Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah! What up? What up, dawg? What up, dawg? Yeah. Aw, man. Oh, man. I love you, too.
It's the BET Awards, 2022. A celebration of the very best of Black entertainers in the worlds of music, film, sport, and beyond
And tonight, no star is bigger than Sean "Puffy" Combs... the recipient of this years' BET lifetime achievement award.
First of all, I want to thank God. God, thank you. Thank you so much for never leaving my side. Always being by my side.
Winning this award is the culmination of a career spanning three decades, and countless accolades...
Um, anything I do is through God. You know, anything I do is through love.That's what I evolved to be. And that's what I'm doing right now.
Sean Combs looks confident, dressed all in black, with a gigantic diamond necklace sparkling around his neck.
In front of an audience full of A-listers. Kanye West hands him the biggest award of the night...
... if it wasn't for God, I would have went crazy, y'all. You feel me? If it wasn't for God, I wouldn't be here. You feel me?
Sean Combs is more than just a rapper or a producer...
I'm the world's most interesting man. And I throw the best parties!
He's one of the most famous men in America...
For years, for decades, actually, Sean Combs has been a fixture in American pop culture. Hip hop is a precursor to American pop culture, in my opinion. And he represented how high hip hop could fly.
30 years of Bad Boy, 10 years of revolt 50 years of hip hop? How does that feel to Sean Combs somebody who's been so instrumental? Oh man, it's, it's, it's humbling and it's really like surreal in a sense... knowing that I started out as a kid from Harlem and have been able to make it all the way to this point...
He started Bad Boy Records - one of the most successful music labels of the 90s... he produced and developed artists including The notorious B.I.G, Mary J Blige and Usher, and from the mid-2000s he became the owner of a diverse business empire... including drinks brands, fashion lines, even a cannabis company...
When you think of Diddy, you think of the ultimate mogul. He is really the epitome of the American dream in a capitalistic sense and definitely the black American dream.
As a result, by the time he wins the Lifetime Achievement Award in 2022, he's on track to become hip hop's next billionaire. Something only two others have achieved.
But he hadn't made it to the top on his own.
Onstage in 2022 one of the people he wants to thank is his ex-girlfriend Casandra Ventura - better known as the R&B singer Cassie.
I gotta give a special thank you to the people that was really like there for me. Cassie, for holding me down in the dark times. Love.
Just 18 months later, Sean Combs would face one of the most spectacular falls from grace the music industry has ever witnessed.
The person behind his demise? Cassie.
First she dropped an explosive civil lawsuit... alleging years of physical and sexual abuse at the hands of Sean Combs.
She filed this using a piece of New York legislation called the adult survivors act. It was designed to overcome the statute of limitations - a legal time limit placed on reporting crimes. The act lasted for one year and allowed alleged victims of historic sexual offences to file a civil suit.
Cassie filed her civil suit eight days before the deadline. The case was settled, leaving more questions than answers.
Then came the video.
It's a grainy picture - with no sound - captured on a fixed rig CCTV at a hotel.
The first frame shows Cassie, head bowed, in a dark hoodie, walking down a hotel corridor. She's carrying a bag, looks like she's leaving. She turns the corner and then Sean Combs comes into view. Tearing down the corridor, in just a white towel and a pair of stripy socks.
What happens next is shockingly violent.
He grabs Cassie by the neck and throws her to the ground. She cowers in fear. Then kicks her, like a footballer taking a shot. Finally he gathers her scattered possessions and yanks her up by her hoodie, dragging her round the corner and out of shot.
This horrifying video was recorded in 2016, but not released until 2023. When it went out on CNN, it shocked the world.
And provided the first piece of visual evidence of the claims Cassie had laid out in her civil complaint.
Since the release of that video, there has been a torrent of allegations.
A woman claims the rapper drugged and sexually assaulted her in New York City back in 1991...
Accuses Combs of sex trafficking and gang rape...
Sean "Diddy" Combs hit with more than 100 new sexual assault allegations...
Sean Combs is now facing three criminal indictments - racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking and transportation to engage in prostitution.
In October 2024, 120 new victims came forward, alleging sexual abuse. These included men, women, and people who were minors at the time of the alleged misconduct. The youngest of whom says they were just 9 years old when these events took place. And more people are still coming forward.
