Law&Crime Sidebar - P. Diddy Grasps at Straws with Mental Health Defense

Episode Date: April 29, 2025

In-person jury selection will soon get underway in the federal racketeering and sex crimes trial of music mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs. Recent court filings appear to indicate that the defense plans to call a doctor to talk about diminished mental capacity in relation to heavy drinking or drug use. Law&Crime’s Jesse Weber discusses the latest developments with former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW:Go to https://ThriveMarket.com/sidebar to receive 30% off your first order AND a FREE gift when you join Thrive Market today!HOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokeVideo Editing - Michael Deininger, Christina O'Shea & Jay CruzScript 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. From a brand new potential mental health defense to propose questions to potential jurors as they begin showing up to court, we're going to get into the latest filings and developments as the sex crimes trial for Sean Diddy Combs is about to begin. Welcome to Sidebar, presented by law and crime. I'm Jesse Weber. Okay, so before we jump into the case, I want to tell you about something else real quick. We have this brand new podcast that we just dropped on Wondery Plus. It's called Karen the retrial. It's about Karen Reed. Shocker. It's the best place

for a recap of everything going on in the Karen Reed case, everything going on in her retrial that's literally happening right now, by the way. What's to come? as the new trial heats up. So you can find Karen the retrial exclusively on the Wondery app or an Apple podcast. Click the link in our description below to listen now. Hope you can check it out. Okay, back to the case. Well, we are now officially beginning the Sean Combs trial.

Yep, it has been reported that prospective jurors have begun arriving at the federal courthouse in downtown New York to begin the initial stage of jury selection in Diddy's long-awaited criminal case where he faces five counts, racketeering, sex trafficking, transportation to engage in prostitution. And we're going to get to the questions a little bit later on about what these jurors may be asked and what the process may be. But there has been a flurry of new activity on the court docket leading up to this trial. So many issues that need to be sorted out. So I want to go through them. And the first one, this is something. So first, we have a interesting defense that was possibly laid out by Sean Combs' attorneys. And it appears,

It appears the defense wants to argue to the jury that Combs had a diminished mental capacity, meaning we're talking about a mental health defense, that he couldn't properly form the necessary criminal intent, we call it mens rea, to commit the offenses that he's charged with. More specifically, it seems Combs wants to call Dr. L.E. G. Aoun, MD, an assistant professor of clinical psychiatry at Columbia University and Forensic Psychiatrist, in New York City. Hopefully I'm pronouncing the doctor's last name correctly. I apologize if I'm not. But the government claims that Dr. Arun didn't examine Combs but looked at all these records. And what he plans to opine about is not 100% clear because so much is redacted

and blacked out in the filings. However, there are references to whether a defendant is lucid or whether a defendant can control his behavior and volitional acts and, quote, evidence of the effects of drugs and alcohol on a defendant's memory or cognitive function. So is the idea that Combs was so heavily intoxicated that he didn't know what was going on, that he didn't have the proper criminal intent to commit these crimes? So before we get into all that, I want to explain why the government says Dr. Arun's testimony should be excluded from trial. And essentially, it seems that whatever defense, the defense is coming up with, they say it shouldn't be allowed to come in. So first argument is that under federal law, usually a men,

mental disease or defect is usually not a legal defense unless we're talking insanity. However, there's a rare and narrow exception where a defendant can introduce mental health evidence to argue that there was no criminal intent. And because it is so rare and so narrow, the prosecution argues that the defendant has to establish a direct link between the evidence and the specific intent required under the charged offenses. And under the federal rules, the defendant has to provide the proper notice to the government before they can introduce evidence about this.

So the government argues that other rules apply to as well. There's Rule 702 regarding expert witnesses and qualified opinions they can give. There's Rule 703. It puts limits on when and how experts can testify to facts and data that are usually inadmissible. Rule 704 prevents the expert from telling the jury whether or not a defendant had the required mental state for purposes of a specific crime. That's up to the jury to decide. So here, the prosecution says the defense failed everything.

