Sean “Diddy” Combs is accusing the “unlawful” Department of Homeland Security of trying to smear him with leaks, including footage of the 2016 beating of Cassie Ventura

Facing a life behind bars if convicted of sex trafficking and other charges, Sean “Diddy” Combs and his lawyers are now on the offensive against the Department of Homeland Security.

In a risky tactic, Combs’ defense is accusing DHS agents of leaking grand jury information and orchestrating a smear campaign against the “It’s All About the Benjamins” actor. While Combs’ release from the violent Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn has been rejected, his team led by Marc Agnifilo and Teny Geragos are demanding a crucial hearing before Judge Arun Subramanian as soon as possible over alleged DHS “misconduct.”

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“Defendant Sean Combs seeks four forms of relief in connection with a series of unlawful government leaks that the defense contends resulted in damaging, highly prejudicial pre-trial publicity that can only tarnish the jury pool and strip Mr. Combs of his office. “Right to a fair trial,” says a potentially disturbing memorandum of law in support of the request for an evidentiary hearing filed late Wednesday in federal court.

Read Sean Combs’ defense memorandum accusing DHS of misconduct here

A day after the Bad Boy Records founder, arrested Sept. 16, began his bid for pretrial release by claiming federal authorities were hiding evidence, the newly filed document strikes a similar note. But unlike the “Ave Maria” appeal, which spared the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York its wrath, this motion is almost entirely about the DHS – almost. Echoing the usual infighting and infighting between bureaucracies, Combs’ team says: “The reason a hearing is necessary is to determine exactly what DHS did and did not do regarding these leaks and what the U.S. Prosecutors did “and did nothing to stop them.”

Today’s filing laments DHS’s “underhanded tactics” and hopes to cast federal authorities’ March 25 raids on Combs’ homes in Miami and Los Angeles as “specifically intended as a public display of brutality and not primarily aimed solely at procuring potential criminals.” “Evidence aligned”.

To that end, the defense is citing allegations of rape, abuse and other horrors made against the rapper by Combs’ ex-girlfriend Cassie Ventura in her short-lived and quickly settled trial last November. While Combs is said to have paid Ventura around $30 million to settle her lawsuit, he always denied her allegations about what happened during the years they were together. That façade fell apart fairly quickly when security footage of Combs attacking and punching Ventura in the hallway of an upscale L.A. hotel was broadcast on CNN and elsewhere in May.

At the time, Combs apologized for his “inexcusable behavior” and said what the video showed “disgusted” him. Now the defense is calling the public broadcast of the eight-year-old surveillance video “the most egregious example” of a government trial by public opinion and is calling for a “stop order” and “suppression of all evidence leaked by government employees.”

To keep this brutal video away from a jury, the defense says, “The videotape was released to CNN for one reason only: to fatally damage its reputation and increase the prospect of Sean Combs successfully defending himself against these allegations.” Instead Using the videotape as evidence at trial, along with other evidence that gives it context and meaning, the agents misused it in the most detrimental and damaging way possible. The government knew what it had: a frankly deplorable videotape of Sean Combs punching, kicking and dragging a woman in a towel on camera in the hotel hallway.”

“The potential problem for the government is that an agent’s provision of this videotape to CNN would constitute a breach of grand jury secrecy,” adds Combs’ Roy Cohn-style team.

But here’s the thing: It’s not clear from today’s filings that the defense actually believes DHS is on the run. “After the undersigned informed the government that we would be filing this request, prosecutors responded that the video broadcast by CNN was not obtained as part of a grand jury proceeding and that DHS did not act in advance of CNN’s release had possession of the videotape,” a footnote in Wednesday’s 17-page memo said. “However, prosecutors have given no indication that they have investigated any of the leaks related to this case.”

As a result, neither representatives from SDNY U.S. Attorney Damian Williams’ office nor DHS responded to Deadline’s request for comment about today’s filings and the allegations they contain. If either company contacts us, this post will be updated.

With all of this underway and the bail appeal process beginning, Combs, his attorneys and prosecutors will be back in court tomorrow for a pre-trial status conference.

Issues likely to come up include disclosure, sealing of certain evidence and scheduling a trial against Combs. “Mr. Combs continues to assert his right to a speedy trial and intends to request a trial date in April or May 2025, consistent with the court’s trial schedule,” Agnifilo and Geragos said in correspondence with Judge Subramanian.

Given these new allegations from the defense and the status of the bail appeal, the date for the start of the trial may be overly optimistic.

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