Diddy continues to face new civil lawsuits alleging sexual misconduct, but some of them have been dismissed in recent weeks. As such, it seems like he and his legal team feel confident in their pursuit of more wins in court, even as it relates to his criminal federal trial for alleged sex trafficking and racketeering. Per an exclusive AllHipHop report, the defense filed a motion in federal court this week that requests to block clinical forensic psychologist Dr. Dawn Hughes from testifying for the prosecution and the government. According to the filing, Hughes will generally speak on "coercive control" and explain abusive behavioral patterns of victimizers.
You may recognize Dr. Dawn Hughes for her testimony in other high-profile sexual assault cases, such as Johnny Depp versus Amber Heard, the Harvey Weinstein trial, and Danny Masterson's situaton. However, Diddy's defense team alleges she only brings opinionated narrative spins to the table without any factual knowledge of the case. In addition, his attorney Alexandra A.E. Shapiro claimed Hughes would only be there to paint Sean Combs as a villain without factual basis, and expressed concern over the possibility of the supposedly undefined "coercive control" term prejudicing jurors before any actual evidence.
When Is Diddy's Trial?
"In this case, Hughes has apparently not interviewed the alleged victims at all, much less engaged in the sort of psychological diagnostics that her profession demands," Diddy's lawyer reportedly alleged. "As a result, she offers unadorned opinions that can explain the accusers’ behavior – even though she has made no effort to exclude alternate explanations. [...] The government wants an expert so that it can waive her testimony in summation like a magic wand to cure the glaring defects in its fact witnesses’ credibility.
"This will be a continuing refrain – 'As Dr. Hughes told you, […] as Dr. Hughes explained' – and it will be highly effective," Sean Combs' attorney continued. "But this is not a proper use of expert testimony and it will not help the jury discover the truth. [...] The evidence in this case will show, for example, that Combs financially supported his girlfriends. That does not count as coercion under the legal definition, but it would count under Hughes’s definition. Suppose the evidence shows that after a fight, Combs apologized, expressed love, and bought his girlfriend a gift. That would not count as coercion under the legal definition, but it would count under Hughes’s definition." The Diddy trial will begin on May 5, if everything goes according to schedule.
