Sean “Diddy” Combs has voluntarily dropped his bail appeal, meaning the Bad Boy mogul will remain detained until his May 2025 criminal trial.
The 55-year-old has been held without bail at the Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) since his arrest on September 16, pleading not guilty to sex trafficking and racketeering charges. If convicted, he faces up to life in prison.
Combs’ legal team had been aggressively fighting for his release, putting forward a substantial $50 million bail package, which included his Miami compound, some of his children’s passports, around-the-clock monitoring, and routine drug testing as collateral and terms for his release.
However, U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian denied Combs’ bail for a third time last month after Southern District of New York prosecutors accused Combs of being a danger to the community and trying to tamper with witnesses from behind bars.
Combs’ legal team already had a bail appeal pending in the Second Circuit, but on Friday, they filed paperwork dismissing the appeal. “Mr. Combs does not seek to appeal the district court’s denial of his renewed motion and hereby moves to voluntarily dismiss the appeal,” the court papers noted.
He will now remain detained until his criminal trial is set to begin on May 5, 2025. He stands accused of running a criminal enterprise “through violence, use of firearms, threats, coercion, and verbal, emotional, physical, and sexual abuse.”
The case is largely built around the experiences of Combs’ ex-partner Casandra “Cassie” Ventura, who sued Combs for sex trafficking and sexual abuse in November 2023. The R&B singer claimed that throughout their decade-long relationship, Combs forced her to engage in sexual acts with male sex workers. Ventura alleged that she was threatened with physical violence, professional retribution, potential leaks of the footage, and was kept compliant through excessive drug use.
Although Combs vehemently denied the claims and reached a private settlement with Ventura a day later, her lawsuit set off a domino effect. Federal investigators began building a case against him and more than 30 civil lawsuits were filed against the music mogul in New York and California. Combs has denied all claims of sex abuse through a spokesperson. “As his legal team has said before, Mr. Combs has full confidence in the facts and the integrity of the judicial process,” his media team previously said in a statement to Rolling Stone.
From Rolling Stone US
