Sean Combs, Music Mogul Known as Diddy, Is Indicted on Sex Trafficking and Racketeering Charges

Sean Combs, the embattled music mogul, has been indicted on three counts of sex trafficking, racketeering and transportation to engage in prostitution.

In the 14-page indictment, which was unsealed on Tuesday, federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York said Mr. Combs had run a “criminal enterprise” that for years threatened, abused and coerced women, and accused him of forced labor, kidnapping, arson, bribery and obstruction of justice. To commit these acts, the prosecutors said, Mr. Combs relied on the help of the employees of his business.

Mr. Combs, 54, was expected to appear for an arraignment later on Tuesday in Manhattan.

“He’s going to plead not guilty, obviously,” Marc Agnifilo, one of Mr. Combs’s lawyers, said outside the federal courthouse on Tuesday morning. “He’s going to fight this with all of his energy and all of his might, and the full confidence of his lawyers. And I expect a long battle with a good result for Mr. Combs.”

The charges against Mr. Combs were revealed a day after he was arrested in a Manhattan hotel room, following an investigation that has been active since at least early this year.

Much of the indictment appears to mirror the accusations made last year by Casandra Ventura, Mr. Combs’s former girlfriend and an artist signed to his label, Bad Boy, under the name Cassie. In her lawsuit — which led to a cascade of other accusations in the following weeks and months — Ms. Ventura alleged that she had been brutally beaten and sexually abused by Mr. Combs for years, and that he forced her to participate in drug-fueled orgies with prostitutes that he called “freak offs.”

Ms. Ventura settled her lawsuit, which was filed in November, after just one day, with Mr. Combs denying any wrongdoing. But the indictment mentions “freak offs” and describes them in similar terms to Ms. Ventura’s suit, as involving copious amounts of drugs and other supplies for the participants, with Mr. Combs watching and sometimes filming the events.

When federal agents raided Mr. Combs’s homes in Los Angeles and Miami Beach in March, the indictment said, “law enforcement seized various Freak Off supplies, including narcotics and more than 1,000 bottles of baby oil and lubricant.”

The arrest of Mr. Combs — a producer, record executive and performer who is also known as Diddy and Puff Daddy — makes him the highest-profile figure in the music world to face criminal charges for sexual misconduct since R. Kelly, the R&B singer who, after trials in New York and Chicago, was sentenced to more than 30 years in prison for child sex crimes, sex trafficking and racketeering.

Mr. Combs was a key figure in the global rise of hip-hop as a commercial force in the 1990s and 2000s, helping to make stars of rappers and R&B singers like the Notorious B.I.G. and Mary J. Blige. After Ms. Ventura filed her suit, five women filed lawsuits alleging sexual assault, and three other suits included accusations of sexual misconduct. Mr. Combs’s lawyers are fighting all of them in court.

After his arrest on Monday, lawyers for Mr. Combs said they were disappointed with the decision to prosecute him.

“Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs is a music icon, self-made entrepreneur, loving family man and proven philanthropist who has spent the last 30 years building an empire, adoring his children and working to uplift the Black community,” Mr. Combs’s legal team said in a statement. “He is an imperfect person but he is not a criminal.”

The statement added that he had been cooperative with the investigation and had “voluntarily relocated to New York” in anticipation of the charges.

“These are the acts of an innocent man with nothing to hide,” his lawyers added, “and he looks forward to clearing his name in court.”

Speculation about the federal case against Mr. Combs has been building ever since the raid on his homes. Prosecutors have been sending subpoenas to witnesses for months.

In anticipation of an indictment, Mr. Combs recently traveled to New York to make himself available to law enforcement. For days he had been staying at the Park Hyatt New York hotel on West 57th Street, largely hunkering down while awaiting any news but also drawing some attention on social media with a visit to Harlem, where he grew up.