By Luc Cohen and Jack Queen
NEW YORK (Reuters) -Sean “Diddy” Combs is due to be sentenced on Friday for prostitution-related charges, with prosecutors pushing for the hip-hop mogul to spend more than a decade in prison and the defense urging his swift release.
A jury on July 2 convicted Combs, 55, on two counts of arranging for paid male escorts to travel across state lines to take part in drug-fueled sexual performances – sometimes known as “Freak Offs” – with Combs’ girlfriends while he recorded video and masturbated.
The jury acquitted him on the more serious charges of racketeering and sex trafficking, which could have earned him a life sentence.
Combs pleaded not guilty and is expected to appeal his conviction after sentencing.
The founder of Bad Boy Records, Combs is credited with elevating hip-hop’s stature in American culture.
The New York-born entrepreneur is one of the most prominent men in the entertainment industry to have faced trial on sex crimes charges.
U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian is due to sentence Combs at a hearing in Manhattan starting at 10 a.m. EDT (1400 GMT). Combs faces up to 20 years in prison, though the judge has a wide degree of discretion in crafting a punishment.
Combs, who has been behind bars at a Brooklyn jail since his conviction, is expected to address the court.
In a four-page letter to Subramanian, filed with the court on Thursday, Combs apologized “for all the hurt and pain that I caused others by my conduct,” and asked the judge for mercy, saying, “I lost my way.”
“Lost in the drugs and excess. My downfall was rooted in my selfishness,” he wrote, adding that the ordeal of incarceration had left him “humbled and broken to my core.” He also said he was now sober for the first time in 25 years.
A former personal assistant to Combs, known in court by the pseudonym Mia, is also expected to speak. Mia testified at his trial that he raped her multiple times.
TRIAL CENTERED ON ‘FREAK OFFS’
Over the course of a two-month trial earlier this year, prosecutors with the Manhattan U.S. Attorney’s office argued Combs coerced two of his former girlfriends – the rhythm-and-blues singer Casandra Ventura and a woman known in court by the pseudonym Jane – into partaking in the performances through violence and threats to withhold financial support.
Jurors saw surveillance footage of Combs kicking and dragging Ventura in a hotel hallway in 2016, an incident she testified took place after a Freak Off. Jane testified that Combs last year attacked her and told her to perform oral sex on a male escort after she said she did not want to.
Combs’ lawyers acknowledged he had physically abused his girlfriends, but argued they willingly took part in the sexual performances. Both Ventura and Jane testified that they at times took part consensually because they loved Combs and wanted to please him.
COMBS TAUGHT JAIL COURSE
Prosecutors are pushing for Combs to spend 11-1/4 years in prison.
Defense lawyers say the appropriate sentence is 14 months, which would mean Combs would be released by the end of the year after receiving credit for time served.
In pushing for leniency, Combs’ lawyers said he helped his fellow inmates at Brooklyn’s Metropolitan Detention Center by teaching a six-week course on business management and personal development called “Free Game with Diddy.” As part of the class, inmates were required to write an essay about “lessons learned from Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs’ journey,” court filings show.
Combs’ sentence could hinge in part on how much weight Subramanian gives to evidence he physically abused his girlfriends.
Defense lawyers say Combs’ acquittal on the sex trafficking and racketeering charges means that evidence of his abuse should play no role at sentencing.
“The scene and images of me assaulting Cassie play over and over in my head daily,” Combs wrote in his letter to the judge, expressing remorse and “shame” for the incident. “I was dead wrong for putting my hands on the woman that I loved.”
Prosecutors said federal guidelines call for higher sentences when crimes involve threats or bodily injury. They said other people convicted on prostitution-related offenses involving violence regularly face significant penalties.
“The defendant should be no exception,” prosecutors wrote in a September 30 filing, “particularly when his history and characteristics demonstrate years of violence.”
(Reporting by Luc Cohen in New York;Editing by Noeleen Walder and Nick Zieminski)
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