets are reporting that Combs is the target. Now remember, Target is essentially the person that prosecutors have evidence against, that they're building a criminal case against. It's also being reported that the search was pursuant to a search warrant issued through the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York.

Homeland Security were the ones who carried out the raid. NBC News reported that several people have been interviewed by federal authorities in connection to allegations of sex trafficking, sexual assault, solicitation, distribution of illegal narcotics and firearms. This comes on the heels of several high-profile lawsuits filed against Mr. Combs and his family and businesses and associates alleging everything from sex trafficking to sexual assault to harassment. If you read the details of these lawsuits, you can't un-hear them.

You can't unsee them. It is just horrific stuff. And it is being reported that this search on the properties was for documents, electronic devices, like phones, computers. It was a wild scene where you saw agents swore. warming onto the property, sometimes with guns drawn. We saw video of several people, including potentially Combs' sons and handcuffs. Seems like they were detained, not arrested.

Now, at the time of this recording, it is not even clear where Combs is at this time. But we do know that neither he nor anyone else has been arrested or charged or indicted in connection with this operation. However, a man named Brendan Paul, someone who is alleged to be Combs drug mule, was arrested on cocaine and marijuana possession. This was charges out in Florida. He's been bailed out. His attorney released a statement, quote, We do not plan on trying this case in the media. All issues will be dealt with in court.

This was a statement from Brian Bieber, his attorney that was issued to CNN. Okay, so with all that in mind, I want to bring on a special guest. I want to bring on right now attorney Brian J. McMonigal. He represents some very high-profile people, rapper Meek Mill, Bill Cosby. So he is no stranger to these situations.

where high profile people face very serious accusations, allegations, they're in the spotlight, they're in the media. And I was so happy to get your perspective on this. Brian, thanks so much for coming on. Pleasure to meet you. So I got to just get your overall take on what happened here. I will tell you, first of all, we were talking about before the air. We've done stories on Diddy. I was maybe not one of the people that was that shocked when this came down because we were reporting on lawsuits where he was accused of sex trafficking and sexual assault. But to see what happened the other day what was your reaction to it i was shocked um i you know they didn't they didn't just come heavy they came nuclear um seeing the kind of federal response you saw it the

execution of those warrants was stunning uh it looked like they were hitting el chapo's house um when i saw on the news and uh i had the same reaction i mean i i had been looking at it and hearing the allegations and and studying some of the lawsuits but i never thought it would rise to the level of federal intervention particularly at that level um so stunned and my initial thoughts were twofold one is that they're very close to indicting somebody or two they had some really hard intel that told them they had to move quickly so they could discover evidence that their information was indicating was was either located at one of these residents but it was stunning

in terms of the swiftness and the the breadth of it I must tell you well listen I wanted your perspective too because it fresh off the Presses yesterday, late yesterday. Diddy's attorney, he's now being represented by Aaron Dyer, released a very long statement on the rapper's behalf as an defense attorney, I'm curious your perspective on. So it says, quote, yesterday, there was a gross overuse of military level force as search warrants were executed at Mr. Combs' residences. There is no excuse for the excessive show of force and hostility exhibited by authorities

of the way his children and employees were treated. Mr. Combs was never detained, but spoke to and cooperated with authorities. Despite media speculation, neither Mr. Combs nor any of his family members have been arrested, nor has their ability to travel been restricted in any way. This unprecedented ambush, paired with an advanced, coordinated media presence, leads to a premature rush to judgment of Mr. Combs and is nothing more than a witch hunt based on meritless accusations made in civil lawsuits. There has been no finding of criminal or civil liability with any of these allegations. Mr. Combs is innocent and will continue to fight every single day to clear his name. What are your thoughts on that? Perfection.

