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Prosecutors aren’t lettingSean ‘Diddy’ Combs get off easy! Instead, they’re urging Judge Arun Subramanian to throw the book at Combs. For his prostitution-related convictions, prosecutors are seeking over 11 years in prison, per the Associated Press. Several trial witnesses, including Cassie, have submitted letters supporting imprisonment.On the flip side, Diddy’s defense has also secured letters of support for a shorter sentence, including from Yung Miami. His team submitted their presentence determination last week.
Most recently, Judge Subramanian ruled on whether Diddy’s convictions should be vacated. So far, it looks like sentencing will continue on Friday (October 3).
Late Tuesday, Judge Arun Subramanian denied Combs request to have his conviction overturned. He rejected his lawyers argument that he was an amateur pornographer and not engaging in prostitution. Additionally, the judge dismissed the argument that the guilty verdict violates Diddy’s First Amendment rights.
“Illegal activity cant be laundered into constitutionally protected activity,” Subramanian wrote. He called Combs filming “incidental, pointing to trial evidence that showed he didn’t typically give notice or ask for consent for filming, as a film producer would.
For context, the 55-year-old has remained jailed since his conviction in July 2025. But his actual time behind bars extends back to September 2024, when he was arrested on charges of sex trafficking, conspiracy, and transportation to engage in prostitution. He was denied bail three times while waiting for his trial to start.
Ultimately, a jury convicted the Bad Boy Records founder on two charges of violating the Mann Act, which bans interstate commerce related to prostitution. Combs was found guilty of arranging the travel of male sex workers to hotels or residences where he directed them to have sex with his girlfriends. Combs often filmed the elaborate, days-long, drug-fueled sexual events. Each count in his conviction carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison. However, the same jury acquitted Sean Combs of the racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking charges. Those charges could have resulted in a life sentence.
As mentioned, the presentence submission asks that Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs be sentenced to at least 11 years and three months in prison.
“His crimes of conviction are serious and have warranted sentences over ten years in multiple cases for defendants who, like Sean Combs, engaged in violence and put others in fear,” prosecutors wrote.
Prosecutors filed their sentencing recommendation shortly after midnight on Tuesday (September 30). The filing includes letters from some of Diddy’s accusers, describing how his violence and demands had impacted their lives. Additionally, prosecutors called Combs “unrepentant”. They said Combs had conceded his acts of violence and abuse throughout his trial, but “incredibly, … he now argues that his victims should shoulder the blame.” Aside from blaming the victims, prosecutors say he’s now trying to cast himself as one.
“He is not the victim,” they wrote. “The Court should focus on the very real effects that the defendant’s conduct had on the lives of the actual victims, his victims.”
At trial, two of Combs’ former girlfriends testified that they felt forced to participate in the drug-fueled sex marathons with male sex workers as Combs watched and sometimes filmed. Casandra ‘Cassie’ Ventura described how Combs beat her when she displeased him during their decade-long relationship. Another ex-girlfriend, testifying under the pseudonym ‘Jane,’ said she felt pressured to perform sexually with male sex workers. She testified that an enraged Diddy once put her in a chokehold and punched her in the face.
In a letter accompanying the prosecutors’ submission, Cassie wrote that she testified while nine months pregnant during Combs’ trial “in front of a packed courtroom about the most traumatic and horrifying chapter in my life.”She added, “I testified that from age nineteen, Sean Combs used violence, threats, substances, and control over my career to trap me in over a decade of abuse.” Additionally, Cassie wrote that Combs controlled her like a puppet.
“These events were degrading and disgusting, leaving me with infections, illnesses, and days of physical and emotional exhaustion before he demanded it all again. Sex acts became my full-time job, used as the only way to stay in his good graces,” she said.
Cassie said she still has nightmares and flashbacks on an everyday basis and requires psychological care to cope. She also fears retaliation.
“My worries that Sean Combs or his associates will come after me and my family is my reality. I have, in fact, moved my family out of the New York area and am keeping as private and quiet as I possibly can because I am so scared that if he walks free, his first actions will be swift retribution towards me and others who spoke up about his abuse at trial,” Cassie wrote.
Meanwhile, Diddy’s attorneys have asked the judge to sentence him to no more than 14 months in prison. In their presentence arguments, the defense said Sean Combs has suffered enough during his nearly 13 months behind bars and should be freed soon.
They also claimed Diddy became a changed man in the Brooklyn federal lockup. On the inside, he has allegedly been under constant suicide watch. Also, he’s reportedly learned to react calmly to threats rather than violently, even when a fellow inmate confronted him with a shiv. Additionally, Combs’ defense says he has realized that his overuse of drugs, including some prescribed by doctors, had contributed to violent acts he participated in.
After Combs was convicted, Judge Arun Subramanian immdiately refused his defense’s request to grant him bail. Subramanian denied it again in August when he rejected Combs’ $50 million bail proposal. At the time, the judge said Diddy hadn’t proven that he did not pose a flight risk or danger. Additionally, he said the defense hadn’t shown an “exceptional circumstance” that would require Combs to go free.
For now, it’s unclear whether the judge will lean into that previous assessment or give Diddy grace. Friday, as planned, will tell.
Associated Press writer Larry Neumeister and Michael R. Sisak contributed to this report via AP Newsroom.