Here the prosecution says the notice was untimely, meaning it's coming in too late in the lead-up to trial. This is an improper justification defense. It's irrelevant. It's unreliable, especially because the government claims there's no direct link between the mental health evidence and negating an essential element of the actual crimes that Combs is charged with. They claim that what Combs is arguing is way too general and it's confusing and it's not going to be helpful. to the jury. And just going back to one specific line in the government's filing for why this testimony is inadmissible and why this doctor should not testify, it quotes a prior case, but it reads, thus, the usefulness of the expert testimony in determining whether the defendant was

lucid during the course of his participation in a complex multi-year scheme is substantially reduced. And moreover, they claim that this doctor's testimony would violate the rule that I mentioned before about how an expert can't say definitively whether or not the defendant had the required mental state. The government complains that Dr. O'un's testimony is unreliable because he didn't examine Sean Combs. He only analyzed certain medical records. And the government says that's not enough. So in conclusion, the prosecution argues that Dr. Oun's testimony should be excluded or they're asking the court to hold a hearing about the admissibility of this testimony. It's called a Daubert hearing. So I'm not going to lie to you. This took me hours last night to be.

go through all these ditty filings, and I was snacking, I was eating dinner, and I'll tell you what, I try to eat clean, I try to eat healthy, but shopping for healthy food is not so easy. It's tough to know what's actually good for you, but that is why I'm so happy. Thrive Market is now sponsoring sidebar. Thrive Market is a go-to online grocery store for getting healthy essentials. One of the things that I love is their shopping experience, because as a Thrive market member, you can customize the assortment of products in just a few clicks based on your preferences and diet. And you can filter the products to get exactly what you're looking for. Like instead of me chopping on candy, I found these amazing organic avocado oil chips. They're perfect

for that midday craving. Also, this place, super echo conscious with all their products shipped from their zero waste warehouses. Everything is delivered straight to your door so you don't even have to leave the house. So if you're ready to make healthy food shopping as easy as a few clicks, check out Thrive Market. Scan the QR code on screen. Click the link in the description or head over to Thrivemarket.com slash sidebar to get 30% off of your first order and a free gift when you join Thrive Market today. So a lot to get into. I want to bring on right now, Nima Romani, former federal prosecutor, trial and criminal defense attorney. Thank you so much for taking the time, Neema. It's great to see you. We have a lot to get into. This is just

part one. So first, let me ask you, am I outside the realm of understanding what this could possibly be? I mean, I've seen reporting about it, but I feels like what the defense is. may be suggesting is, hey, jury, because of drugs and alcohol or something else, he didn't have the required mental state to commit these crimes? Am I understanding that correctly? Jesse, you nailed it. And that's exactly what the defense is trying to do here. And we all know that voluntary intoxication is not a defense to a criminal offense. So drug use, alcohol use. Yeah, if you're drugged, sure. But if you voluntarily take drugs, that's not a defense so what the defense is trying to do here is force a square peg through a round hole

because like you said it's also well established that an expert or any witness for that matter can't testify to a defendant's criminal state saying they intended to do this or they did not so I think the judge is going to exclude this particular witness setting aside the Daubert hearing setting aside his or her qualifications or even foundation because this individual apparently reviewed some other records, didn't examine Combs himself. So for all those reasons, I expect this witness to be excluded. And like you said, Jesse, there are plenty of federal rules and cases that support that exclusion. I feel like you're right.

I feel like the judge is going to agree with the prosecution here. Although it does make me wonder the defense arguing this. And again, so much of this is redacted, but assuming we're right, does this feel like grasping its jaws by the defense to go with this defense? It really is swinging for the fences here. The problem with this type of defense also is you're really admitting that Combs did all this, right? And he just didn't know what he was doing, essentially. That's the defense.