You know, he's obviously represented by a great lawyer, and that's the exact response that you want. This is an indication from the defendant. If he is going to be a defendant, that they're not messing around, that they're not going to lie down. It's unequivocal. It's, I'm innocent, and if you've got something, bring it. I don't know that you could have crafted a better statement, and I think it's an indication

of what's to come, because if they are going to bring charges, this is the case that's going to go to trial. Well, that's my question. But when they say that he cooperated, there was a lot of talk, a lot of early speculation that did he had left the country, that, you know, he escaped, doesn't appear to be the case. But what does it mean that he cooperated with them? Do you think he had advanced notice of what was happening at his home? Do you think he was informed right when it was happening? What do you think it means by he cooperated?

I don't know that you could read much into that. You know, cooperation takes on a couple of different meanings. So cooperation could mean that he's already met with law enforcement. I don't think that he has. Cooperation could mean that he's cooperating with law enforcement. I don't think that he has. I think this was a statement by his lawyer basically saying, hey, listen, we're not going anywhere. We'll face these charges. If somebody needs access to dwellings or records, they can issue subpoenas. You don't have to come, you know, with the strike force here if you need information or if you need evidence. We've got it. And we look forward to cooperating with an investigation that'll clear my client's good name.

think that's the only way you can read that. Talk to me about, though, if this gives you any indication about where Diddy is? What I say that is, you know, there was a question of did he leave the country, right? It seems to me if he's somehow cooperating and maybe gave up electronic devices that he would still be in the country. Does that, you think that's a fair assessment? You know, it's hard to tell. I mean, if he had some preexisting plans, you know, wouldn't be surprising you know a guy with that lifestyle could be anywhere but I would think it would make sense for for everybody if he's not in the country for him to get back in the country quickly any important matter in your life deserves your attention if I was advising him I'm advising

him to come back home to hold his chin up and to get ready to deal with what's coming it's probably going to start raining soon for him and he's going to want to make sure that he makes it clear to everybody he's got nothing to run from and that he won't run from anything so if he's not in the country i would expect in short order he will be back in the country um without question unless he went to a country that doesn't have an extradition policy but yeah but let me ask you this yeah they usually don't work out too well oh no i mean again people were like oh my gosh if he knew this is the heat was on i mean he's just going to go somewhere where he doesn't have to come back but you don't suspect that's what the case is it's a small

world. I've had some people try that. It doesn't usually work out too well. Let me ask you this. The idea, and you are echoing, I think, what a lot of other attorneys, legal analysts have said that it seems charges are about to come down. Now, I will tell you a lot of people have said that they thought that with a raid, there would be an indictment in conjunction with it. People would be arrested. We haven't seen that. It's been, at the time of this recording, two days since the raid. A, are you surprised we haven't seen arrests in connection with this? Again, what is a purported sex trafficking investigation, and do you think charges are going to come? On the first question, I'm not surprised.

I mean, you know, they usually do it one and two ways. They'll either come heavy and indict immediately or they're coming heavy to try and secure evidence so they can start a process of putting evidence before a grand jury. I mean, we don't even know if there has been any evidence presented to a grand jury yet. They're the feds. They're not the state courts, and they are not going to indict somebody or charge somebody on somebody's word alone. I can assure you. And so they want to try and develop as much evidence, forensic evidence.

You know, they're going to be looking at phones. They're going to be looking at travel. They're going to be looking at corroborating every allegation that's been made in these lawsuits. I wouldn't be surprised if they took their time because they know that they're going to get the best representation in the world for this celebrity. And they're not going to look to want to lose. And so, you know, they're very interesting in how they operate the feds. you know so i think trying to read too much into timing could be problematic particularly if they

didn't find anything i mean what what did these searches yield did they get any evidence is there anything um that they obtained that would would make them run before a grand jury and bring charges um you know i i think they're going to take their time uh unless they've got it and i'd be surprised if they haven't yet a couple of things there right so we know that you would need probable cause for search warrant um they did show quite the presence now you can could say, and I'm reading the lawsuits, right? And if you take the allegations and the lawsuits is true that Diddy is surrounded by weapons, that he has quite the security presence, large properties. You don't know what you're entering into. I've spoken to law enforcement experts to say