Sean Combs has been repeatedly denied bail - and now is locked up in a notorious jail in Brooklyn. If he's found guilty, one of America's biggest cultural figures could spend the rest of his life behind bars.
But given these accusations cover three decades, what's baffling is how someone who lived in the glare of publicity - in fact his career depended on it - could get away with so many horrendous crimes for so long?
We first heard about the legal allegations in October or November of last year. Now, I live in Los Angeles, and this was one of the worst kept secrets in Hollywood. But as far as a potential legal finding, it was really Cassie Ventura, Combs longtime ex girlfriend of more than a decade, She's the one that really started all this.
Neama Rahmani is a former federal prosecutor, now running his own law firm, West Coast Trial Lawyers.
He says that without Cassie coming forward, there's no way that Sean Combs would be in jail.
Her civil complaint is so upsetting, the court published it with a trigger warning, saying it contained highly graphic information of a sexual nature, including sexual assault. She directly references the thanks Sean Combs gave to her in his BET lifetime achievement award acceptance speech.
"The truth, [...] is that Cassie -- Ms. Casandra Ventura -- was held down by Mr. Combs and endured over a decade of his violent behaviour and disturbed demands. For Ms. Ventura, the "dark times" were those she spent trapped by Mr. Combs in a cycle of abuse, violence, and sex trafficking."
Key to Cassie's complaint is the allegation that Combs forced her to participate in violent orgies he called "freak offs" - where he and his associates would drug her and force her to be raped by sex workers he trafficked between states.
Her complaint describes how these Freak Offs took place. What's coming up quotes from it and as the court warns - it's graphic.
"Within a few months of beginning a romantic relationship with forty-year-old Mr. Combs, the twenty-two-year-old Ms. Ventura felt beholden to his whims and demands.
While in New York City, Mr. Combs told the Ms. Ventura that he wanted to engage in a fantasy of his called "voyeurism." Mr. Combs said that it would "turn him on" if he saw Ms. Ventura "with another dick."
The first time, Mr. Combs hired a man and brought the man to his home in Los Angeles. The man, Mr. Combs, and Ms. Ventura wore masquerade masks, and ingested drugs. Mr. Combs directed Ms. Ventura to perform sexual acts with this man while Mr. Combs watched them. He masturbated while he directed Ms. Ventura and the man to do specific sexual acts.
The entire encounter lasted multiple days.
Mr. Combs began to call the arrangement a "Freak Off," or "FO." He repeatedly tell Ms. Ventura at random moments that he wanted an FO, and Ms. Ventura was eventually expected to facilitate the location and the hiring of male sex workers.
At certain points during Ms. Ventura and Mr. Combs's relationship, he would insist on an FO weekly. Mr. Combs would repeatedly tell Ms. Ventura that this practice was "our thing" and "our secret."
These Freak Offs, according to Cassie, often took place in hotels, usually in New York, Florida, and Los Angeles.
When Combs' properties were raided in 2024, police found evidence there of the materials Cassie said were used in Freak Offs. They found including over a thousand bottles of baby oil, lubricant, and drugs. They also found three AR15 rifles.
Freak Offs weren't the only thing Cassie claims she had to endure. She describes Combs threatening, drugging, beating, and raping her. She says this lasted throughout their decade-long relationship.
Sean Combs' lawyer said his client, I quote, "vehemently denies these offensive and outrageous allegations."
In public Sean Combs and Cassie acted like any celebrity couple in love. They posed happily for photographs on red carpets, and posted about their blended family on social media.
High-five for the co-parenting!
In 2018 Cassie left Sean Combs. According to her legal complaint, when he discovered she was leaving he forced himself into her home and raped her.
Reportedly she wanted 30 million dollars, Combs wanted to pay her 10, they were unable to come to an agreement, and she filed her lawsuit.
Neama Rahmani says it was Sean Combs' refusal to pay Cassie the compensation which sparked the subsequent events.
She filed a complaint, and inevitably it became news.
He settled her civil claim the next day, but denied all culpability.
I was f***ed up. I mean, I hit rock bottom, but I make no excuses. My behaviour on that video is inexcusable. I take full responsibility for my actions in that video. I'm disgusted. I was disgusted then when I did it. I'm not asking for forgiveness. I'm truly sorry.
No one knows who leaked the CCTV video. But it prompted the Department of Justice to investigate. And in September they made their arrest.
