Sean Combs was arrested on Monday on charges of racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, and transportation to engage in prostitution.
The arrest marked the culmination of a monthslong federal investigation into Combs, which lined up with a series of sexual and physical abuse allegations facing the hip-hop star — many coming from former romantic or business partners.
Combs has denied all the allegations against him and maintained his innocence over the last year. In May, after 2016 video footage of Combs physically assaulting his then-girlfriend, Cassandra Ventura, surfaced, he apologized and said he was “disgusted.”
“We are disappointed with the decision to pursue what we believe is an unjust prosecution of Mr. Combs by the US Attorney’s Office,” Marc Agnifilo, Combs’ lawyer, said in a statement to Business Insider on Monday. “These are the acts of an innocent man with nothing to hide, and he looks forward to clearing his name in court.”
In the indictment, federal prosecutors noted that Combs was able to pull off his acts in large part due to the power, money, and influence he had accumulated.
“Combs relied on the employees, resources, and influence of the multi-faceted business empire that he led and controlled — creating a criminal enterprise whose members and associates engaged in, and attempted to engage in, among other crimes, sex trafficking, forced labor, kidnapping, arson, bribery, and obstruction of justice,” the 14-page indictment says. “Combs, and other members and associates of the Combs Enterprise, wielded the power and prestige of Combs’ role at the Combs Business to intimidate, threaten, and lure female victims into Combs’ orbit.”
Diddy operates in a world of extreme wealth. In the three decades since he started Bad Boy Records, the 54-year-old has amassed more money than nearly any other hip-hop artist. He pioneered a business playbook that has been followed by many other successful musicians and became an industry gatekeeper — giving him power that several of the people suing him accuse him of using to cover up his abuse.
Records, fashion, liquor: Combs pioneered the hip-hop money-making playbook
In 1993, Combs, then known as Puff Daddy and Puffy, founded Bad Boy Records after a stint at Uptown Records.
The label soon became the place for East Coast hip-hop acts emerging on the scene. He signed Craig Mack, 112, Faith Evans, Mase, and The Notorious B.I.G. Combs’ own 1997 album “No Way Out” reached platinum status seven times over.
In its heyday, the label brought in $130 million annually — enough that Combs could negotiate a $55 million personal advance in 1998 from Bad Boy’s partner, Arista Records, Forbes reported in 1999. Until he returned the publishing rights to some of Bad Boy’s artists last year, Combs was personally earning millions from the Bad Boy catalog each year.
Music was only the beginning. By the late 1990s, Combs was paving the way for what would become the business path for many future musicians.
He started with Sean John, a line of clothing, furniture, and fragrances sold at stores like Macy’s and Dillard’s. It became a consistent source of revenue for the mogul.
While the brand’s cache eventually dwindled — he purchased it back for only about $7.6 million in 2021 — Sean John enjoyed more than a decade of success. In 2016, when a majority share was sold to Global Brands Group, it was reported that the brand had retail sales of $450 million and that he pocketed $70 million.
Combs’ most lucrative endeavor came in 2007 when he became a brand ambassador for Ciroc vodka. He struck up a unique deal with Diageo and got paid per case.
Within the first two years of the partnership, annual sales grew from 75,000 to 400,000 cases, according to a lawsuit Combs filed against Diageo last year. In 2014, it sold 2.6 million. The liquor giant doubled down on Combs, announcing in 2014 that they’d bought DeLeon tequila in a 50-50 partnership.
While Combs and Diageo parted ways earlier this year after a contentious legal battle, the company did give some insight into Combs’ total earnings in a court filing last year: He’d made nearly a billion dollars throughout their 15-year partnership.
He’s invested that money in other upstarts, launching the Revolt TV cable network in 2013 — he has since stepped down as its chairman and sold his shares — and teaming with Mark Wahlberg to purchase a majority stake in water company Aquahydrate.
“At the end of the day, the numbers don’t lie,” he told Forbes that year. “I’m just like any other businessman; at the end of the year I have to get my report card and deal with the reality of whatever it is.”
In 2022, Combs was labeled a billionaire for the first time
In 1999 interview, Combs told Forbes that he “wanted to be very, very rich.”
That’s exactly what happened. By 2022, Combs’ net worth had reached $1 billion, according to Zack O’Malley Greenburg, the author of the Jay-Z biography “Empire State of Mind,” who tracks hip-hop’s wealthiest musicians.
And while that figure has no doubt fallen over the past year — he’s given up the publishing rights for Bad Boy’s artists, and his deal with Diageo has been dissolved — he’s still one of the richest in hip-hop.
Combined, he’s earned well over $1 billion, pretax, from the Ciroc deal, his record label, and Sean John. Some of that is tied up in various investments — including less-than-successful ones, like Revolt TV — while a significant amount has been spent on a life of luxury and various toys. He owns a jet that costs eight figures, over $1 million worth of jewelry, and a collection of art that includes a $21 million painting by Kerry James Marshall and works by Andy Warhol, Keith Haring, and Jean-Michel Basquiat.
His real estate portfolio includes an immense property on Miami’s Star Island, worth $36 million, according to county assessments, and his Los Angeles mansion is on the market for $61.5 million.
While building his empire, Combs amassed “dangerous” power
The indictment against Combs lays out how he used a combination of wealth and influence from his various business endeavors to control his victims and to carry out his crimes. It names Bad Boy Entertainment, Combs Enterprises, and Combs Global as part of the criminal organization.
“Combs ensured participation from the women by, among other things, obtaining and distributing narcotics to them, controlling their careers, leveraging his financial support and threatening to cut off the same, and using intimidation and violence,” the indictment says.
Those employees who “demonstrated loyalty to Combs and willingness to conceal his crimes” were enriched, the indictment says.
The claims mirror those in the previous civil suits filed against Combs.
His standing in industry made him “immensely powerful, and immensely dangerous,” Ventura’s attorney wrote in her complaint against Combs.
He “used his money and power to orchestrate extensive efforts to hide the evidence of his abuse,” the complaint continues.
The complaint alleges Combs “lured” Ventura into his circle, using his position as the head of Bad Boy Records. Ventura said after the abuse started, Combs used his money and power to hide it.
She was often afraid to fight back or speak up, knowing he had a powerful network who would defend him, according to the complaint.
“There was no one she could tell about what had happened at the hands of this incredibly powerful man,” the complaint says. “She recognized that she was powerless, and that reporting Mr. Combs to the authorities would not alter Mr. Combs’s status or influence but would merely give Mr. Combs another excuse to hurt her.”
In a separate lawsuit filed in November, Joi Dickerson-Neal alleges that Combs drugged and assaulted her in 1991.
When, at the time, she tried to take legal action, “colleagues told Plaintiff that they were terrified that Combs would retaliate against them and that they would lose future business and music opportunities if they made a statement in support of Plaintiff, as Combs’ star was on the rise in the 1990s,” the complaint says.
Yet another lawsuit, filed in December by an unnamed woman only identified as Jane Doe, accuses Combs of using a private jet to aid in the sex trafficking and gang rape of a high school student.
The federal indictment may be the nail in the coffin for Combs’ reign as a hip-hop powerhouse.
“His career is effectively done,” an entertainment lawyer told BI earlier this year.
Correction: March 26, 2024 — An earlier version of this story misspelled the name of Combs’ fashion and lifestyle company. It is Sean John, not Sean Jean.
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