it's not surprising they came with that level of, you know, military reinforcements or they talked about military grade. But at the same time, you know, the way that they did it was quite a statement. And to not have it be in conjunction with other charges at the moment, you say, you know, it could have been that there's reporting that they had been speaking to certain individuals. Again, the belief is that this is emanating from the Southern District of New York, the U.S. attorneys for the Southern District of New York. But it seems don't, do you feel that they had more than just statements from witnesses to go after these properties, to go into these properties like that? Yeah, there's no doubt that they had something that, you know, kind of suggested. a clear and present danger or something that suggested to them that there was going to be real evidence there that could be destroyed. I don't think they would have came in the way they

came without some hard intel. And so, I mean, that tells me one of two things. It tells me that they're getting real information about criminal activity, whether it's true or not, who the heck knows, that criminal activity is ongoing. Otherwise, they wouldn't have came the way they came without an indictment. But I just think it's always, you need to be cautious in terms of trying to understand their mindset. I don't know what drove those warrants. I don't know what that probable cause was. And I think that will tell us everything once those warrants get unsealed and charges emanate. But, you know, they can always charge a couple of different ways in a federal case. You can charge by an information or you can charge by a grand jury indictment. They've done neither

here. And I think they were hoping to find something. And whether they found it or not, I don't know, but I didn't get a sense of them. By the way, as I cover stories like this, I always think about what are some ways we can protect ourselves in this absolutely crazy world? You know what one of the best things you can do is? Learn about who you surround yourself with. Yeah. And you can do that with truthfinder.com. There are great sponsor. Always so happy to talk about them because TruthFinder is one of the largest public record search services in the whole world. Their goal is to help people like you learn the facts about the people in their lives. Here's how it works.

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No, I don't have them. But you know what's really useful is if you type in an address, like your home address or where you work, It tells you the registered sex offenders that may live in that area too. Yeah, and that's the point. Unless you use TruthFinder, you may never know the reality about the people around you. And I'll tell you this, honestly, once I started with this website, I couldn't get off of it. I started typing in like everybody's names I could think of. I must have spent a straight half hour going through it.

It was absolutely fascinating, studying the people in my life. And right now, you can get 50% off of confidential background reports. You just go to truthfinder.com slash L.C. Sidebar. Hope you check it out. Do you think the civil lawsuits have an effect on this? But what do I mean by that? I mean, we both know that even if you settle a lawsuit, like Cassie Ventura was one of his accusers, settled with him the day after filing that sexual assault lawsuit, she accused him

of rape, really horrible, horrible, horrendous things, settles with him. She could be cooperating with law enforcement. Do you think, I mean, again, I just think the timing of this, after lawsuit, after lawsuit, after lawsuit after lawsuit, one of the latest ones, is the one from his former producer, Little Rod Jones. I have to feel that that has an effect on what's going on here. No? I don't think there's any doubt about it. I mean, I, you know, I don't believe in like, you know, consecutive lightning strikes. And so I think that's exactly what's driving it. And you know how this goes. I mean, one witness, two witnesses, but a multitude of witnesses

will get the attention of law enforcement. But this is a federal investigation. And it's, you know, this isn't just a sexual assault allegation like we see in the state courts. This is a trafficking investigation. And so the kind of investigation that usually follows that kind of investigation is lengthy. It's detailed. And I'd be surprised if they rushed into something here. That's just not how the feds operate. So they did come heavy. They sent a clear signal that they're coming. But how quickly you'll see charges, I think, remains to be seen. I'd be stunned if they move too quickly on this that's just not that's just not who they are by the way i have to ask i mean one of the big questions is is if this is true okay let's just assume the worst here

was this just like a known secret that nobody came out was it a situation you know like maybe someone was afraid to come forward i mean we talked about it so much with other cases right are kelly geoffrey epstein but big question i keep getting asked uh uh is if this is true is this just what was going on and nobody spoke up and nobody said anything was this just like part of the hip hop world i mean because it's a really you read the allegations in these lawsuits it is next level yeah it's hard to imagine that that this could be going on with with the world not knowing there's always too many people involved there's there's a lot of money and you can spend a lot of money keeping keeping people quiet if there's criminal activity but it would be stunning to me if all of these allegations are true

and everybody put their head in the sand. It's just unimaginable to me, quite frankly, because everybody's looking for an angle, everybody's looking to make a buck. You know, you've got people making accusations every day trying to derive some financial benefit from it. So it is shocking that it could have gone on that long if it ever went on at all without somebody knowing.