You're focused on his intent at the time. And like you said, maybe if there was one episode where he wasn't lucid, maybe a jury or a judge might consider it. But we're talking about a conspiracy ranging decades here is the argument that he was under the influence of drugs for all these freakoffs. And when he entered into this conspiracy and when he was procuring these women and men

to participate in these sex acts and when he was completing the acts, let's not forget the freakoffs lasted days. I just don't see it in a case like this. By the way, so much of this filing, and a lot of the filings, is still redacted. In a few weeks, are we going to know everything? Well, if the evidence comes in, we will absolutely know everything because, of course, trials are public. And unless there's some evidentiary issue like a hearing that's going to be outside the presence of the jurors,

we're going to see and hear everything that comes into evidence in that federal court. But obviously, if something's excluded and some pretrial filing, we're not going to hear it. Just to be clear, see everything. I mean, there's no cameras in the courtroom, but there's going to be reporting on it and maybe some exhibits will be released, possibly not, but there'll be a lot of reporting on it. Okay, so I want to move on to another argument from the prosecution. So not only do they argue that this doctor's testimony should not be allowed at trial, the jury shouldn't can hear it, but they also filed the motion arguing the testimony

of another defense witness should not be allowed. And this is Connor McCourt. We've talked about it before. So he is who the defense claims is a forensic video expert who's going to testify about the infamous footage of Combs purportedly beating Cassandra Ventura in a hotel hallway back in 2016. Remember when CNN published this footage? Apparently there's copies of it. Apparently there were cell phone videos taken of it. Apparently there's raw footage of it. But essentially, the defense wants to challenge the authenticity of this footage. And it's not surprising because it could potentially have.

quite a powerful impact on the jury. Remember, the prosecution claims this proves Ventura, who we believe to be victim one in the case, was running away from Combs and a sex worker during an infamous freakoff, so i.e. forced commercial sex work, sex trafficking, right? Now, the defense seems to want to call Mr. McCourt to make the argument that the videos the government will rely on are not reliable, that some are artificially sped up. They're distorted, including cell phone videos that make homes look more stocky and more imposing. There are inaccurate timestamps. In other words, these videos, whatever videos are actually published for the jury to see,

they don't accurately portray what may have happened. Now, the prosecution argues, like they did before, the defense failed to provide timely notice of Mr. McCourt's testimony by a certain deadline. This is required under Rule 16. They also argue that this testimony should be excluded, because whatever probative or relevant value it may have is substantially outweighed by the risk of unfairly prejudicing the jury because even though the government says it plans to authenticate the videos, their argument is having this expert come in and say these videos have all of these

technical issues, a jury may give more weight to what he has to say. And they claim he doesn't add anything. And then he'll confuse the jury. And the prosecution even suggests that the defense will have an opportunity to cross-examine an unnamed witness about certain videos. So maybe the person who took them, maybe like the cell phone videos. And if there's any questions about quality of the videos, timestamps, the defense can cross-examine this person about any edits that were made or anything like that. And the government also argues that at the very least, his testimony should be limited because he offers legal conclusions that are supposed to be decided by a jury.

And his conclusions, they argue, are irrelevant, that they're outside. the scope of his expertise. For example, the government writes, for McCourt to testify about the prospect of intentional tampering with the videos based solely on the video files being converted from one format to another is extremely prejudicial. Or how about this? McCourt said that the cell phone videos were handheld with varying focus and zoom recording a fixed camera view, which has the effect of making the action more dramatic. There's no need for McCourt or any expert to opine whether a video filmed on a cell phone is more dramatic than surveillance footage. This kind of subjective observation, which is based on comparing one type of visual recording

with another, is certainly something that the jury is more than capable of making without McCourt's testimony and his opinion on the matter should be precluded. Now, remember, recently the judge said that whatever videos the defense wants to present about this 2016 incident will be coming in. So Nima, you think they're right? You think the prosecution has an argument for why Mr. McCourt should not testify? Yes and no. I think he's likely going to be able to testify if he can lay a foundation as to why. The video was altered. And we know the defense is saying that it was sped up.

