Speaker 1: What's up, everyone, and welcome to another episode of The
Diddy Diaries. In the previous episode, talking about sex trafficking
and defending Diddy, I was saying that we were going
to take a look at the Man Act charge and
try and formulate a defense for that. But I have
to tell you I can't come up with a good
defense for the Man Act considering we know for a
fact that mal prostitutes were imported to several different states,
allegedly at Ditty's behest. So it's almost impossible to defend
the Man Act. Now, you could defend it when it
comes to the women, right, but that's not what the
government's alleging. The government's alleging that these male prostitutes were
in fact imported over state lines for nothing more than sex.
And I think that the testimony has done more than
prove that. So I'll leave it to other people to
try and defend Ditty on that charge, and we're gonna
move on to obstruction instead. There's an old prosecutor trick
that every season defense lawyer recognizes when your case is
weak on the law, when you lack the hard evidence
to convict on the actual elements of the crime, you charged,
you pivot to narrative. You hint at things you don't
formally charge. You see suspicion where you cannot plant proof.
You create the ghost of a crime, not to meet
your burden, but to inflame a jury sense of outrage.
And that is precisely what the government has done with obstruction.
In this case, Shawn Colms is not charged with obstruction
of justice. The government had every opportunity to do so
if they believe the evidence supported it. They did not,
because it does not yet. Throughout this trial. In their
enterprise letter, in witness questioning, in their reco theory, in
their opening statement, they have repeatedly invoked obstruction, destruction of evidence,
intimidation of witness, manipulation of legal process, silencing of victims.
They cannot prove these things in accordance with federal law,
so they have not formally charged them. Instead, they use
them rhetorically to poison the well, to dirty the canvass,
to convert jury suspicion into juror conviction. But courts are
not places for shadows. There are places for evidence. They
are not places for fear. There are places for law,
and on that standard, the only one that matters the
government's obstruction narrative collapses entirely to ground ourselves. Let us
remind the jury of what obstruction actually is. Under federal law,
obstruction requires that a defendant one knowingly engaged in conduct
intended to interfere with an investigation proceeding or official action.
Two acted with corrupt intent, meaning with the purpose of
impairing the integrity of the justice process. Three to concrete
identifiable acts designed to influence or prevent truthful participation in
that process, whether through destruction of evidence, intimidation of witness, bribery,
or coercion. Intent is critical, action is critical, Casualty is critical.
Suspicion alone is not enough. Atmosphere is not enough. Celebrity
culture is not enough. The government must prove that Calms
personally and knowingly engaged in obstruction with intent to subvert justice.
They have failed completely to do so. Let us begin
with the centerpiece of the government's obstruction narrative, the use
of non disclosure agreements and private settlements. The government is
suggested without formally charging that Colm's use of NDAs and
settlements with accusers constitutes obstruction. They imply that he use
these agreements to silence victims and to prevent the reporting
of crimes. But here the law is clearer. Das are
not illegal. They are a standard, lawful tool used by
public figures in every industry and every sphere of American
life to protect reputation, privacy, and brand settlements. Are not obstruction.
There are civil agreements between parties represented by council, voluntary,
legally binding, and recognized under every jurisdiction in this country.
To convert these tools into evidence of obstruction, the government
must prove that they were used with corrupt intent to
impair the justice process, not simply to resolve disputes or
avoid reputational harm. And on this point the government's case
is empty. Not one NDA produced that trial contains an
illegal term. Not one contains an agreement to lie to
law enforcement, not one forbids reporting a crime, not one
forbids cooperating with a legal process. In fact, most contain
the very opposite standard carve outs for law enforcement cooperation. Moreover,
many witnesses who signed NDAs testified that they did so willingly,
with independent counsel and with full understanding of the rights,
and the defense exposed this relentlessly in cross examination. No
witness could testify that Combs or as attorneys forced them
into an NDA under threat. No witness could testify that
they were told not to report a crime to police.
No witness could point to a single instance where an
NBA prevented them from cooperating with an investigation. NDAs are
not obstruction, they are a legal defense, and to criminalize
them would be to criminalize the very tools that American
legal system provides for private resolution of disputes. The government
has also leaned heavily on a rhetorical flourish describing private
settlements as hush money, but this is not a legal term.