But I think we're going to find out. I don't know if we're going to find out in a week or a month or six months, but I think something's going to come with this. It's the rarest of occasions, where they execute warrants at this level and don't end up doing something about it. So I think that, you know, Diddy's team is going to be poised for, you know, charges to be to be leveled at some level at some point in time, just how quickly it's hard to tell. Well, again, you represent high-profile people. What would you be advising Diddy right now if you were representing him?

Yeah, I'd be telling him, hey, listen, you're innocent, you haven't done anything wrong, so act like you haven't done anything wrong. live your life you know keep your friends close and and keep your enemies away from you walk like you're innocent talk like you're innocent continue to do the things that you do every day um try to get yourself invested in some good things if you aren't already i'm sure he's got a lot of charities etc that he's working on you know show yourself to be who we say you are um and um i think in that way you don't make a bad situation if it is a bad situation even worse so i think he's got to put a good face on and to make sure he lets the world know and ultimately his jury know that he's innocent and I would take an aggressive approach if I was them. I really would because this is a case

that's going to garner an enormous amount of publicity. You're talking to jurors with your actions and so he wants to make those actions real and right and I'm sure that that'll happen. I'm sure he's in the best of hands and they'll make sure that he's sending a message loud and clear to any particular jury pool that he's innocent of these charges and he looks forward to defending him. Now, let's say he's not charged yet, right? Would you, I can't imagine, I'm not sure, but he's being attacked on the PR machine. I mean, everybody is saying things about him right now.

And to give you an example, so 50 cent came out, basically he was trolling Diddy a lot. I know they have a feud. He's posted on Instagram. Now it's not Did he do it. It's Diddy Done. They don't come like that unless they got a case. It just got real. The feds and all the Chris.

Damn, they got the kids in cuffs. Aubrey O'Day, who was part of Danity Kane, that was a music group that was started, I believe, by Diddy. She came out and said, what you sow, you shall reap. I pray this emboldened all of us, all of us victims to finally speak on what we've endured. Would you advise Diddy to make a statement personally, whether it's an interview and a media outlet, or to a statement of his own on social media, to respond to this? Only if it's controlled. I've seen disaster after disaster. We saw it in the Penn State case where people went on Dateline. The defendant went on Dateline and got interviewed. It would have to be controlled. I think it would have to be brief. I think once you go down that road, you're running into a lot of trouble. Keep in mind that the story here is a better story if he did it than if he didn't. And I've tried to be on the other side of that in cases. And you can see it go both ways. In our case with Meek, obviously, the media was rooting for him because it was right. It was just. In other cases I've had, they didn't care what the accused had to say.

That's not the story for them. The story is better if it's that he did it. And so I think if he's going to make any kind of a statement at all, it'd be a prepared statement. It'd be a quick statement. Did he not take questions? And it'd be something probably as perfectly crafted as the response you saw from his lawyer. And that would be the end of it. Taking interviews, I think, can be a disaster. One misstep during an interview. And it's a news cycle. for a month that you'll that you'll never be able to overcome. So very limited in terms of a response, but perhaps a response that's measured in brief. And let's say did he is hit with these massive sex trafficking related charges and you were to represent him. How do you defend him at trial?