Of course, CNN has come out publicly and said that they aired what they received. So they received a video from someone at the Intercontinental Hotel in Los Angeles. So we may have multiple witnesses here that are going to be laying the foundation in that sort of chain of custody. You know, I think the argument the prosecution is making really goes to the weight of the evidence, not admissibility. I think this is fair game. If, again, this expert can say that these videos were doctored, they were edited, they were sped up, they were chopped up. Now, certain things I agree with the government on. There's no way a witness should be able to testify as to the intent.

of whoever was editing it, they can come and say, well, this was edited. This was slowed down. This was whatever. But to say that, you know, the prosecution manipulated this to make Combs look bad, that's something for closing argument. That's not something that a witness should properly testify to as to the intent of whomever altered the video. So I think a judge is going to properly exclude that line of inquiry and testimony.

So his testimony would be limited. Tell us what the technical issues you see in the videos are. Leave a jury to decide what to make of it and why it was done that way. Okay, that makes sense. Now, a lot to get through, so I'm kind of speeding through it. But another argument we need to talk about, this is an important one, is it's called defendant Sean Combs' request to charge. Now, this is about instructions and language to be provided to the jury. So, for example, the defense asks the court, provide the standard instructions that you do when it comes to the role of the court and the jury.

the presumption of innocence, okay? Tell the jury that. But then it provides a request for actual instructions for each charge. So for example, this is what the defense wants the judge to read to the jury. Count one charges the defendant with conspiracy to violate the racketeer influenced and corrupt organizations act in order to prove that the defendant conspired to violate the racketeer influenced and corrupt organizations act. The government must establish beyond a reasonable doubt each of the following elements of the offense. First, an agreement among two or more persons to conduct or participate in the affairs of an enterprise that would affect interstate commerce through a pattern of racketeering activity.

Second, that the defendant knowingly and willfully joined that agreement. And third, that the defendant agreed that he or another member of the conspiracy would commit to racketeering acts, as I will define that term for you. And this goes through everything, like the list of elements of a racketeering charge and definitions of every term like what is an enterprise, what is interstate or foreign commerce, definitions of all of the underlying crimes of racketeering, like kidnapping, arson, forced labor. And I've got to say, it's actually pretty interesting about how nuanced and specific these definitions are, because honestly, if the jury carefully considers the evidence and the charges

and the elements, the case can all depend on this language. So, for instance, listen to this part about sex trafficking, because I think this is a little bit of a confusing charge for people. First, that the defendant knowingly transported or recruited or enticed or harbored or provided or obtained or maintained or patronized or solicited a person by any means. Second, that the defendant knew or was in reckless disregard of the fact that forced fraud or coercion would be used with respect to this person. Third, that the defendant knew or was in reckless disregard of the fact that this person would be engaged in a commercial sex act, as I will

define that term for you. And let's talk about that because Combs wants this to be what a commercial sex act means. So his definition would be that he wants the jury to hear. Any sex act on account of which anything of value is given to or received by any person. Mr. Combs maintains that for a sex act to be commercial, there must be a monetary or financial component to the thing of value that is given or received, and the sexual exploitation must be for profit. Now, before I go into the prosecution's language here, Nima, talk to us about why this document is so important, how important it is for this language to be adopted by the jury? So we're talking about jury instructions and charging instructions.

And like you said, certain ones are standard, right? The role of the judge and jury, reasonable doubt, evidence, witnesses. But now we're talking about the specific language for the charges. And whether it's RICO, whether it's sex trafficking, whether it's the prostitution charges, there are what we call pattern jury instructions in every circuit. And obviously, New York is in the second circuit. Now, to the extent that some of the. instructions need to be modified, that's what a judge is going to do. I don't think a judge

is going to include any instruction that says Mr. Combs or the defense argues. The court's going to decide. So we're going to need definitions of force, fraud, and coercion. Those are important because that's what separates sex trafficking from consensual sex between adults. Now, the commercial sex acts, that language is also important. I don't necessarily think anything needs to be specified with respect to profit. I think that is an overreach by the defense. And obviously, they want to make the definition as narrow as possible. So the jurors have something to potentially hang their hat on and say, well, maybe I don't know.

