Diddy Appeals Four-Year Prison Sentence

Sean “Diddy” Combs’s lawyers have asked a U.S. appeals court to overturn the hip-hop mogul’s prison sentence of more than four years, arguing it was excessively harsh and based on improper considerations.

Combs, 56, was sentenced in October following a high profile trial that exposed details of alleged “freak-offs” described as prolonged sexual encounters involving hired male escorts, his former partner Casandra Ventura, and another unidentified woman.

While a jury cleared him of the most serious charges, including sex trafficking and racketeering, he was convicted on two counts of transporting individuals across state lines for prostitution.

At Thursday’s hearing in Manhattan, defense lawyer Alexandra Shapiro argued before a three judge panel that the trial judge improperly relied on allegations tied to charges for which Combs had already been acquitted.

“The evidence the judge was relying on was totally separate and, in fact, was acquitted conduct,” Shapiro told the court, insisting that claims of threats against Ventura and another woman should not have influenced the sentencing.

However, prosecutors pushed back, maintaining that certain actions including an incident where Combs allegedly showed Ventura recordings of past encounters were directly relevant to the transportation charges.

Government lawyer Christy Slavik argued that these incidents were closely linked to the offenses for which Combs was convicted, even using a pizza analogy to explain how different pieces of evidence contributed to the final sentencing decision.

One of the judges, William Nardini, described the matter as an “exceptionally difficult case,” highlighting the complexity of the legal arguments. The panel did not issue an immediate ruling.

Combs, who was not present in court, is currently serving his sentence at a low-security federal prison in New Jersey and is expected to be released in spring 2028. He is also separately appealing his conviction, though that matter was not the focus of Thursday’s proceedings.