NEW YORK — Sean “Diddy” Combs was denied bail on Wednesday as he awaits a May sex trafficking trial by a judge who cited evidence showing him to be a “serious risk” of witness tampering and proof he has tried to hide prohibited communications with third parties while incarcerated.
U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian ruled in a five-page order following a bail hearing last week. At the hearing, lawyers for the hip-hop mogul argued that a $50 million bail package they proposed would be sufficient to ensure Combs doesn’t flee and doesn’t try to intimidate prospective trial witnesses.
Two other judges previously had agreed with prosecutors that the Bad Boy Records founder was a danger to the community if he is not behind bars. Subramanian concurred.
“There is compelling evidence of Combs’s propensity for violence,” Subramanian wrote.
Lawyers for Combs did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment on the decision. Nicholas Biase, a spokesperson for prosecutors, declined comment.
Combs, 55, has pleaded not guilty to charges that he coerced and abused women for years, aided by associates and employees. An indictment alleges that he silenced victims through blackmail and violence, including kidnapping, arson and physical beatings.
A federal appeals court judge last month denied Combs’ immediate release while a three-judge panel of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan considers his bail request. That appeal was put on hold while Subramanian, newly appointed to the case after an earlier judge stepped aside, considered the bail request for the first time.
Subramanian said he took a fresh look at all the bail arguments and the evidence supporting them to make his decision.
Prosecutors have insisted that no bail conditions would be sufficient to protect the public and prevent the “I’ll Be Missing You” singer from fleeing.
They say that even in a federal lockup in Brooklyn, Combs has orchestrated social media campaigns designed to influence prospective jurors and tried to publicly leak materials he thinks can help his case. They say he also has contacted potential witnesses through third parties.
Lawyers for Combs say any alleged sexual abuse described in the indictment occurred during consensual relations between adults and that new evidence refutes allegations that Combs used his “power and prestige” to induce female victims into drugged-up, elaborately produced sexual performances with male sex workers known as “Freak Offs.”
Subramanian said evidence shows Combs to be a “serious risk of witness tampering,” particularly after he communicated over the summer with a grand jury witness and deleted some of his texts with the witness.
The judge also cited evidence showing that Combs violated Bureau of Prisons regulations during pretrial detention at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn when he paid other inmates to use their phone code numbers so he could make calls to individuals who were not on his approved contact list.
He said there was also evidence that he told family members and defense counsel to add other people to three-way calls so their communications would be more difficult to trace and that he made efforts to influence his trial’s jury pool or to reach potential witnesses.
Subramanian said his “willingness to skirt” jailhouse rules to conceal communications was “strong evidence” that any conditions of release would not prevent similar behavior.
The judge said defense claims that Combs stopped using one particular phone technique criticized by prosecutors was belied by the fact that Combs apparently used it again on Sunday, two days after his bail hearing last week.
Even a bail proposal that would include the strictest form of home confinement seemed insufficient, the judge said.
“Given the nature of the allegations in this case and the information provided by the government, the Court doubts the sufficiency of any conditions that place trust in Combs and individuals in his employ — like a private security detail — to follow those conditions,” Subramanian wrote.