More than 100 victims — including one who was 9 years old at the time — are expected to file lawsuits against Sean “Diddy” Combs for alleged sexual abuse and exploitation in cases that will expose “many powerful people,” lawyers announced Tuesday.
“I want to focus on the ages of these victims. When we talk about the ages of these victims when the conduct occurred, it’s shocking,” Texas-based lawyer Tony Buzbee said during a press conference Tuesday, Page Six reported.
The fresh wave of complaints by 120 accusers were roughly split evenly by gender, spanned over 30 years and included 25 minors, with one child who was allegedly just 9 when they were victimized, Buzbee said in Houston, Texas on Tuesday.
The children the rapper allegedly abused were “seeking TV or music careers with promises [from Combs] of ‘I’ll make you a star,” Buzbee alleged.
Buzbee said his team has amassed evidence including photos, videos and text messages that will help prove the alleged assaults and that will implicate “many powerful people” and reveal “many dirty secrets.”
Buzbee said the notable names expected to come out “will shock you.”
“We will expose the enablers who enabled this conduct behind closed doors. We will pursue this matter no matter who the evidence implicates,” the attorney vowed.
The new accusations are the latest in a surge of claims against the Bad Boy Records founder, 54, who was arrested on sex trafficking charges in New York two weeks ago.
Most of the new cases are expected to be lodged in New York and Los Angeles and will begin getting filed within the next month, Buzbee said.
Dozens of allegations involve “violent sexual assault or rape, facilitated sex with a controlled substance, dissemination of video recordings [and] sexual abuse of minors,” the lawyer added.
“This is an important matter that we intend to aggressively pursue,” Buzbee said.
“We will leave no stone unturned to find all potentially liable parties, to include any individual or entity who participated in or benefited from this egregious behavior.”
The federal indictment unsealed last month detailed troubling allegations that Combs, 54, manipulated women and plied them with drugs in order to participate in his “Freak Offs,” or violent sex sessions that were sometimes recorded against their will.
Combs’ staff participated in organizing the violent sexcapades – and helped to keep them a secret, the indictment claimed.
Combs pleaded not guilty and is currently held without bail in federal custody at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn.
Prior to Combs’ high-profile arrest in at a Manhattan hotel, 12 people – including his former girlfriend, Cassie Ventura – accused the hip-hop mogul of sexual assault in civil court.
In May, unearthed surveillance footage from 2016 showed Combs viciously attacking Cassie in a hotel hallway.
“The gut-wrenching video has only further confirmed the disturbing and predatory behavior of Mr. Combs,” Douglas H. Wigdor, a lawyer for Ventura, said at the time.
“Words cannot express the courage and fortitude that Ms. Ventura has shown in coming forward to bring this to light,” Wigdor added.
Attorney Ariel Mitchell-Kidd claimed that a shocking pornographic video of Combs and a “more high-profile’ celebrity was being “shopped around” Hollywood.
“I can tell the video was pornographic. This was in his Atlanta home, and it does seem like the person isn’t looking into the video. To me, it doesn’t seem like that person knows they’re being videotaped,” Mitchell-Kidd told NewsNation.
Mitchell-Kidd said she also planned to file another lawsuit against Combs on behalf of a client that claimed she was raped by the music star in 2018.
“Combs sexually assaulted her with an inanimate object. … And then directed another gentleman to sexually assault her while he watched and pleasured himself,” the lawyer alleged.
It was not immediately clear if Mitchell-Kidd’s clients claims were among those announced on Tuesday.