It is a narrative device designed to provoke dure or
outrage rather than legal analysis. The reality is far simpler.
In a world of celebrity litigation, risk is omnipresent. Reputational
damage is as lethal as legal exposure, and when disputes arise,
especially disputes involving sex, money, or power, the path of
civil settlement is not only legal, but often advisable. No
evidence was produced that any settlement was paid to prevent
testimony in this case. No evidence was produced that any
payment was conditioned on perjury, witness tampering, or the destruction
of evidence. The settlements were negotiated through council, they were
entered into voluntarily, and they contained lawful terms. Again, this
is not obstruction. The government has made much of an
allegation that Colms ordered the destruction of surveillance footage and
other digital evidence. But where's the proof. There is no
forensic report that was produced showing deliberate erasure traceable to Colmbs.
No witness testified credibly that Colmbs gave an order to
destroy evidence. No chance of custody was presented showing that
evidence was destroyed while in colmb's control or in his instruction.
No subpoena was issued to Colmbs where he allegedly failed
to comply. No video was subpoenaed and then destroyed after
the subpoena. In short, there is no act of obstruction
proven here. What the government relies on are innuendos, missing footage,
gaps and timelines, former employees speck relating that something must
have been deleted. But speculation is not evidence. This is
a smear, not proof, and in a court of law
that distinction matters. Another branch of the government's obstruction narrative
involves alleged intimidation of witnesses, But again, where's the proof.
No credible witness testified that Shan Colms directly threatened them.
No credible witness testified that he instructed others to threaten them.
No credible witness testified that any threat prevented them from testifying.
In the case, no credible evidence was presented of bribes, blackmail,
or retaliation. The government's witnesses did speak of fear, but
fear is not proof of intimidation. Public figures often inspire
complex emotions, power, fame, wealth. These create atmospheres that people
interpret in many ways, But the law demands specific acts
of intimidation, not subjective feelings, and the defense did their
best to expose this in cross examination. Witnesses admitted they
traveled freely both before and after alleged intimidation. Witnesses admitted
they cooperated with this investigation despite alleged intimidation. Witnesses admitted
they spoke to the media, filed lawsuits, and posted publicly,
not the behavior of individuals intimidated into silence. There is
no act of intimidation proven here. None. Let's be honest.
The real purpose of the government's obstruction narrative is not
to prove obstruction, it's to salvage their reco charge. Without obstruction,
the government's RICO pattern falls apart. Their alleged enterprise lacks continuity.
Their predicate acts are too sparse, too disconnected, and so
they inject obstruction not as a charge, but as an
atmosphere to glue the case together. But this is an
abusive process. You cannot prove RICO with non charged, unproven obstruction.
You cannot convict based on shadow charges. You can use
suspicion where the law requires proof. The defense drove this
point home. If obstruction was provable, why was it not charged.
If obstruction was provable, why was no forensic evidence produced?
If obstruction was provable, why did government rely on inference
and implication rather than act in proof. Because they can't
prove it, and the jury must not let them succeed
through suggestion alone. And so after four weeks, the government
is left with nothing but fog, no clear evidence of obstruction,
no forensic trail, no proven witness intimidation, no illegal NDAs,
no illegal settlements, no proven destruction of evidence. What they
have is a story designed to outrage, But outrage is
not an element of the offense In the courtroom bound
by law not emotion. The obstruction narrative must be rejected
in full. Without obstruction, there are reco charged Withers without obstruction,
their case return to what it is and incoherent collapsing
attempt to criminalize celebrity life through implication not proof, and
that is not justice, all right. So that's going to
do it for this one. And in the next episode
we're going to bring it home and wrap this bad
boy up. All of the information that goes with this
episode can be found in the description box. What's up, everyone,
and welcome to another episode of the Diddy Diaries. In
this episode, we're going to wrap up taking a look
at the defense that Diddy. The time has come. After
weeks of testimony, after countless exhibits, after days of argument
and cross examination, the court room returns to its core truth,
one truth that transcends all others. The burden of proof
is not ours, it's the governments in this nation, in
this system of justice, no one, not the powerful, not
the famous, not the flawed, can be stripped of their
freedom unless the government proves beyond the reason doubt that
they committed the crimes charged, not suggested, not implied, not suspected, proven,
And after all this time, after all this theater, after
all these headlines, the government has not met that burden,
not even close. They want to convict Sean Combs not
because the law demands it, but because they hope your
heart will override your reason. Because they hope that if
they stir enough moral outrage, enough revulsion at celebrity excess,
enough discomfort with the world Combs and habits, that the
jury will forget the standards that they swordw uphold when
they took their owth. This jurors, but this court room
is not a tabloid, It's not Twitter. This is not
a place where we convict based on feeling. It's a
place where we convict or refuse to convict, based on proof.