Maybe the government didn't approve that money was made. Or maybe Combs actually lost money on these freakoffs. They didn't really profit from it. So I think that's going to be important. you know, there may be individuals that participated in these sex acts for non-monetary reasons. Maybe they wanted fame or they wanted to spend some time with a celebrity. I mean, we know that sometimes rich and famous artists, they do have an entourage of folks that may willingly engage in these sex acts.

That's, of course, going to be one of the defenses here. So I think the judge is going to have to sort through all that and look at case law to see really what is required for something to be. commercial sex act as opposed to ordinary sex. Yeah, I think that this case could be one or lost based on the language and the instructions, because let me just read to you real quick, the government's request to charge. And there are certain agreements that they have with the defense, like, you know, give the standard instructions for all of the court, the jury, all that. But talking commercial sex acts, which I think we've been talking about is a big part of this

case, because while the prosecution claims that these were sexual arrangements that were a crime, the defense is just going to say they were romantic-related. relationships. So listen to how the government defines commercial sex acts. They seem to greatly expand what it can mean. Quote, that term means any sex act on account of which anything of value is given to or received by any person. The term sex acts should be given its plain meaning, which is ordinarily understood, to be an act performed with another for sexual gratification. It is not required that a commercial sex acts occur as long as the government has proven that the defendant recruited, enticed, harbored, transported, provided, obtained, maintained, patronized,

or solicited the victim for purposes of engaging in commercial sex acts, the thing of value given or received in connection with the commercial sex act need not involve a monetary exchange and need not have any financial component. Instead, it may be

any tangible or intangible thing of value given to or received by any person including promises to help a person with career advancement. The defendant need not be the person who receives the thing of value from the Sex Act. Nemo, quite the difference. Very different, of course.

So the defense is saying that it needs to be a financial transaction and someone needs to profit from it. The government, of course, is saying that, well, if someone wants to advance their career and that's why they had sex with Sean Diddy Combs, that's enough to be a commercial sex act. So a really big difference there. Who's right? Who's right? I think the government is going to be right here. If they're, you know, generally speaking, when you're talking about something of value, it doesn't necessarily have to be currency. If there is some sort of tangible benefit, the law is pretty broad when it comes to these issues.

Okay, two more documents I want to talk about here. And I know we're speeding through it, but there's just a lot to get into. So we have Sean Combs proposed voir dire, meaning questions to ask prospective jurors, which is interesting because, as I mentioned before, prospective jurors, they are going to come to court. They're going to fill out questionnaires. both sides, prosecution defense, they're going to look through them, provide lists of potential jurors to the judge, and then we believe we're going to get more thorough juror questioning on May 5th. But here's what defense attorneys are looking at in terms of questions they want to be asked.

Standard questions like, what is your age, what is your sex, how do you get your news? Then there's this. Do you believe you make most decisions based on intuition or the examination of facts? Do you have any personal experiences or opinions about drug or alcohol use or addiction? which is, you know, a common theme in this case. What kind of music do you like? Do you have experience or training in the area of sex crimes? There's a question about cheating. There's another question about feelings towards prosecutors, how much weight they would give alleged victims testimony. We looked at the prosecutions proposed jury questions too, and those consisted of

feelings regarding prostitution, sexual assault, rape, firearms. Nemo, what do these questions tell you about what the defense and the prosecution is looking for in terms of jurors? The parties are trying to find favorable jurors. And of course, the defense wants folks who may potentially hang this panel, people that may decide that, you know what, I don't believe the testimony of these victims because let's not forget, this case is going to come down entirely to those victims. We know there are at least three. And the person is going to want to corroborate that testimony with video for instance video is the best evidence it doesn't lie and the defense is going to say that they're fabricating all this because of fame money

