THIS week’s biggest story in the entertainment industry was the arrest and indictment of mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs, one of the most influential musical personalities of this era.
A day after his arrest, Federal prosecutors in the United States unsealed a sweeping indictment in which he is facing charges of racketeering, sex trafficking by force and transportation to engage in prostitution. The indictment accuses Combs of being the ringleader of a criminal “enterprise” and this game him the power to allegedly sexually, physically, emotionally and verbally abuse his victims for years.
The indictment claims Combs “abused, threatened, and coerced women, and others around him, to fulfil his sexual desires, protect his reputation, and conceal his conduct.”
His staff and colleagues are being accused of having “wielded the power and prestige” of Combs’ name in order “to intimidate, threaten, and lure female victims into Combs’ orbit, often under the pretence of a romantic relationship.”
He is also being accused of narcotics offences, arson, bribery, kidnapping, forced labour and other offences.
This is a sensational fall from grace for Combs, the man who founded Bad Boy Records and helped unleash the best that was the Notorious B.I.G.
The indictment appears to be a carbon copy of the charges which landed another star, R Kelly, in jail.
R Kelly, who was one of the superstar artists who were hired to entertain fans ahead of the start of the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, is now serving 30 years in an American jail for sex trafficking and racketeering.
He is also serving a 20-year jail term for child sex abuse offences.
While these cases are happening in the United States, we need to follow them closely because we believe that there are some bad apples, within our entertainment industry, who have been abusing helpless women for some time now.
They lure these women with promises that they will change their lives and, in the process, they take advantage and start sexually abusing them.
While it might not be at the level of what the likes of Combs and Kelly are said to have done, abuse remains abuse and one such abuse is the same as multiple abuses.
We have issued warnings that we believe there is something terribly wrong with events at some of the local companies who are involved in the recruitment of models.
We have seen some romantic pictures of some people, who are supposed to be managing and helping these models, which suggest that there is more than just management which is going on.
These pictures paint images of relationships and, in most of these cases, we have warned that the young models are being taken care of. We have warned that some of these so-called owners of these agencies are their power, just like Kelly and Combs, to sexually abuse these innocent models.
Hopefully, our authorities are also watching all this closely and those who are on the wrong side, like Combs and Kelly, will one day face the music.