And by that standard, this case is already over. The
government built the case en Rico because they knew their
individual charges were weak. They needed a grand narrative. They
need a frame into which they could force disconnected, disjointed
events and allegations. They failed after four weeks. What has
been proven No enterprise, no structure, no hierarchy, no agreement,
no chain of command, no written plan, no verbal commitment,
no criminal goals. What we saw instead was the chaos
of a celebrity entourage, a world of shifting alliances, opportunistic actors,
toxic relationships, and transactional dynamics. But not a criminal enterprise,
not a rico pattern, not a conspiracy. The defense is
demonstrated this with unrelenting force. Witnesses failed to describe any structure.
No one can name an agreement. The so called pattern
was a patchwork of isolated events, stretched across years and continents.
This is not rico. It is fiction, a dangerous fiction
used to leverage heavy penalties when the government cannot make
the case on the merits and in the court room,
fictions must not prevail. The government sex trafficking case was
a calculated gamble, an effort to trigger moral revulsion, to
bypass the jury's reason and go straight for the gut.
But when stripped of that emotional veneer, their case crumbles.
Force not proven, no physical restraint, no violence compelling sex
fraud not proven, no documented false representations, no explicit quid
pro quo, no promises exchanged for sexual activity. Coercion not
proven as the law defines it. What we heard were
stories of emotionally fraught relationships of adult women, making complex,
often painful choices, but choices. Nonetheless, the prosecution's trauma expert
was presented to excuse every inconsistency to override the presumption
of agency. But trauma science, valid though it may be,
cannot replace the legal elements the government failed to prove,
and the core truth remains. No act of sex trafficking
is defined by Section fifteen ninety one was proven beyond
a reasonable doubt, not one. The failure of the Man
Act charges. Here the government's desperation became clearest. They took
the most ordinary acts of celebrity life, travel, hospitality, intimacy
and attempted to criminalize them. But the law is clear.
The man Act requires proof of purpose at the time
of transportation, not post hawk moral judgment, not guilt by lifestyle.
And here again the government's case collapsed. Not one message
from colmb's arranging prostitution, not one travel record proving illicit purpose,
not one agreement conditioning travel on sexual favors. Instead, the
government asked the jury to infer a purpose from outcome,
a legally impermissible maneuver that the defense dismantled through meticulous
cross examination. Adults travel adults make choices. The existence of
intimacy after travel is not proof that the travel was
criminal in purpose, and without such proof, the man Act
charges cannot stand. But perhaps the most cynical element of
the government's case was its use of obstruction, not as
a charge crime, but as a cloud of suspicion to
prop up they're a failing reco theory. But here too
they failed. No direct evidence of obstruction, no forensic trail,
no witness testifying to orders from Combs, no illegal NDAs,
no illegal settlements, no proven destruction of evidence. What they
presented was atmosphere fear, innuendo, a play to the jury's imagination,
precisely what our system of justice forbids. The defense exposed
this strategy for what it is and improper effort to
glue together a case that cannot stand on its own,
and the jury must not allow it. Beyond Shawn Combs,
beyond the salacious headlines and public outrage, this case presents
a deeper danger, one that threatens the integrity of the
justice system itself, because if the government can convict here
without meeting its burden, if it can convert lifestyle into conspiracy,
agency into coercion travel into crime, legal tools into obstruction.
