Attorneys for Sean “Diddy” Combs have moved to overturn a $100m judgment awarded this week to a Michigan jail inmate who accused the music mogul of sexual assault 27 years in the past.
Two emergency motions filed at Lenawee county’s circuit courtroom accuse Derrick Lee Cardello-Smith of launching a “frivolous” lawsuit towards the entertainer, who they insist he by no means met.
Cardello-Smith, 51, accused Combs of drugging and sexually molesting him at a celebration in Detroit in 1997 – and gained a default award at a digital listening to on Monday when neither the three-time Grammy winner nor his legal professionals confirmed as much as contest the allegation.
The motion was considered one of no less than eight different lawsuits filed in current months towards Combs, a rapper, producer and businessman. The latest criticism was lodged the day after the Cardello-Smith judgment, when Daybreak Richard, a singer within the former Combs-founded woman group Danity Kane, sued for sexual assault and inhumane remedy.
Attorneys for Combs didn’t touch upon the brand new filings. However of their second movement they blasted the plaintiff whereas aiming to dissolve a short lived restraining order granted towards their shopper as a part of the judgment Cardello-Smith gained by default.
“This can be a frivolous lawsuit towards a outstanding businessman, based mostly on apparent fabrications, filed by a convicted rapist and serial litigant with an overactive creativeness and a thirst for fame,” Marc Agnifilo, Combs’ lawyer, wrote.
“[Combs] realized about plaintiff and this motion for the primary time three days in the past, when media retailers reported that this courtroom had entered a $100m default judgment towards him. Had the criticism been served (and it was not), it could nonetheless be topic to swift dismissal on the deserves.
“[Even] if each (wholly implausible and clearly fabricated) allegation within the criticism had been true, the motion would nonetheless be utterly non-viable as a result of the statute of limitations on the claims asserted expired nearly 17 years earlier than the case was filed.”
Combs’ attorneys mentioned Cardello-Smith’s criticism was “objectively unbelievable and incoherent”. In addition they asserted that the plaintiff had “a historical past of submitting frivolous lawsuits”.
They particularly cited a “fantastical” declare by the plaintiff that he paid Combs $150,000 for a 49% share within the entertainer’s internet value. A 2022 estimate by Forbes valued the rapper’s fortune at $1bn, and regardless of shedding his billionaire standing due to his authorized troubles, he’s nonetheless value an estimated $800m.
The Lenawee county circuit courtroom decide Anna Marie Anzalone has not said when she is going to think about the emergency motions.
Earlier than the $100m judgment, she issued an order stopping Combs from promoting any property which may have helped him elevate funds for any damages the courtroom discovered him responsible for.
Supply hyperlink
