Sean Diddy Combs seeks time-served release as sentencing looms in Mann Act case
Manhattan federal court poised to decide sentence after not-guilty verdicts on racketeering and sex-trafficking; Combs asks for time-served release on two Mann Act counts.
Sean Diddy Combs asked a Manhattan federal judge to release him on time served ahead of his Oct. 3 sentencing on two Mann Act prostitution counts, according to a filing his lawyers submitted late Monday. The 55-year-old rapper has been jailed in a Brooklyn detention facility since his September 2024 arrest and faces up to 10 years in prison on the two counts.
Jurors previously acquitted Combs of racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking, but found him guilty on the two Mann Act counts for transporting individuals across state lines for prostitution. Judge Arun Subramanian, who presided over the two-month trial, is set to decide the sentence. Combs is due back in court for a hearing Thursday morning, with prosecutors expected to file their sentencing recommendation by next Monday.
Prosecutors described the case as highlighting a pattern of coercive, drug-fueled sexual encounters, while defense lawyers acknowledged domestic violence but argued the women consented to the encounters and that the government overstepped by criminalizing a swinger lifestyle. The jurors heard testimony about sex tapes, explicit texts and other material the defense said showed consent.
Testimony included a former girlfriend identified as Cassie Ventura, who testified that Combs used the threat of releasing sex tapes to coerce her into hundreds of encounters with escorts. A second former lover who used the alias Jane described a brutal assault and being forced to have sex with a male sex worker hours later. The defense countered that the relationships were consensual, and no member of Combs’s inner circle testified at trial.
Time served in pretrial custody could blunt the potential sentence, as Combs’s lawyers filed the request for release on time served while prosecutors prepare their own sentencing recommendations for the Oct. 3 hearing.
Prosecutors are expected to present their version of an appropriate punishment next week, with sentencing guidance to be weighed by the judge. The case has drawn attention to Combs’s personal life and his Bad Boy Records empire, underscoring the cultural spotlight on the entertainer as the legal process unfolds.
