Prosecutors seek 11-year sentence for Diddy

NEW YORK (AP):

Key witnesses against Sean 'Diddy' Combs, including longtime ex-girlfriend Casandra 'Cassie' Ventura, are urging a federal judge to reject leniency for the hip-hop mogul at his sentencing on Friday, saying they fear for their safety if he is freed.

Prosecutors included letters from R&B singer Cassie, her parents and four others with a written submission Tuesday as they seek to have Combs sentenced to at least 11 years and three months in prison for his conviction on two prostitution-related charges.

Notably absent was the voice of an ex-girlfriend who testified under the pseudonym Jane. Like Cassie, she said Combs subjected her over several years to days-long, drug-fuelled sexual performances with male sex workers that Combs watched and often filmed.

On Tuesday, Judge Arun Subramanian denied Combs' request to have his conviction overturned, rejecting his lawyers' argument that he was an amateur pornographer - not engaging in prostitution - and that the guilty verdict violates his First Amendment rights.

"Illegal activity can't be laundered into constitutionally protected activity," Subramanian wrote. He called Combs' filming "incidental," pointing to trial evidence that showed he didn't typically give notice or ask for consent for filming, as a film producer would.

Some who submitted letters expressed disappointment that a jury exonerated Combs, 55, of racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking charges that could have put him behind bars for life, leaving him convicted of two lesser Mann Act charges stemming from interstate commerce related to prostitution.

"If there is one thing I have learned from this experience, it is that victims and survivors will never be safe," wrote Cassie, who testified for four days at Combs' trial, describing numerous assaults that left her bruised and traumatised.

She said she was 19 years old when Combs "used violence, threats, substances, and control over my career to trap me in over a decade of abuse".

A former personal assistant who testified under the pseudonym Mia that Combs raped her in 2010 asked Subramanian to dispense a sentence "that takes into account the ongoing danger my abuser poses to me, and to others".

"The defendant's wealth, power, and fame should not place him above the law," she said.

Ex-Combs employee Capricorn Clark, who testified that a gun-waving Combs forced her to join him when he broke into Rapper Kid Cudi 's home in 2011, suggested he would benefit from spending time in prison.

"The last ray of light is that you provide justice to us," she told the judge. "I truly believe that serving more time will save Puff's life, as time away from his money, drugs, and power is the only punishment he will recognise."