00:00have reached verdicts after a long trial of Sean Diddy Coombs. He's been convicted on prostitution
00:06counts, but cleared on the more serious charges, and they carried a potential maximum sentence of
00:1320 years. Now, it's been reported that Mr. Coombs' mouth thank you across the room to the jury and
00:20made prayer gestures towards them. Let's now speak with the American attorney, Lisa Bloom. Lisa,
00:26welcome to the show. Extraordinary Scenes in New York, and we spoke with a defense attorney in
00:33America a short while ago. It's his conviction that Sean P. Diddy Coombs will most likely walk free.
00:40What's your take? Well, I don't know about that. The judge is going to decide in a couple of hours.
00:45The defense has asked that Sean Combs be released. You are correct. But the prosecution has said they
00:51want the top sentence against him, which would be 20 years, 10 years on each of the prostitution
00:57charges on which he has now been convicted. Listen, this was a split verdict, which means the jury found
01:03him guilty of two charges, and they acquitted him of the other three. The ones that he was acquitted of
01:09were the more serious charges. So I represent victims. I represent two Sean Combs accusers,
01:15one of whom, Don Richard, was brave enough to testify in this trial. And there's no question
01:20about it that this is a disappointing day for us. But our civil cases will go on, and we hope that
01:26the judge will sentence him to many years behind bars for the charges that he was convicted of.
01:32And Lisa Bloom, talking there about the clients that you represented that were directly involved
01:39in this case, there's inevitably going to be the notion that this is a very wealthy man,
01:45a very powerful man, who seems to have maybe bought his way out of this. Is there anything in that?
01:52Well, listen, I have been covering celebrity trials and suing billionaire bullies for decades.
01:58And there is no question that having money and power is a major advantage in our justice system.
02:04Sad to say that, but it's true. And I'll also tell you that I was in the Sean Combs courtroom during
02:09jury selection weeks ago, and there were a lot of jurors who really wanted to be on this jury.
02:16That is unusual. Usually people try to get out of jury duty, right? They have any excuse to the judge.
02:21I'm sick. I have to take care of my children. My job won't allow me to be gone. This was the opposite.
02:26People wanted to be on this jury. And, you know, until the jurors are interviewed,
02:30we really don't know what their reasoning is going to be. They saw a video of Sean Combs
02:35brutally beating his girlfriend, Cassie Ventura, in a hotel hallway. But that was not enough for
02:41them to come back with convictions on the top charges. So what do you think then has precipitated
02:47this verdict? He was guilty of the prostitution, but a big part of his defense was this was consensual.
02:56Those two accounts don't seem to marry up. Right. Well, listen, there is no way the government
03:03would have brought this case if it was just about the prostitution and crossing state lines
03:09with prostitutes is a federal crime. If they hadn't crossed the state lines, it wouldn't even
03:13be a federal crime. The government brought this case because of the racketeering and sex trafficking
03:18charges, the bigger charges that Sean Combs has now been acquitted of. This is a big loss for the
03:24prosecution today. And it's a big win for Sean Combs. There's no question about it in terms of
03:29the consent. Consent is typically not even a defense to sex trafficking. If somebody is forced
03:36into sexual behavior based on fraud, force or coercion, consent is really not a defense.
03:42But the defense really drove home to the jury text messages from Cassie, who you see here with
03:47Sean Combs and saying that she wanted to engage in the freak offs, that she loved him, that she
03:54enjoyed it. And I think that those text messages were probably very significant to the jury.
03:59And you've been involved, Lisa Bloom. You've represented clients, women whose sexual harassment
04:05claims precipitated the firing of Bill O'Reilly from Fox News. These women don't just fabricate this,
04:13they're not gold diggers. They want justice. And there's a feeling here that maybe that's not been
04:20the case here. Right. And if you think about this case, yes, and I've represented many women against
04:26many prominent men and billionaire bullies. But listen, Cassie, who testified nine months pregnant
04:33for four days, already got her money in her civil claims against Sean Combs. That was a couple of years
04:39ago. So she clearly does not have any economic motive to testify against him now. She didn't
04:44have to do this at all. But she did. And that was one of the defense arguments, as you say,
04:49that there was some economic motive. That one really didn't make any sense to me.
04:54And Lisa Bloom, there's inevitably going to be a huge backlash from the feminist community
04:59in the United States and across the world. That once again, this will discourage future women
05:06from speaking out to have the bravery to do that. What's what's your message to them?
05:11Listen, the Me Too movement and the feminist movement that I have been involved in all of my
05:16life is not about one case or one person. It is much bigger than that. Millions of women and men
05:23all over the world have shared their stories of sexual abuse, and they are continuing to do so.
05:28And that to me is a beautiful, breathtaking movement. It's a very empowering experience for people
05:34to stand up. I've been representing victims for 40 years. I'm going to continue to do it.
05:39And each case is decided on its own facts. And I hope that nobody is discouraged by the outcome in
05:45this one case. Yeah, we were joined a short while ago by Alan Hershovitz, who said that this will be a
05:52terrible day for the Me Too movement, a terrible day for the feminist movement, who would like to have
05:57taken down Sean P. Diddy Coombs. But he's an innocent man. And the notion was he was put before
06:05the courts as already guilty. Well, what is he innocent of? Federal racketeering and sex trafficking
06:13charges. His own attorneys admitted that he is a terrible human being, that he is a domestically
06:18violent boyfriend, right? And he has got multiple civil charges against him. And he violated federal
06:25law at least twice by transporting prostitutes against state lines. So this is no choir boy.
06:32This is not somebody that we're going to look up to as a role model. I think his career is over.
06:37You know, I think Alan Dershowitz overstated if he said that. Diddy is a reprehensible human being,
06:43and nobody would want to raise a son to be like this man who was caught on video, beating his
06:49girlfriend, dragging her by her hair, kicking her when she's down on the ground in a fetal position.
06:54Multiple witnesses, including my client, also testified to that abuse. The defense was simply,
07:00this is a domestic violence case. It's not a federal racketeering case. And the jury believed that.
07:05But this man is not innocent. And it's been described as a stinging defeat for the
07:12prosecutors. A terrible day for them. Do you think that's a fair point to take? They failed
07:21to put away the man you described there, the moral fiber of Sean Coombs you attacked there,
07:27yet they still failed to put him away? It's definitely a defeat for the prosecution.
07:32And they did an admirable job. I was in that courtroom for weeks. I followed the case very closely.
07:38I think the prosecutors worked very hard. But listen, this is what happens in a jury trial.
07:43I've been a trial attorney for many years. When you put the case in front of a jury,
07:47you never know what they are going to do. But the jury has spoken
07:51unanimously, and we all have to respect this verdict.
07:54So, let's see.
07:55So, let's see.
07:56So, let's see.
07:57So, let's see.
07:58So, let's see.
07:59So, let's see.
08:00So, let's see.
08:01So, let's see.
08:02So, let's see.
08:03So, let's see.
08:04So, let's see.
08:05So, let's see.
08:06So, let's see.
08:07So, let's see.
08:08So, let's see.
08:09So, let's see.
08:10So, let's see.
08:11So, let's see.
08:12So, let's see.
08:13So, let's see.
08:14So, let's see.
08:15So, let's see.
08:16So, let's see.
08:17So, let's see.
08:18So, let's see.
08:19So, let's see.
08:20So, let's see.
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