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The US government responds to Diddy’s accusations of racism as he tries to get the charges against him dismissed.
As his court date draws near, Sean “Diddy” Combs and his legal team hope to have charges against him dismissed on the basis that the law itself is “racist.” Now the federal government has responded, asserting race played absolutely no role in the charges contained in the indictment.
Filed on Tuesday, March 4, documents filed by the government referred to Combs’ claims as “outrageous and illogical.” They add that “race played no role whatsoever in the decision to seek the charges contained in the indictment, which instead stemmed from the defendant’s decades of criminal conduct.”
“Because the defendant offers nothing more than conjecture to suggest otherwise, [the motion to dismiss] should be denied,” the documents conclude.
Combs’ motion was filed last month, focusing specifically on the charge of transportation to engage in prostitution — one of three counts in the indictment, alongside sex trafficking and racketeering. His legal team claims there has never been a similar prosecution under the Mann Act, and that no white person has ever been targeted with the law. The Mann Act, which has been in place for over a hundred years, was designed to prohibit the transportation of women for sex.
According to his team’s filing, Combs is a victim of racism. “MR. Combs has been singled out because he is a powerful Black man, and he is being prosecuted for conduct that regularly goes unpunished.” It also doubles down on the defense’s assertion that all sexual activity between Combs and others was consensual. Further, it claims that federal prosecutors have been leaking information about the case to the media ahead of the trial scheduled to begin on May 5.
“The government’s handling of this case demonstrates bias and animus,” the filing claims. “It has gone out of its way to humiliate Mr. Combs and to prejudice the jury pool with pretrial publicity that plays on racist tropes. It has leaked damaging (and oftentimes false) material to the press.”
The government has denied claims prior to their filing that they have discriminated against the media mogul based on his race. A prosecutor called similar accusations made by Diddy’s team during a pre-trial hearing in October “baseless,” and said they posed a “serious risk” to the conduction of a fair trial.