Today I'm announcing the unsealing of a three count indictment, charging Sean Combs with racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, interstate transportation for prostitution... to conceal his conduct.
He was charged under the RICO - or Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organisation - act first used in 1970 against the Mafia. The act covers a list of 35 crimes and allows for much higher sentences provided the crimes take place across state lines and involve a number of people working together in an organised criminal enterprise.
That means it's not only Sean Combs who is facing serious accusations.
The advantages of RICO are as follows, it allows prosecutors to bring in a lot more people into The Rico Conspiracy or the charge. So for instance, let's say someone was setting up the cameras and the lighting for these freak offs. Let's say someone was buying the baby oil or someone was administering the IVs after the sex acts. Because they are committing overt acts in furtherance of the conspiracy, they can be charged as co-conspirators.
It's not only the people who worked with Sean Combs recently, who might have reason to be worried.
Under the RICO statute, you can even bring in charges that are barred by the statute of limitations potentially.
Meaning that allegations that might be decades-old, can be tested in court.
So the example I like to give is the video of Combs beating Ventura. That happened in 2016. That would be barred by the Statute of Limitations in California where I live. State prosecutors can't file that, but it can be used as a RICO predicate act. So it expands the timeline, expands the individuals, and expands the charges that would be admitted at trial.
There's that really famous Notorious B. I. G. lyric that says, I never thought hip hop could take it this far. Sean Diddy Combs is the epitome of that line.
Sidney Madden is a reporter for the American broadcaster NPR. Her podcast series, Louder than a Riot, explores the power dynamics of hip hop.
When you think of Diddy, you think of the life of the party, hit maker. He's come to define what we call black excellence.
Sean Combs got his start in the music industry in his teens, as a dancer in Diana Ross and Michael Jackson's music videos.
He was someone who was born and raised in New York, became this prolific party promoter and party thrower um And had big dreams of being the shot caller the money maker the deal maker in whatever space he occupied.
Here Sean Combs is being interviewed on a US talk show in 1994.
Instead of just looking at the rapper. Like, my eyes kind of wandered to, like, the people that were on the telephones and the people that were telling the performers which way they should go... the people in the suits, you know what I'm saying? You want to be beyond just an artist. You want to be the person in control?Yes. Yeah.
Sean Combs quickly became one of those people in suits... as an A&R at Andre Harrell's Uptown Records. Starting when he was 18.
Even then he had a reputation of being boisterous. commandeering, you know, a large personality who wouldn't take no for an answer. His early days at Uptown Records were scattered with small whispers and controversies and he, yeah, he got let go from that position.
This was only a temporary setback. In 1993 Combs started his own label, Bad Boy Records,. The business embodied its boss's attitude.
Like the whole slogan of Bad Boy Records: can't stop, won't stop right? I think people who worked with him early saw that, um, brutish tenacity and some people respected it and some people moved around it in fear of it.
Sean Combs became a kingmaker. He made stars out of his signings, and of himself.
It's so wild to think about this, but he really did come to define a whole era of the 90s, right, because the hip hop industry specifically runs on this like panache and audacity and main character energy and getting things done by any means necessary. It's, it's a level of acute machismo that is actually rewarded a lot of times in these spaces.
Throughout his career, Combs walked a very fine line between uptown and downtown.
Just because there has been somewhat of a success, I'm not away from the streets. I'm not away from reality. I'm still a part of what's going on, cos I have not removed myself from that.
Allegations of his criminal behaviour have now emerged from as early as 1991 but he avoided any significant charges throughout the decade.
In April 1999 for instance he stormed into the office of another record company and beat up a record company executive.
Later that same year, he was involved in a shooting at a Manhattan nightclub with his then-girlfriend Jennifer Lopez and his rap protege Shyne.
Shyne took the blame and served ten years in prison.
Somehow, none of this hurt his career. He was business-savvy. He owned his artists' rights, and made a fortune releasing tribute songs and tracks from their back catalogues - including the rapper the Notorious BIG, who was murdered in 1997.
Around this time, the producer Sean Combs raised his own profile by stepping in front of the mic.
