Hip-hop mogul Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs is currently in federal custody, awaiting trial on serious charges of racketeering and sex trafficking.
His arrest last week in New York comes amid a wave of civil suits alleging sexual assault and physical violence, some dating back to the 1990s.
The latest accuser, Thalia Graves, claims that Combs and his bodyguard drugged, bound, and raped her in 2001, even filming the horrific incident.
The lawsuit, submitted to a federal court in New York, adds to a growing list of legal actions against Combs following his recent arrest and the unsealing of a federal sex trafficking indictment.
Thalia Graves, the plaintiff, claims that when she was 25 and dating an executive at Combs’s company in the summer of 2001, the rapper and his head of security, Joseph Sherman, lured her to a meeting at Bad Boy Recording Studios. She alleges they picked her up in an SUV and offered her a drink that was ‘likely laced with a drug,’ according to a report by the Associated Press.
The lawsuit states that Graves lost consciousness and woke up bound in Combs’s office and lounge. She alleges that the two men then raped her, physically assaulted her by slapping her and slamming her head against a pool table, all while ignoring her cries for help.
During a tearful press conference in Los Angeles with her attorney, Gloria Allred, Graves spoke about the emotional toll the incident has taken on her. ‘It has been hard for me to trust others, to form healthy relationships, or even feel safe in my own skin,’ she said.
Graves described the pain as ‘a pain that reaches into your very core and leaves emotional scars that may never fully heal,’ as reported by AP.
Graves’ lawsuit is filed under the New York City Victims of Gender-Motivated Violence Protection Act, which allows victims of sexual assault to sue within a two-year window, even for incidents that occurred long ago.
In her suit, Graves also claims to have recently learned from her former boyfriend that Combs had recorded the assault, shown it to others, and sold it as pornography.
Both Combs and Sherman allegedly contacted Graves multiple times after the assault, threatening her with repercussions if she ever spoke out. The lawsuit seeks damages to be determined at trial and requests that all copies of the alleged video be located and destroyed. Several companies owned by Combs are also named as defendants.
Despite these serious allegations, the Harlem-born rapper has denied any criminal wrongdoing.
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