Prosecutors argue ‘public must be defended’ from Combs’ violence
Prosecutors accused Sean Combs of downplaying his alleged violence, despite his lawyers openly conceding during trial that he was violent with two of his exes.
«He owned that violence only insofar as it benefited him,» prosecutor Christy Slavik said.
«The violence in this case was uncontested,» Slavik said. «The evidence of what the defendant did was overwhelming.»
Slavik emphasized what she said was «life-altering» violence that Combs’ girlfriends Cassie Ventura and a woman who testified under the pseudonym «Jane» testified at trial, as well as Combs’ allegedly abusive behavior towards his employees.
«He hit her, he kicked her, he threw her into walls, he stomped on her face, he dragged her by the hair,» Slavik said of Ventura, who she said was «treated like an animal.»
«Once is bad enough,» she said. «Dozens and dozens of times is something the public must be defended from.»
«This is not a person who has accepted responsibility,» she said.
Slavik also pushed back against the defense argument that Combs’ relationships with «Jane» and Ventura were mutually harmful.
«The court heard Cassie engaging in a ‘freak-off’ while he was overdosing on drugs. What is mutual about that?» Slavik said. «There is nothing mutual about that.»
Even if the judge removed the alleged violence, Slavik argued that a significant sentence would still be justified. Prosecutors argued that the most comparable case for Combs’ conduct is a 2023 conviction of a movie producer who ran an international prostitution business. The defendant in that case received a five-year prison sentence.
«Even prostitution cases that don’t involve violence get significant sentences in this district,» she said.
