By Luc Cohen
NEW YORK, April 9 (Reuters) - A lawyer for Sean "Diddy" Combs said on Thursday judges should not be allowed to consider conduct relating to charges for which a defendant has been acquitted in determining a sentence, urging an appeals court to overturn the hip-hop mogul's conviction on prostitution charges and his prison sentence.
"This case presents an important issue about a respect for jury verdicts and public confidence in our criminal justice system," defense lawyer Alexandra Shapiro told the Manhattan-based 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals during arguments in an appeal by Combs of his conviction and sentence of four years and two months in prison.
Shapiro has said in court papers that U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian, who oversaw the sex crimes trial, should not have considered evidence that Combs abused and threatened former girlfriends in sentencing him last October.
Combs is serving his sentence at a low-security federal prison in Fort Dix, New Jersey.
His seven-week trial last year in Manhattan federal court centered on drug-fueled and days-long sexual performances, sometimes called "Freak Offs," between two former girlfriends of Combs and male sex workers. Combs, the founder of Bad Boy Records, was found guilty by a jury on July 2, 2025, on two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution.
But jurors acquitted him on more serious sex trafficking and racketeering charges related to allegedly forcing the two former girlfriends - rhythm and blues singer Casandra Ventura and a woman known in court by the pseudonym Jane - to take part in the encounters while he watched, masturbated and sometimes filmed.
Shapiro has argued in court papers that his conviction on prostitution charges should be overturned because he was alleged to have watched his former girlfriends have sex with paid escorts but did not take part himself.
Shapiro has said the judge should not have considered evidence that Combs threatened to release an explicit video of Ventura and threatened to cut off rent payments for Jane in deciding on the sentence.
Prosecutor Christy Slavik is expected to present her arguments after Shapiro.
In court papers, Slavik has said that Subramanian was right to consider evidence of threats and abuse by Combs toward his former girlfriends, even though he was acquitted of sex trafficking, because that conduct was relevant to the prostitution counts.
"According to Combs, the District Court should have closed its eyes to how he carried out his Mann Act offenses and abused his victims," Slavik wrote, referring to the federal law criminalizing transportation to engage in prostitution.
Combs has acknowledged abusing his former girlfriends. But he has said incidents of what he called domestic violence were separate from the sexual performances at issue in the case, which he said were consensual.
He is currently due to be released from prison on April 15, 2028, Bureau of Prisons records show.
(Reporting by Luc Cohen in New York; Editing by Noeleen Walder and Will Dunham)