revenge something like that so what they're trying to do is get people's feelings about sexual assault you know there are a lot of people that believe that it is the most underreported crime other people think that it can be falsely reported so by asking these questions, they really kind of try to prod and probe into these potential jurors to see who might be favorable or disfavorable to their case. Yeah, I mean, there's even a question. Is there any reason why you cannot be a fair and impartial juror for this case? I wonder how many people are going to check that box and be honest about it because it's tough. This is a tough jury to be a part of and it's going to take some time. But I will tell you, there is one more issue I wanted to talk to

you about NEMA because I said there's a flurry of filings. So the defense wrote a letter to the court On April 23rd, complaining about the government, sending an enterprise letter on April 20th. This was two weeks after their last superseding indictment against Combs. Remember, Combs was hit with a third amended superseding indictment, added two charges, a little bit of difference in language. And all that enterprise letter is supposed to do is provide more details about the racketeering charge. But here, the defense is like, you filed this so late, well past the deadline. We're about to go to trial. The defense claims that this letter has new evidence, new legal theories, 15 days before trials to start.

We can't prepare in time. And what all this is about is not clear because so much of it is redacted, but we can kind of get a clue here. For example, their filing says, in other words, while the government had previously raised forced labor allegations only as to victim for the second superseding indictment, the government now seeks to raise forced labor allegations, and then it's redacted. labor is a part of the racketeering charge. There's no reason to believe these allegations were ever presented to and thus approved by the grand jury. To the contrary, the government's extremely late disclosure of these new theories suggest a last

minute attempt to alter and broaden its case. So Combs is asking the court to exclude evidence relating to these new allegations. The prosecution just responded in a letter of its own. They argue that this is just the defendant's attempt to exclude powerful evidence from the case. That we provided information about freakoffs already. We believe we already provided notice of the evidence of racketeering. But it's also, by the way, their argument is this is really evidence of sex trafficking counts for victims one and two. And if that's the case, we don't have to provide additional notice beyond what's in the indictment. We don't need

to provide more particular details about that. Sex trafficking is an underlying predicate crime for racketeering, but it's also stands alone as two separate charges. And they argue allowing this evidence to come in doesn't mean we're amending the third superseding indictment or anything like that. Neema, I gave kind of a condensed summary of both of their arguments, but who's right here? I think the government's right here. So when you're looking at the racketeering charge, it's a conspiracy. So you have the unlawful agreement. We've talked about that a bit.

Then you have the enterprise itself. And it doesn't have to be an actual organization like the mob or the cartel. It's a loose association of two or more people. And we know that Combs had people that were helping him set up these freakoffs to procure the individual, set up the lights, the cameras, the hotel rooms. So I think we're going to get that. Then we're talking about those RICO predicate acts. And we know that we need two or more acts. And, you know, typically you have things like assault, you have things like extortion, you have sex trafficking, or forced labor.

And we know that there's at least some allegations related to one employee and some of these victims. to the extent that they were forced to engage in these acts, that also can qualify as predicate acts. So I think the government has the upper hand here. The indictment is pretty detailed, and we've had now multiple superseding indictments. So I think ultimately the court is going to side with the government here. All right.

We shall see. Nima Romani. Thank you for doing this marathon of legal issues as we head into the Sean Ditty Combs trial. I'm sure we're going to get a flurry of more activity on the court docket website as this continues. But thank you so much for taking the time. Good seeing you. Thanks, Jesse. Thanks for having me, as always. And that's all we have for you right now here on Sidebar. Everybody, thank you so much for joining us. And as always, please subscribe on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you should get your podcasts. I'm Jesse Weber. I'll speak to you next time.

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