Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs arrested by federal agents in New York

Sean “Diddy” Combs was arrested Monday, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in New York City said.

Combs was arrested at the Park Hyatt hotel on West 57th Street, a representative said. He was caught off-guard by the apprehension, according to a person familiar with the situation, who added he had been living at the hotel for several weeks.

U.S. Attorney Damian Williams confirmed in a statement that on Monday evening, federal agents arrested Combs based on a sealed indictment filed by the Southern District of New York.  

“We expect to move to unseal the indictment in the morning and will have more to say at that time,” Williams said.

Combs’ attorney Marc Agnifilo expressed disappointment in a statement. He said Combs, 54, had been cooperative with the investigation and “voluntarily relocated to New York last week in anticipation of these charges.”

“Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs is a music icon, self-made entrepreneur, loving family man, and proven philanthropist who has spent the last 30 years building an empire, adoring his children, and working to uplift the Black community,” the statement said. “He is an imperfect person but he is not a criminal.”

“These are the acts of an innocent man with nothing to hide, and he looks forward to clearing his name in court,” it added.

It was not immediately clear on what charges Combs, the rapper-turned-music mogul, was arrested.

Combs has faced a wave of lawsuits — one as recent as last week — accusing him of sexual assault and misconduct since November, when former girlfriend Casandra Ventura sued him in federal court, accusing him of years of physical and sexual abuse.

Ventura, who is best known by her stage name, Cassie, was once signed to Combs’ Bad Boy record label. The two settled her lawsuit a day after it was filed, without disclosing the terms of the settlement. An attorney for Combs said the settlement was not an acknowledgment of wrongdoing. He previously denied the allegations.

Since then, a number of others have sued, including Dawn Richard, who alleged that he groped and threatened her when he employed her from 2005 to 2012 and that she witnessed him brutally beat Ventura. Combs has vehemently denied the accusations in the lawsuits, saying they were “sickening allegations” from people looking for “a quick payday.”

But in May, after CNN released hotel video of Combs kicking, punching and throwing Ventura on the floor in a hallway in Los Angeles in 2016, he apologized in a video on Instagram in which he said that his behavior was “inexcusable” and that he had sought therapy. The video was later removed from his page.

Richard, who was a member of the girl group Danity Kane, which Combs formed on the MTV reality competition “Making the Band,” and later the group Diddy — Dirty Money, sued Combs last week.

An attorney said Combs was “shocked and disappointed” by Richard’s lawsuit, which, like Ventura’s complaint, depicts him as controlling and violent.

Ventura’s lawsuit included allegations of sex trafficking. She alleged that he frequently beat her, that he forced her to engage in sex acts with male prostitutes — drug-fueled encounters Combs referred to as “freak offs” and sometimes recorded — and that in 2018, as she was trying to end their relationship, he forced his way into her home and raped her.

Richard said in her suit that she attended “drug-fueled parties,” where guests were required to surrender their phones. She also said she witnessed what she believed were inebriated underage girls being sexually violated by Combs and his guests.

In March, federal investigators searched Combs’ homes in Miami and Los Angeles.

Investigators interviewed several people in relation to allegations of sex trafficking, sexual assault and the solicitation and distribution of illegal narcotics and firearms, a source familiar with the investigation told NBC News in March.

The warrant to search Combs’ properties came from the Southern District of New York, NBC News has reported. 

Combs, who has also gone by such names as Puffy, Puff Daddy and Love, founded Bad Boy in the early 1990s. He is regarded as a trailblazer of hip-hop, fashion and media, having created the Sean John clothing line and launched the Revolt TV channel, which he sold his stake in over the summer.

Rodney “Lil Rod” Jones, a producer on Combs’ most recent album, alleged in a lawsuit in February that Combs made unwanted sexual contact, forced him to hire prostitutes and pressured him to participate in sex acts with them. Jones said he lived and traveled with Combs from September 2022 to November 2023, during which time he recorded hours of video and audio of Combs, his staff and others “engaging in serious illegal activity.”

His attorneys, Rodney S. Diggs and Tyrone Blackburn, who are also representing other Combs accusers, said Combs’ “long awaited arrest” was “an important step towards justice for all of Mr. Combs’ victims.”

“We leave the criminal aspect of this case in the hands of the people and justice system,” they said Monday night. “As for the civil cases, we await our time for the facts to reveal themselves and seek the justice our clients deserve. We also anticipate more victims coming forward. We knew this was coming. The evidence is very clear and it was only a matter of time.”

After the hotel video of Combs assaulting Ventura was published, Howard University cut ties with him. In June, the school rescinded an honorary degree it awarded him and disbanded a scholarship program in his name. The same month, Combs honored a request from New York Mayor Eric Adams and returned his key to the city.

This month, Combs listed his home in Los Angeles that was raided in March for $61.5 million.