Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs trial to delve into the seediest side of rap’s ‘bad boy’
Hip-hop impresario Sean “Diddy” Combs once presided like a prince over his White Parties in the Hamptons, attracting A-list celebrities, gossip columnists and photographers. But at a trial starting Monday, prosecutors will cast the entertainer as a criminal sexual deviant who exploited his fame to abuse women at gatherings held far out of public view.
For over two decades, prosecutors allege, the Bad Boy Records founder used the power and prestige he’d gained in building a hip-hop empire to destroy young lives.
He faces an indictment that includes descriptions of “Freak Offs,” drugged-up orgies in which women were forced to have sex with male sex workers while Combs filmed them.
In late 2022, well before Sean “Diddy” Combs got into real trouble, a man in Los Angeles approached Tanea Wallace with an offer.
The man was a scout for Soft White Underbelly, photographer Mark Laita’s YouTube channel about people struggling with issues such as abuse or addiction. Wallace, an aspiring singer who sometimes made money doing sex work, took Laita up on it, for $300, sitting for his camera and talking about her life.
In the interview, she recounted an alleged incident from 2018 — a crown prince of Brunei flew her from Los Angeles to Miami with a promise to help her singing career. Once there, he took her to a party on Star Island, an uber-exclusive, man-made enclave home to celebrities such as rapper Rick Ross, retired basketball star Shaquille O’Neal and Combs. The music mogul was throwing the party. Security guards took her phone before she could wander through the property.
The National Human Trafficking Hotline is a vital resource for victims of sex trafficking looking for assistance and liberation, but the organization tasked with running it has been accused of mismanaging it by failing to report tips to law enforcement.
Nonprofit organization Polaris Project has operated the hotline since 2007 and will likely continue doing so when HHS soon decides whether to renew the hotline’s funding in a grant totaling up to $9 million. Earlier this month, a bipartisan group of 38 state attorneys general wrote a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. making him aware of the issues with Polaris’s management of the National Human Trafficking Hotline and its decision to end tip sharing with local law enforcement.
“The National Human Trafficking Hotline had long been an integral part of our work, until it was discovered a few years ago that the organization awarded the grant to run the Hotline, Polaris, was no longer sharing tips from concerned citizens and distressed family members with local law enforcement. Without those tips, our law enforcement loses critical leads to dismantling trafficking operations. We also lose valuable leads to rescuing the victims of trafficking and helping them begin the road to recovery,” the AGs told Kennedy.
Fortunately for Polaris, its co-founder and former president Katherine Chon is a senior adviser at HHS and its director of the Office on Trafficking in Persons, according to her LinkedIn profile. The notice of funding opportunity for the human trafficking hotline indicates that the Office on Trafficking in Persons within the HHS’s Administration for Children and Families is the awardee of the grant.
The attorneys general emphasized the importance of awarding the human trafficking hotline grant to an organization willing to cooperate with law enforcement by sending forward tips from the public. Despite their insistence, Polaris rejected the attorneys general’s advice and continued to operate without delivering tips to law enforcement.
“We cannot stress enough the importance of ensuring that this year’s awardee is committed to notifying law enforcement of tips it receives from a vigilant public. As Attorneys General, we spent years attempting to engage with Polaris in an honest dialogue about how vital those tips are to our efforts to help human trafficking victims. But in the end, we were unable to convince them of this necessity,” the AGs added.
The National Human Trafficking Hotline is a 24/7, confidential resource for victims seeking help or citizens with tips on potential trafficking activities. Since 2007, the hotline has identified more than 100,000 cases of human trafficking involving 197,000 victims, according to statistics the hotline compiled.
An October 2024 report from the Justice Department’s Bureau of Justice Statistics indicates that 1,912 people were referred to federal prosecutors for human trafficking offenses in fiscal year 2022, a 26 percent increase from a decade prior.
In January, Senator Ashley Moody (R., Fla.) highlighted the hotline’s failures when she questioned the Trump administration’s FBI Director Kash Patel at his confirmation hearing. Citing her experience as Florida attorney general, Moody said human trafficking exploded under former President Joe Biden because of his disinterest in enforcing federal immigration law at the southern border.
“It might shock you to know that the National Human Trafficking Hotline that was funded by Congress to report tips to law enforcement in the last four years decided that they would no longer report tips to law enforcement,” Moody said.
Polaris recently hired a new CEO after its previous executive Catherine Chen stepped down in December following four years of leading the organization. It is unclear if Chen’s departure was connected to the incoming Trump administration’s strong support for law enforcement.
Over two years ago, Moody was part of a similar group of 36 state attorneys general that sounded the alarm about the failures of the National Human Trafficking Hotline. The AGs lambasted Chen’s approach and said Polaris’s slow reporting system was hindering law enforcement’s ability to assist trafficking victims.
“Possibly more alarming, some states are reporting that they receive tips from the Hotline a month, sometimes two months, after a tip of suspected trafficking is reported to Polaris. If the Hotline is not promptly sharing tips with law enforcement, law enforcement cannot act to help victims of trafficking,” the National Association of Attorneys General wrote in a 2023 letter to congressional leaders of both parties.