Then no one is safe. Then every flawed relationship becomes trafficking.
Then every lavish gift becomes prostitution. Then every settlement becomes obstruction.
Then every celebrity becomes a target. And that is not justice,
That is opportunism cloaked in moral rhetoric. The jury must
be the bulwark against that abuse. And for the jurors,
their role is not to right every wrong. It's not
to punish every act that they dislike. It's not to
reform the culture of celebrity. Their role is to uphold
the law, to hold the government to its burden, to
ensure that no man, however powerful, however famous, however flawed,
is convicted without proof beyond the reasonable doubt. And when
you apply that standard here on rigorously, the conclusion is inescapable.
The government has not proven its case, not on rico,
not on sex trafficking, not on the man Act, not
on obstruction. And in our system, when the government fails
to prove its case, there is only one verdict, not guilty.
And now we leave you with these closing thoughts. When
all is said and done, we come to the hardest
part of the jury's task the part where the pressure
of public expectation, the pull of personal feeling, and the
moral gravity of the accusations may weigh heaviest upon them.
And it is precisely here in this moment where the
jury's duty matters most. They're not here to deliver justice
for headlines. They're not here to deliver justice for social media.
They're not here to answer the calls of those who
would see this man condemned not because the law demands it,
but because they found him unsavory, or his lifestyle objectionable,
or his world foreign to their values. The jury is
here to uphold the one thing that separates a court
of law from the court of public opinion, the presumption
of innocence, the burden of proof, the requirement of proof
beyond the reasonable doubt. And if you allow feeling, if
you allow moral outrage to replace that requirement, you do
not merely convict one man unjustly. You damage the system itself.
You signal that for some defendants, those who are famous,
those who are wealthy, those who live outside the cultural norms,
the presumption of innocence is hollow, that for them the
standard is lower, that for them, story will suffice where
evidence does not. But our system must be better than that.
It must be. You are a difficult testimony. You are
painful stories. Some of it may have disturbed you deeply.
But difficult testimony is not a license to convict. Inconsistencies remain,
proof is absent, the legal elements have not been satisfied.
You may believe John Colmes is arrogant, that he is selfish,
that he is morally compromised, that his lifestyle is repugnant,
and you are entitled to those personal views. But you
are not entitled, not in this court room, not under
this constitution, to convict him of crimes. You are not
convinced he committed beyond a reasonable doubt. The law draws
that line sharply, and your oath demands that you hold it.
If you allow that line to blur, if you convict
because you dislike them, because you feel for the witness,
because you fear what the press will say. If you
do not, the jury surrenders the very foundation of due process.
You allow feeling to overwhelm fact, You allow narrative to
override law. And I'll tell you this plainly, that is
not justice. That is not what a jurors oath commands
that is not what the law demands of them. The
jurors may walk out of the courtroom with mixed feelings
about the man who sat at this table. They may
walk out believing that he lived recklessly, that he made
grievous personal mistakes. He may even believe that he caused
pain to people who trusted him. But unless you believe,
truly believe, that the government is proven beyond a reasonable doubt,
every element of these charges everyone, then the jury is
bound by their oath to acquit not because Sean Colmes
is perfect, not because he is worthy of admiration, but
because the government did not meet its burden. And because
our system depends on jurors, jurors who are willing to
uphold the standard even when the title public opinion runs
against it. That's the jury's duty, and in this case
the duty is clear. There's no enterprise proven. There is
no trafficking proven. There is no Man Act violation proven,
there is no obstruction proven. There is feeling, there is outrage,
there is a narrative, but there is no proof. And
in this country, in this courtroom, without proof, there can
be no conviction. So when the jurors enter that jury room,
they need to remember they are not the sword of
the public. They are not the shield of law. They
are not here to serve a story. They're here to
serve justice. They are not here to punish a man
for his failings as a human being. They are here
to judge whether this man committed specific crimes as charged
beyond a reasonable doubt, and if they hold to that standard,
as the oath requires, then their verdict can only be
what the law demands, not guilty on every count. All
of the information that goes with this episode can be
found in the description box.