Again, you've represented very high profile people. Cosby is a name that comes up in a very high profile case. How would you represent him? Well, I, you know, I think, it depends on what the evidence is. If the evidence is allegations being made by individuals, you know, you do it the old-fashioned way. You develop an investigation. You find out everything that they've ever said about them, any motives they would have to lie about them. And, you know, one by one, you try and dissect the allegations. I don't think there's another way to do it. You know, sometimes you get real lucky in these cases. Somebody makes an allegation that you were somewhere at someplace at some time and you weren't. These other individuals, I'm sure, are being

interviewed in the media. You want to get every single sound bite they've ever given, everything they've ever said about the case, and hold up those inconsistencies, one against the other. And more importantly, if he's got evidence of innocence, you know, sometimes you really, you really do, you've got an innocent client there. Believe it or not, nobody believes that. And if this guy is innocent of these allegations, or if they've been distorted in any way, remember, you know, you prove one distortion, and then all of a sudden the whole thing could collapse. And so, you know, I'm sure. or what he's going to do and what his lawyers are going to do is they're going to dissect everything that's been alleged against them. You know, the nice thing about civil lawsuits is there's a lot

of information you can glean from them. There's depositions. There's interrogatories. And people are of record. And so there's great fodder for cross-examination in these cases. And I'm sure he's done a lot of wonderful things in his life. And those things are going to have to be brought to bear in a criminal courtroom. You know, let the world know how good he is and how good he's been so that that image can be created. And, you know, remember, in a criminal case, you don't need to convince You just got to convince one. One of the things, though, I don't know if you had the opportunity to read the Little Rod Jones lawsuit, but embedded in that lawsuit were screenshots of what appears to be Diddy with what appears to be underage girls at a party.

They're Cuba Gooding Jr. is somebody who's been implicated in this. There's a picture of Little Rod Jones with Cuba Gooding Jr.'s arm around him. There is, he claims Little Rod Jones. He has other evidence. He even says that Diddy has cameras. in his house of all of this purported sexual conduct as a form of blackmail, he seems he came forward in that lawsuit. And again, it's a different standard. It's a lawsuit. It's not a criminal case. But he seems to have enough to, a lot to prove his allegations. And again, I wonder what that

effect had on this case. Because when I was reading it three weeks ago, four weeks ago, I was like, this is, he's not just making out, he's got receipts in a way of it. And I thought that was really substantial. I'm curious how that might be playing into this case. Well, I think it's everything about this case at this point. I think they went looking for receipts. I mean, you know, I think you're right. I think there was enough allegations and specific allegations that suggested that there was proof in existence in places that they could find it.

And that's what they went looking for. I don't think, you know, these search warrants were just to send a message. They were looking for stuff. And I think it was based on a lot of the allegations you've just suggested. The question is, did they find the receipts? because when you say there's tapes and when you say there's evidence and the feds go looking for it and they don't find it, well, that's, you know, that's one more quiver, you know, in our arsenal in terms of being able to defend these cases. So I don't think you're wrong.

I think, you know, they were looking for the breadcrumbs and were trying to find the kind of real evidence that the feds rely on when they indict somebody again you know they're very careful they're not going to go on somebody's allegations because of some picture they're going to want to look at you know real evidence what evidence do they have that people are being brought into the country i mean you've got homeland security here so this wasn't an fbi sting uh an fbi warrant this was homeland security so they're looking at you know international um evidence they're looking at flight evidence they're looking at whatever kind of real evidence that doesn't lie that can't be cross-examined in order to bring a credible prosecution and they won't come without it they're not going to come

with with he-say she-say stuff in federal court they never do um and if they do come then my guess is they're going to have to they're going to have to bring it with a lot of credible real evidence and whether they found any they may have i mean they probably got computers and they probably got you know every single piece of digital information they could get to corroborate these allegations but you're going to need corroboration or they won't come what a case what a case what a development unbelievable and we will see where it goes it's an ever developing story um brian j micmonogoth really thank you so much for coming on talking about this giving us a different perspective on it we'll make sure to stay in touch as this definitely progresses thanks for having me it's been a pleasure

absolutely all right everybody that's all we have for you right now here on this episode of sidebar thank you so much for joining us as always please subscribe on apple podcast spotify youtube wherever you get your podcast i'm jesse weber speak to you next time you can binge all episodes of this long crime series ad free right now on one Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.