He became a front-facing talent himself and also moving into the space of being a big business impresario. He was able to translate that charisma and that cult of personality to a lot of other industries, even outside of hip hop. Hollywood and, and liquor and fashion, all of these places. He came to define the late 90s and early 2000s with his kind of great Gatsby like energy. And I'm talking, of course, about the infamous, uh, white parties, in the late 90s, early 2000s, that was, like, the invite you wanted to get. That was the hottest ticked of the year.I remember growing up and reading recaps of the infamous white parties. Reading how rappers would rub shoulders with politicians who would rub shoulders with sports teams owners and even Pastors and other celebrities because that was the place to be.
Bad Boy Records was a hit factory, and everyone wanted to work with Sean Combs.
He had this sheen and this light around him that if it shone on you You would come up from it. Like, you would get that shine too.
His temper and violence weren't offputting - in fact, Sidney Madden says they supported his image.
A tentpole of his personality and his public image is being aggressive. Like the label's called Bad Boy, right? The accusations of tearing up people's offices if he didn't like a decision they made or going into magazines and taking hard drives or even attacking one of his son's coaches because he didn't like a decision he made about what, what he was doing to coach his child. These are all moments of anger and aggression and violence that have been very well known within the industry, but also laughed off and actually respected.
You can glimpse this propensity for violence in a 2007 video, when Sean Combs is filmed smashing up his office.
Savage! I'm a savage! Oh! I'm a savage! Whatever I want, I'm going to get! Whatever I want, I have to get!
His associates sit impassively in their chairs, not even blinking as Combs screams and shouts and throws electrical equipment.
What's next? Give me something else. What can't you do? I can do it. I can do anything.
The plaintiffs suing Sean Combs range from former partners to people who attended his parties and also to artists who worked with him... like Dawn Richard.
She first met Sean Combs in the mid-2000s, when she was cast as one of the singers in his girl group, Danity Kane. Here's an excerpt from her official complaint.
"Mr. Combs' namesake temper frequently manifested in physical violence. Mr. Combs regularly hurled objects in fits of rage, often throwing items such as mobile phones, laptops, food, and studio equipment across the room or at people. On numerous occasions, Ms. Richard witnessed Mr. Combs brutally beat his girlfriend, Ms. Casandra ("Cassie") Ventura ("Ms. Ventura"). His persistent abuse included choking and strangling Ms. Ventura, striking her with his hands and with objects, slapping her, punching her, and throwing items at her, including a scalding hot pan. On many occasions, Ms. Richard tried to intervene, offering Ms. Ventura support and encouragement to leave Mr. Combs. Each time, Mr. Combs learned of her efforts to help Ms. Ventura and became enraged, threatening Ms. Richard's life with statements such as "you want to die today," "I make a n***** go missing" and "I end people." [...] Compounding Mr. Combs' violent acts and death threats, he flagrantly exploited Ms. Richard's musical talent as a singer and writer while withholding her rightful earnings, stealing her copyrighted works, and subjecting her to years of inhumane working conditions which included groping, assault, and false imprisonment, among other violations."
According to the complaint Dawn Richard is still living with the repercussions of her time with Sean Combs. She suffers from PTSD after years of being forced to record for days on end, denied food and sleep.
She also alleges Sean Combs owes her millions of dollars in unpaid wages and songwriting royalties.
I remember Sean Combs' rise. I remember his video for Mo Money Mo Problems, where he played golf and jumped into a gold Rolls Royce. I remember him appearing on the cover of Forbes with Jerry Seinfeld. For so many years he was everywhere.
So if the allegations are true, how did he get away with this behaviour for so long?
Dorothy Carvello might be able to help answer that question. She worked for Atlantic Records in the 1980s, and says she was abused by her boss, and the record company's founder, Ahmet Ertegun.
He would masturbate in the office right in front of me. Smoke pot in the office. Do cocaine in the office. Urinate in the office. We kept a safe in the CFO's office and the safe was filled with cash. And that cash was used to pay off women. You know, he would touch my ass. He would touch my breasts. I was attacked by him in a few incidences.
You know, nobody said no, this was wrong. And this is an important theme in the music business. And these people are treated really like gods.
Dorothy raised a complaint about Ertegun's behaviour with HR - and they fired her. She says she was blackballed from the industry for speaking up, and never got a job in music again.
Ertegun, of course, did just fine.
You know, in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, we have the Ahmet Ertegan award. Cause this is the dichotomy of the record business, you know, all BS.
Dorothy Carvello has spent the last 40 years trying to get her story out there - she's written books and she's currently suing Ertegun's estate.
