Diddy Alleges He’s Being “Selectively Prosecuted” Due To Race
Written by djfrosty on February 20, 2025
Source: Getty / General
Lawyers for Diddy filed a motion alleging that one of the sex trafficking charges he’s facing is unfair and applied due to his race.
Diddy and his lawyers are alleging that the usage of one law in federal prosecution against him has been wrongfully applied because he is Black, in a motion filed in court on Tuesday (Feb. 18). The specific lesser charge of sex trafficking, “transportation to engage in prostitution,” is the third count brought against Diddy aka Sean Combs by the U.S. Attorney’s Office of the Southern District of New York. That count is based on the Mann Act, a federal law on the books since 1910 created as an anti-prostitution law.
In the motion, Diddy’s lawyers cite the “racist origins” of the law, claiming he is being “selectively prosecuted” as they are targeting a “prominent Black man” with the charge. “No other person, and certainly no white person, has ever been prosecuted under the White-Slave Traffic Act (the Mann Act) for hiring male escorts from another State,” his attorneys write.
They continued, “The use of escorts, male or female, is common and indeed widely accepted in American culture today,” citing that the chief executive of the escort service that Diddy allegedly used has been interviewed frequently in the media and took part in a reality series on Showtime to support their claim. The lawyers also stated that the charge was being used to prosecute “Black male sexuality,” citing how it was used against the first Black heavyweight boxing champion Jack Johnson, who had been convicted for violating the act for transporting a white woman across state lines. Johnson would receive a posthumous pardon in 2018 by President Donald Trump during his first term.
Former federal prosecutor Elizabeth Geddes, who was part of the first successful prosecution against R. Kelly, noted that the Mann Act is regularly used against individuals who have committed more serious crimes. In comparison to other charges in the indictment, which include the use of “force, fraud or coercion” to compel someone to engage in a sex act, the lesser charge stemming from the Mann Act only requires the jury to find that Diddy “willfully caused” the transportation of people with that express purpose of engaging in prostitution. “No doubt it is far easier to prove,” Ms. Geddes said to the New York Times. If convicted of that charge alone, Diddy would face a sentence of 10 years in prison.