WARNING: This text comprises graphic content material and should have an effect on those that have skilled sexual violence or know somebody affected by it.
Two properties belonging to music mogul Sean (Diddy) Combs in Los Angeles and Miami had been searched Monday by federal Homeland Safety Investigations brokers and different regulation enforcement as a part of an ongoing intercourse trafficking investigation by federal authorities in New York, two regulation enforcement officers instructed The Related Press.
It is not clear whether or not Combs was the goal of the investigation. The officers weren’t licensed to publicly focus on particulars of the investigation and spoke to the AP on situation of anonymity.
In an announcement, Homeland Safety Investigations stated it “executed regulation enforcement actions as a part of an ongoing investigation, with help from HSI Los Angeles, HSI Miami, and our native regulation enforcement companions.”
A spokesperson for the U.S. lawyer’s workplace in Manhattan declined to remark.
Messages to Combs’s legal professionals and different representatives searching for remark weren’t instantly returned.
A police line was arrange across the Los Angeles home within the rich Holmby Hills neighborhood close to Beverly Hills. Helicopter video from KABC-TV confirmed a gaggle of brokers with vests that indicated they had been from Homeland Safety Investigations gathered within the residence’s yard close to the pool. A command put up was arrange exterior the home and brokers had been nonetheless getting into and leaving hours after the search started.
There have been a number of sexual assault lawsuits filed in opposition to Combs in latest months.
In February a music producer filed a lawsuit alleging Combs coerced him to solicit prostitutes and pressured him to have intercourse with them. Combs’s lawyer Shawn Holley has stated of these allegations that “we’ve got overwhelming, indeniable proof that his claims are full lies.”
Combs’s former protege and girlfriend, the R&B singer Cassie, sued him in November alleging years of sexual abuse, together with rape. The lawsuit stated he pressured her to have intercourse with male prostitutes whereas he filmed them. The swimsuit was settled the day after it was filed.
One other of Combs’s accusers was a lady who stated the rap producer raped her twenty years in the past when she was 17.
The Related Press doesn’t usually title individuals who say they’ve been sexually abused except they arrive ahead publicly as Cassie did.
Combs had stated in a December assertion, “I didn’t do any of the terrible issues being alleged.”
Douglas Wigdor, an lawyer who represents Cassie and one other girl who sued Combs, stated in an announcement Monday, “Hopefully, that is the start of a course of that may maintain Mr. Combs liable for his wicked conduct.”
It isn’t clear whether or not the search is said to any of the allegations raised within the lawsuits.
Hip-hop empire
Combs is among the many most influential hip-hop producers and executives of the previous three many years. Previously often called Puff Daddy, he constructed one among hip hop’s greatest empires, blazing a path with a number of entities hooked up to his well-known title. He’s the founding father of Dangerous Boy Data and a three-time Grammy winner who has labored with a slew of top-tier artists together with Infamous B.I.G., Mary J. Blige, Usher, Lil Kim, Religion Evans and 112.
Combs created the style clothes line Sean John, launched the Revolt TV channel with a concentrate on music and produced the fact present Making the Band