The rapper is charged with sex trafficking, racketeering and transportation to engage in prostitution by federal authorities in New York City
By Liam Quinn, a crime reporter for People Magazine.
Music mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs has been indicted on charges of sex trafficking, racketeering and transportation to engage in prostitution.
The charges come one day after the Southern District of New York announced that Combs was arrested by federal agents. Sources told PEOPLE that the rapper and producer was taken into custody at a hotel in Manhattan by Homeland Security Investigations agents.
Speaking outside the federal courthouse in New York, Combs’ attorney Marc Agnifilo vowed to “fight like hell” to get his client released and said the mogul was “going to plead not guilty, obviously.”
“He’s going to fight this with all of his energy and all of his might and the full confidence of his lawyers, and I expect a long battle with a good result for Mr. Combs,” Agnifilo said.
In the indictment, which was unsealed Tuesday and obtained by PEOPLE, prosecutors accuse Combs of manipulating women into participating in “highly orchestrated performances,” which he called “freak-offs.” The “freak-offs” allegedly involved male sex workers; prosecutors allege in the indictment that Combs would arrange to have women and sex workers fly to his location.
Prosecutors allege that Combs “ensured participation” by giving them narcotics, holding sway over their careers, threatening to cut them off from financial support and using violence and intimidation.
Dating back to 2009, prosecutors allege that Combs assaulted multiple women. One incident in 2016 at a Los Angeles hotel, in which Combs allegedly “kicked, dragged and threw a vase” a woman, was caught on camera, according to the indictment. Prosecutors claim the rapper tried to bribe a staff member in exchange for silence.
In a statement to PEOPLE following the rapper’s arrest, his attorney, Agnifilo, said they were “disappointed” by what he called an “unjust prosecution.”
“Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs is a music icon, self-made entrepreneur, loving family man, and proven philanthropist who has spent the last 30 years building an empire, adoring his children, and working to uplift the Black community,” Agnifilo said. “He is an imperfect person but he is not a criminal.”
“To his credit Mr. Combs has been nothing but cooperative with this investigation and he voluntarily relocated to New York last week in anticipation of these charges,” Agnifilo continued. “Please reserve your judgment until you have all the facts. These are the acts of an innocent man with nothing to hide, and he looks forward to clearing his name in court.”
The charges come in the wake of several lawsuits against Combs filed in the last year related to allegations of sexual abuse. In November, his former girlfriend, singer Cassie, sued him in New York.
In the suit, Cassie accused Combs of raping her over the course of their relationship, which lasted a decade. The suit was settled a day after it was filed.
Douglas Wigdor, Cassie’s attorney, tells PEOPLE she has no comment on Combs’ indictment.
A week after Cassie filed suit, another woman, Joi Dickerson-Neal, did the same, accusing Combs of drugging and raping her while she was a student at Syracuse University in 1991. The next day, a third woman sued Combs, alleging that he and his friend Aaron Hall took turns raping her in 1990, when she was 16 years old.
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Another woman sued Combs in December, claiming that he and two other men raped and trafficked her in 2003, when she was 17.
Combs denied all the allegations in a December statement to PEOPLE.
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