A federal judge has denied Sean Combs’ request for a two-month delay of his upcoming criminal trial on charges of racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking. At a Friday morning hearing in Manhattan, U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian said the trial will proceed as planned on May 5, according to Inner City Press.
Combs, 55, asked for the delay earlier this month, saying he needed more time to prepare after prosecutors filed a third superseding indictment with a new sex trafficking count for Victim 2. Prosecutors opposed the delay, arguing in court filings that the new charge was hardly “substantially new conduct,” considering prosecutors quoted from Victim 2’s messages to Combs back during his initial bail arguments last Fall. They said the messages implicated Combs in her alleged trafficking.
“The government has consistently described Victim-2 as a victim of sex trafficking,” prosecutors argued in a letter to the court this week. They said the first superseding indictment, returned by the grand jury on January 30, 2025, also “explicitly alleged” sex trafficking of Victim-2 as racketeering activity.
At least three victims in the case also opposed a trial delay, prosecutors said. “These victims have a statutory right under the Crime Victims’ Rights Act to proceedings free from reasonable delay and to be treated with fairness and with respect,” prosecutors wrote. “The defendant’s adjournment request violates these rights.”
Combs was arrested last September and immediately pleaded not guilty to allegations he trafficked multiple women under a “criminal enterprise” that used violence, threats, and manipulation to fulfill his “sexual gratification.” The Bad Boy Records founder has been in custody ever since and repeatedly denied bail.
The initial indictment largely mirrored the bombshell rape and trafficking lawsuit filed by Combs’ ex-girlfriend Casandra “Cassie” Ventura in November 2023. Prosecutors didn’t identify Ventura by name, but her lawyers attended his first court appearance, and she’s widely known to be Victim 1. Prosecutors recently said Victim 1 was willing to proceed with her full name at trial.
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Victim 2 asked to proceed anonymously, prosecutors said. According to court filings, Combs reached out to the woman shortly after Ventura filed her lawsuit. The woman had contacted him to say reading Ventura’s complaint was like “reading her own sexual trauma,” according to prosecutors.
“It makes me sick how three solid pages, word for word, is exactly my experiences and my anguish,” the woman allegedly texted Combs. In another message to an unidentified person, the woman purportedly said Combs “threatened me about my sex tapes that he has of me on two phones. He said he would expose me. Mind you, these [are] sex tapes where I am heavily drugged and doing things he asked of me for the past three years.”
Beyond denying the delay, Subramanian also ruled that drafts of an unidentified, alleged victim’s memoir must be turned over by April 25, Inner City Press reported. The same alleged victim would not be required to hand over financial records sought by Combs through a personal subpoena, the judge ruled.
Last September, Combs’ defense team told the court that Victim-1 had contacted Combs through a lawyer in 2023 to let him know she was writing a book. The lawyer allegedly inquired if Combs wanted to buy exclusive rights to the book for $30 million to prevent it from being published, Combs’ attorneys claimed. On Thursday, Ventura’s lawyer Doug Wigdor filed a redacted memorandum in the criminal matter, urging Subramanian to deny Combs’ request for the memoir drafts and bank statements.
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Before the court hearing ended Friday, Subramanian also granted prosecutors’ motion to allow Victim-2 and two other alleged victims to testify under pseudonyms at the trial to protect their privacy, according to Reuters.
Once the hearing ended, Combs turned toward the courtroom gallery to address his mom, Janice Combs, and other supporters. “I love you all,” Combs said, blowing a kiss, Reuters reported. He was then led away by U.S. Marshals.
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Earlier this week, Combs added Young Thug’s high-powered defense lawyer, Brian Steel, to his trial team. In denying Combs’ request to delay his trial, Judge Subramanian reportedly cited the fact that Combs now has four law firms representing him, according to Inner City Press.
Steel represented Young Thug, born Jeffery Williams, during the rapper’s nearly two-year trial related to his YSL gang and racketeering case in Atlanta. Steel famously took a contempt charge from the original judge on that trial and was subjected to a dramatic, on-camera arrest when he refused to disclose how he’d heard about a controversial conversation between the judge, prosecutors, and a key witness. The contempt charge was ultimately dropped, and that original judge was removed from the case.
