Lawyers for Sean “Diddy” Combs filed a motion to dismiss some of the claims in a sexual assault lawsuit that accused the Bad Boy rapper of revenge porn.
The lawsuit, one of three filed against the rapper in November 2023 ahead of the expiration of the Adult Survivors Act, claimed that after Combs took the then-19-year-old woman to dinner at a Harlem restaurant in January 1991, he drove her to a recording studio, where she claims she was unable to exit the vehicle because she had been intentionally drugged by Combs, “resulting in her being in a physical state where she could not independently stand or walk.”
Combs then allegedly took the accuser (who after the lawsuit was initially filed revealed herself to be Joi Dickerson-Neal) to where he was staying and sexually assaulted her. According to the lawsuit, Combs also filmed the act, which a friend of the accuser reportedly viewed. “Days later,” the suit reads, “a male friend revealed to her that he had viewed the ‘sex tape’ along with other men.”
According to the Associated Press, the motion filed Friday by Combs’ legal team seeks to dismiss the “revenge porn” claims in the lawsuit against him, as the New York State Revenge Porn Law was not codified until 2019. Similarly, the lawsuit’s allegations of sex trafficking predate the passage of the New York Services for Victims of Human Trafficking Law, which came into effect in 2007, the motion claimed.
The motion, obtained by Rolling Stone, states, “Without addressing the Complaint’s numerous false, offensive, and salacious accusations, which the Combs Defendants vehemently deny, substantially all of the claims purportedly alleged by Joi Dickerson-Neal (“Plaintiff” or “Dickerson”) cannot survive this Motion to Dismiss because they were brought under statutes that did not exist at the time the alleged misconduct occurred and against corporate entities that were not formed or in existence.”
At the time of the lawsuit’s filing, a rep for Combs denied the allegations in a statement, “This last-minute lawsuit is an example of how a well-intentioned law can be turned on its head. [The] 32-year-old story is made up and not credible. Mr. Combs never assaulted her and she implicates companies that did not exist. This is purely a money grab and nothing more.”
Dickerson-Neal’s lawsuit against Combs was filed soon after he reached a settlement in Cassie’s lawsuit against him where she accused him of rape, sex trafficking, and physical abuse. The following day, another lawsuit — filed by a Jane Doe accuser — alleged that Combs and singer-songwriter Aaron Hall took turns raping the then-16-year-old plaintiff and her friend after a record label party in 1990 or 1991 – and that Diddy turned violent during a rage days later, allegedly assaulting and choking his accuser.
The sexual assault lawsuits — including one filed earlier this year by a producer on Diddy’s Love Album — come amid a federal sex trafficking investigation against Combs that saw his properties in Miami and Los Angeles raided by agents; so far, no criminal charges have been filed against the rapper-producer, although his alleged “drug mule” was taken into custody on drug charges.
From Rolling Stone US
