The judge in Sean “Diddy” Combs‘ sex trafficking trial has formally dismissed a juror for giving inconsistent answers about where he lives, rejecting warnings by the rapper’s defense attorneys about a “thinly veiled effort to dismiss a Black juror.”
Prosecutors moved to remove the juror last week, citing a “lack of candor” in his answers before he was picked for the trial. The defense blasted the move, arguing in a court filing over the weekend that he was “one of only two black men on the jury” and that Diddy would be “severely prejudiced” by his removal.
But at the start of Monday’s proceedings Judge Arun Subramanian said it was “inappropriate to consider race” in deciding whether the juror had been truthful in his answers, according to ABC News.
“The record raised serious concerns as to the juror’s candor and whether he shaded answers to get on and stay on the jury,” Subramanian said. “There’s nothing the juror could say at this point to put the genie back in the bottle.”
The judge replaced the juror, a 41-year-old Black man, with a member of the alternate pool, a 57-year-old white man.
Combs is standing trial over accusations that he ran a sprawling criminal operation aimed at facilitating “freak-offs” — elaborate events which he allegedly forced his ex-girlfriend Cassie Ventura and other women to have sex with male escorts while he watched and masturbated.
Prosecutors also say the star and his associates used violence, money and blackmail to keep victims silent and under his control. (Read Billboard‘s full explainer of the case against Diddy here.) Combs has pleaded not guilty to the charges, which include on racketeering and sex trafficking; if convicted, he faces a potential sentence of life in prison.
Five weeks into a trial that’s expected to run until early July, prosecutors moved to dismiss Juror No. 6, citing alleged inconsistencies about where he lives. During jury selection, the man said he lives in the Bronx, but he later revealed that he had been living some of the time in New Jersey – a residence that would make him ineligible to sit on the jury.
Diddy’s team, which criticized prosecutors during jury selection for striking several Black candidates, vehemently opposed the removal. In court last week, defense attorney Xavier Donaldson called it a “thinly veiled effort to dismiss a Black juror.” And in a motion filed with the judge on Sunday, Diddy lawyer Alexandra A.E. Shapiro said the government had a “discriminatory motive” and was seizing an opportunity to “strike yet another black male from the jury.”
“The fairness of the trial depends in part on having jurors with backgrounds similar to Mr. Combs share their perspectives on the evidence with other jurors from diverse backgrounds during deliberations,” Shapiro wrote. “Removing this particular juror will deprive Mr. Combs of that important perspective.”
In the filing, Shapiro warned that removing the juror “at this late stage” would warrant a mistrial: “There is no question Mr. Combs would be severely prejudiced if the juror in question were removed,” she wrote. “Their pretextual motion to dismiss [the juror] is just one more attempt to gain an unfair advantage at the expense of Mr. Combs’s right to a fair trial — which is all we ask this Court to preserve.”
At Friday’s proceedings, Judge Subramanian tentatively dismissed the juror, though he vowed to consider the defense’s objections over the weekend. On Monday, he stuck by his earlier decision, including rejecting the complaints about race: “This jury does not raise those concerns.”
After blockbuster testimony last week from an alleged victim known as “Jane,” the Diddy trial will now continue into its sixth week. Prosecutors are expected to wrap up their case by the end of the week, allowing Combs’ team to begin presenting their own witnesses. A verdict is expected by July 4th.
