The jurors selected to decide Diddy’s fate in his high-profile sex trafficking trial will be asked a series of unusual questions – including about their views on sex with multiple partners, drugs and hip-hop.
Rapper Sean Combs, 55, is facing myriad civil lawsuits alleging he sexually abused several anonymous complainants between 1990 and 2023 at star-studded events including VMA’s afterparties and his notorious ‘White Party’ functions in New York.
The sordid accusations range from gang-raping minors as young as 13 alongside celebrities including Jay-Z, to drugging women in order to sexually assault them.
Combs and Jay-Z have vehemently denied the allegations. Diddy’s attorneys told DailyMail.com he ‘never sexually assaulted anyone’, adding that the ‘barrage of filings’ are nothing but ‘clear attempts to garner publicity’.
The voir dire process – the questioning of potential jurors to assess their suitability for the task – is set to begin next week ahead of Diddy’s New York City trial.
Questions proposed by both prosecutors and the defense team center around jurors’ beliefs and experiences related to topics like cheating in a relationship, prostitution, illegal recreational drugs, and fame in the music industry.
A filing from the defense team proposes asking potential jurors whether ‘wealthy people get away with things that the less wealthy do not’.
Diddy’s attorneys also want prospective jurors to be quizzed about whether they think hearing about ‘people engaging in sexual relations with multiple sexual partners’ would be difficult.
The jurors selected to decide Diddy ‘s fate in his high-profile sex trafficking trial will be asked a series of unusual questions – including about their views on sex with multiple partners, drugs and hip-hop. (Pictured: Diddy performing during the 2022 BET Awards in June 2022 in LA)
The sordid accusations against Diddy include gang-raping minors as young as 13 alongside celebrities including Jay-Z. Both rappers have strongly denied the allegations (Pictured: Jay-Z and Sean Combs at Puffy’s Fourth of July Party at Sean Combs’ House on July 2, 2000)
Diddy’s trial is set to begin in New York City on May 5. (Pictured: A courtroom sketch of Diddy during a bail hearing in federal court in Manhattan in September 2024)
The prosecution have proposed questions about whether the jurors watch police dramas like ‘Law and Order’ and ‘CSI’, and which other media sources they consume.
Federal attorneys have also requested that jurors are asked about whether they have experienced any prior sexual assault or sexual harassment, or domestic violence training, as well as whether they have ever been through a traumatic event.
‘You may hear evidence in this case relating to acts of violence, including intimate partner violence and other assaults,’ the prosecution’s filing states.
‘Do you have any feelings, beliefs, or experiences relating to that aspect of the case that could affect your ability to be fair and impartial in this case?’
Federal attorneys also want the court to ask about paying commercial sex workers in exchange for sex; sex trafficking; personal feeling towards law enforcement; the distribution and use of illegal drugs and firearms.
In the filing, prosecutors also allude to the searches of Combs’ Los Angeles and Miami pads.
‘You may hear testimony in this case that law enforcement officers recovered certain evidence from cellular telephone records and iCloud accounts,’ the filing states.
‘These searches were perfectly legal.
‘Do you have any feelings, beliefs, or experiences regarding such searches by law enforcement that would influence your ability to evaluate this testimony fairly and impartially?’
Allegations against Diddy first surfaced after his ex-girlfriend Cassie Ventura accused him of raping and trafficking her over a period of 10 years.
Most of the cases have been filed anonymously, though one came from his former producer Rodney Jones, who filed a $30 million lawsuit against Combs in February 2024.
Jones claims that the Harlem-born rapper was part of a an illegal racketeering enterprise involving drugs and ‘the solicitation of minors and sex workers’.
In March this year, several of Jones’ allegations were dismissed, though some are still pending.
Plaintiffs include 25 people who were minors are the time of the alleged abuse – both male and female. Many complainants said they were drugged or offered hush money.
Diddy’s trial is set to begin at the Daniel Patrick Moynihan courthouse in New York City on May 5.
According to court documents obtained by DailyMail.com, Diddy wants to have a doctor and Columbia professor Dr. Elie Aoun testify on his behalf that he had a ‘mental condition bearing on the issue of guilt.’
The details of his alleged condition had been redacted in the documents, but all will be revealed during his trial.
