WARNING: This article may affect those who have experienced sexual violence or know someone affected by it.
Sean (Diddy) Combs presided over a sordid empire of sexual crimes, coercing and abusing women for years while using blackmail and shocking acts of violence to keep his victims in line, according to an indictment unsealed Tuesday which accuses the music mogul of U.S. federal sex trafficking and racketeering charges.
Combs “engaged in a persistent and pervasive pattern of abuse toward women and other individuals,” according to the indictment.
He is accused of inducing female victims and male sex workers into drugged-up, sometimes days-long sexual performances dubbed “Freak Offs.” It also refers obliquely to an attack on his former girlfriend, the R&B singer Cassie, that was captured on video.
Combs was arrested late Monday in Manhattan, roughly six months after federal authorities conducting a sex trafficking investigation raided his luxury homes in Los …