11 people have sued Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs for sexual assault in 10 months. Here’s a timeline of the allegations against him.

Derrick Lee Cardello-Smith, who was incarcerated in a Michigan prison after criminal sexual misconduct and kidnapping, sued Combs on June 6th in Lenawee County Circuit Court in Michigan.

The Detroit Metro Times reported in September that Cardello-Smith accused the rapper of drugging and sexually assaulting him at a party in Detroit in 1997. At the time of the alleged assault, Cardello-Smith was a restaurant and hospitality industry employee, the Detroit Metro Times said.

Combs filed a new motion in Jones’ lawsuit against him, requesting the court to dismiss the case.

The motion said that Jones failed to provide enough evidence for multiple allegations.

“Jones’ Second Amended Complaint is his third attempt to dress up a run-of-the-mill commercial disagreement as a salacious RICO conspiracy,” the motion reads. “Replete with legally meaningless allegations and blatant falsehoods, the SAC’s true purpose is to generate media hype and exploit it to extract a settlement.”

The motion also alleged that Jones posted a video on X in which he and rapper Uncle Murda joked about the lawsuit. The video no longer exists on Jones’ X page, but the motion provides a link to another account that has reshared it.

According to the account @ArtOfDialogue, the video was taken at 50 Cent’s Humor & Harmony weekend festival, which took place between August 7 to 11.

On August 26, Combs’ lawyer Erica Wolff told Business Insider in a statement via email: “Mr. Jones’s lawsuit is pure fiction — a shameless attempt to create media hype and extract a quick settlement. There was no RICO conspiracy and Mr. Jones was not threatened, groomed, assaulted, or trafficked. We look forward to proving — in a court of law — that all of Mr. Jones’s claims are made-up and must be dismissed.”

Blackburn, Jones’ attorney, responded to Combs’ motion in a statement to Business Insider via email on August 28.

“Rodney Jones filed an affidavit under penalty of perjury to the truth of the matter asserted in the filing,” Blackburn wrote. “Can Sean Combs do the same?! Sean Combs is a proven liar. He said Cassie was lying, and then, out of the blue, a video popped up of him beating her in the hallway. At the end of the day, Sean Combs word is as reliable as quicksand.”

A day later, Combs was hit with another lawsuit.

Dawn Richard, a former member of the R&B girl group Danity Kane, which was formed by Combs in 2005, accused the rapper of assault, sexual assault and harassment, sexual battery, and false imprisonment.

In her lawsuit, filed in New York’s Southern District court, Richard alleged multiple instances in which the rapper groped her and verbally abused her while Danity Kane was signed to Combs’ label, Bad Boy Records.

Richard said the harassment continued when she joined Diddy in Dirty Money, a musical trio formed in 2009 featuring Richard, Combs, and singer Kalenna Harper.

Richard also claimed she saw Combs choke and punch Ventura, whom Combs was dating at the time, on multiple occasions.

On Monday, People reported that Harper responded to the lawsuit on her Instagram Story on September 13.

In one of the Story posts, Harper wrote: “It’s important to understand that while I was present in some of the same professional settings mentioned, many of the allegations and incidents described in this suit are not representative of my experiences, and some do not align with my own truth.”

Harper denied that she and Tony Vick, her husband, were involved in or aware of any abusive or unlawful behavior. In the lawsuit, Richard claimed Harper witnessed Combs abusing Ventura and was also yelled at by Combs. Richard also said Harper once confided in her that Vick was abusive to her.

In an emailed statement to Business Insider on September 17, Combs’ attorney Wolff denied the allegations.

“Mr. Combs is shocked and disappointed by this lawsuit,” Wolff said. “In an attempt to rewrite history, Dawn Richard has now manufactured a series of false claims all in the hopes of trying to get a pay day — conveniently timed to coincide with her album release and press tour.”

“If Ms. Richard had such a negative experience with ‘Making the Band’ and Danity Kane, she would not have chosen to continue working directly with Mr. Combs for Dirty Money, nor would she have returned for the ‘Making the Band’ reboot in 2020 or agreed to be featured on ‘The Love Album’ last year.”

Wolff added: “It’s unfortunate that Ms. Richard has cast their 20-year friendship aside to try and get money from him, but Mr. Combs is confidently standing on truth and looks forward to proving that in court.”

On Sept. 12, Combs’ attorneys filed an emergency motion in the Cardello-Smith case, claiming that Combs was never served the summons for his missed trial.

In the motion, seen by Business Insider, Combs’ attorneys asked the court to overturn the judgment and give them time to file a response to the complaint.

Combs’ attorneys wrote: “This is a frivolous lawsuit against a prominent businessman, based on obvious fabrications, filed by a convicted rapist and serial litigant with an overactive imagination and a thirst for fame. Defendant, who was never served with this lawsuit, learned about Plaintiff and this action for the first time three days ago, when media outlets reported that this Court had entered a $100 million default judgment against him.”

Combs’ attorneys also wrote that the statute of limitations on Cardello-Smith’s claim had expired before the case was filed.

Late on Sept. 16, Combs was arrested by federal authorities at the Park Hyatt New York Hotel in Manhattan, New York.

The next day, federal prosecutors announced on social media that Combs had been charged with racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, and transportation to engage in prostitution.

In the indictment, seen by Business Insider, federal prosecutors said: “For decades, Sean Combs abused, threatened, and coerced women and others around him to fulfill his sexual desires, protect his reputation, and conceal his conduct.”

The indictment also said Combs created a “criminal enterprise whose members and associates engaged in, and attempted to engage in, among other crimes, sex trafficking, forced labor, kidnapping, arson, bribery, and obstruction of justice.”

After Combs was arrested, Combs’ attorney Agnifilo told Business Insider via email that the arrest was “an unjust prosecution of Mr. Combs.”

“He is an imperfect person, but he is not a criminal,” Agnifilo said. “To his credit Mr. Combs has been nothing but cooperative with this investigation and he voluntarily relocated to New York last week in anticipation of these charges. Please reserve your judgment until you have all the facts. These are the acts of an innocent man with nothing to hide, and he looks forward to clearing his name in court.”

Correction: May 24, 2024 — An earlier version of this story misstated the date that Cassie Ventura spoke out. It was May 23, 2024, not May 23, 2023.