After the attorneys general’s concerns were raised, then-HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra told Senator Cindy Hyde Smith (R., Miss.) that the department was working on restoring the hotline’s close relationship with law enforcement, the AGs said in the most recent letter.
The AGs are hoping to work with Kennedy on restoring the integrity of the hotline and partnering with it on tackling sex trafficking. The Trump administration’s top law enforcement officials have stated their intention to make sex trafficking a priority, especially in the context of curtailing illegal immigration and gang activities.
lynnswarriors05-02 ❌National Human Trafficking Hotline Accused of Failing to Share Tips with Law Enforcement | National Review
California lawmakers in the Assembly Public Safety Committee are blocking a proposal that would make it a felony to purchase 16 and 17-year-old children for sex.
It’s the latest development in a debate that has been underway for more than a year at the state capitol as lawmakers target criminals who buy children for sex.
Last year, Republican State Senator Shannon Grove first introduced the proposal to make it a felony to buy a child under the age of 18 for sex. Before the proposal, it had been a misdemeanor crime in the state.
“I’m proud that this budget establishes our landmark distraction-free schools policy,” Hochul announced Monday night at the state Capitol.
“We protected our kids before from cigarettes, alcohol and drunk driving, and now, we’re protecting them from addictive technology designed to hijack their attention.”
Bipartisan, bicameral bill empowers victims of revenge porn by forcing social media to remove explicit images
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today,the U.S. House of Representatives passed the bipartisan, bicameral TAKE IT DOWN Act, authored by Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and co-led by Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), by a vote of 409-2. Having passed the Senate in February, the TAKE IT DOWN Act now heads to the President to be signed into law.
The TAKE IT DOWN Act criminalizes the publication of non-consensual intimate imagery (NCII), including AI-generated NCII (or “deepfake revenge pornography”), and requires social media and similar websites to remove such content within 48 hours of notice from a victim.
Upon passage of the TAKE IT DOWN Act, Sen. Cruz said:
“The passage of the TAKE IT DOWN Act is a historic win in the fight to protect victims of revenge porn and deepfake abuse. This victory belongs first and foremost to the heroic survivors who shared their stories and the advocates who never gave up. By requiring social media companies to take down this abusive content quickly, we are sparing victims from repeated trauma and holding predators accountable. This day would not have been possible without the courage and perseverance of Elliston Berry, Francesca Mani, Breeze Liu, and Brandon Guffey, whose powerful voices drove this legislation forward. I am especially grateful to my colleagues—including Sen. Amy Klobuchar, Rep. Maria Salazar, Rep. Madeleine Dean, First Lady Melania Trump, and House Leadership—for locking arms in this critical mission to protect Americans from online exploitation.”
Sen. Klobuchar said:
“We must provide victims of online abuse with the legal protections they need when intimate images are shared without their consent, especially now that deepfakes are creating horrifying new opportunities for abuse. These images can ruin lives and reputations, but now that our bipartisan legislation is becoming law, victims will be able to have this material removed from social media platforms and law enforcement can hold perpetrators accountable.”
The House companion was introduced by Reps. Maria Elvira Salazar (R-Fla.) and Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.).
Rep. Salazar said:
“The TAKE IT DOWN Act’s passage is a bipartisan victory to protect victims of real and deepfake revenge pornography. This bill shows Congress at its best, working together to empower victims, especially women and girls. It equally holds offenders and Big Tech accountable.”
lynnswarriors04-29 MAJOR VICTORY. HOUSE PASSES TAKE IT DOWN ACT & GOES TO THE PRESIDENT TO BE SIGNED INTO LAW
A shock investigation claims that Meta AI engaged in sexual role play conversations and sometimes used celebrity voices too.
The controversial platform is available across WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram and the Ray-Ban Meta Glasses to ask questions and have virtual chats.
Deals were signed with huge names including Judi Dench and Kristen Bell to lend their voices for the service.
But the Wall Street Journal has uncovered multiple examples of romantic role-play that turns explicit, after posing as children by talking to the bot with accounts registered for minors.
Across Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp, Meta Platforms are racing to popularize a new class of AI-powered digital companions that Mark Zuckerberg believes will be the future of social media. But what about online safety for kids?
Inside Meta, however, staffers are extremely concerned about crossing ethical lines.
Virginia Giuffre, the woman who has accused the late convicted sex offender Jeffery Epstein and Prince Andrew of sexual abuse, has died by suicide, her family said in an exclusive statement to PEOPLE.
Giuffre died on Thursday, April 24, in Neergabby, Australia, her residence of the past several years, her family said.
“Giuffre lost her life to suicide, after being a lifelong victim of sexual abuse and sex trafficking,” her family said. “Virginia was a fierce warrior in the fight against sexual abuse and sex trafficking. She was the light that lifted so many survivors. Despite all the adversity she faced in her life, she shone so bright. She will be missed beyond measure. The light of her life were her children Christian, Noah, and Emily.”