For most of that time, she says, no one's listened - but she thinks Sean Combs' arrest might finally signal a change in the music industry.
Everybody was complicit in it, and that's what's going to be found out. For once, we're going to have the enablers being held accountable. Who booked the airline tickets? What lawyers did the NDA? It's all got to come out. And I believe that when these investigations really start getting underway, what do you do? You follow the money. Where did the money come from? The money always comes from the record label.
It's over now for the music business. We're only beginning. Diddy is low hanging fruit of what's to come.
Sean Combs is a billionaire. He currently has some of the best lawyers money can buy working to secure his freedom.
But the evidence is stacking up against him.
Of the 140 plus people personally suing Sean Combs there's a music producer named Rodney Jones.
Known professionally as Lil' Rod, he worked with Sean Combs in 2022. He alleges that he was drugged and assaulted by multiple members of Sean Combs' entourage while working as his music producer.
He also claims that Sean Combs required him to film this kind of activity. His complaint states that he possesses, and I quote, "Hundreds of hours of footage and recordings engaging in serious illegal activity."
Neama Rahmani says, that's bad news for Sean Combs.
Witnesses can lie, even victims can lie, but video doesn't lie. And if you believe the victims, and I do, Diddy recorded these sex acts for either his own sexual pleasure, but also potentially to have leverage over the participants, maybe as blackmail or extortion, or to maintain control over them.
The irony now, though, of course, is those same videos are going to be used against Combs in a criminal trial. So, uh, what he did to maybe gain power is ultimately the very evidence that may be his downfall.
We approached Sean Combs' team for comment. They didn't get back to us, but Sean Combs has always denied all the allegations against him.
He's publicly called his accusers money grabbers... and his legal team asserts that he is an innocent man.
The case against Sean Combs may still be developing - it's shaping up to be one of the biggest of its kind.
What all of these lawsuits and allegations are really bringing to light was how much power he was able to broker over time, to use and abuse so many victims, so many plaintiffs in these cases. There's an array of people coming forward that is not even just in the music industry. We're talking about security guards, uh, models, partygoers. So, you just see how, how long his shadow is, and how largely he looms in pop culture from from the 90s when he was starting even till now, so it really is a reframing of image and legacy, and it's gonna have larger effects.
Sean Combs was an icon.
His cultural capital proved to be an effective shield. But with the Rico charge, former allies could now turn against him.
The federal trial, set for May 2025, will be a media circus. It will be covered by some of those same journalists who once clamoured for an invite to his parties. Where, it's now alleged, his abuse was unfolding in plain sight.
According to the indictment, that's where all the sex trafficking was happening. That's where the grooming was happening. And that's where a lot of the orchestrated concealment of all of it was happening, too.
But Sidney Madden tells me another very disturbing story from 15 years ago which I think may shed the most light on how Sean Combs got away with it for so long.
Allegedly, at this really swanky, high powered industry dinner, Combs punched Cassie Ventura in the stomach, and it caused her to topple over in pain, and she was quickly ushered away by a bodyguard. And nobody did anything in the situation. The dinner did not stop, it was as if nothing happened. Nobody skipped a beat.
This is not just a story about Sean Combs. It's about how the self-interested, complacent people around him - who benefitted from his glamour and his prestige - allowed him to rise to power unchecked.
And there was real human suffering at the heart of this story.
Just listen to Cassie on a radio talk show, Hot 97, in 2017. Remember this is a year after the CCTV hotel video took place where Sean Combs beat her to the ground, and it's a year before she finally leaves him.
Cassie, what's up kid? Hey- Wow, she sounds crazy. Late night, last night? Um, yeah, you know. What was you doing last night? I had to host at, uh, Sapphires. Oh wow, you was in a strip club last night. Okay. You know, it wasn't really like, it wasn't that kind of night.
Mirrored sunglasses. White nail polish. A night at a strip club. And that scratchy voice.
Videos like that feel really haunting now.
Cassie's courage has opened the door for so many others to come forward.
After she filed her complaint, she issued this statement.
"Domestic Violence is THE issue. It broke me down to someone I never thought I would become. With a lot of hard work, I am better today, but I will always be recovering from my past. My only ask is that EVERYONE open your heart to believing victims the first time. I offer my hand to those that are still living in fear. Reach out to your people, don't cut them off. No one should carry this weight alone."