Latest / DISGRACELAND / Sean “Diddy” Combs (Pt. 1): A Nightclub Shooting, a Fatal Stampede, and the Cost of Doing Business

Transcript

Sean “Diddy” Combs (Pt. 1): A Nightclub Shooting, a Fatal Stampede, and the Cost of Doing Business · DISGRACELAND

0:00
Speaker 1: Disgraceland as a production of Double Elvis. The stories about
0:16
Speaker 1: Sean Diddy Combs are insane. He was the promoter for
0:21
Speaker 1: a charity basketball game where nine people were crushed to
0:24
Speaker 1: death during a stampede. He allegedly delivered a savage beatdown
0:29
Speaker 1: to a record executive. He fled the scene of a
0:32
Speaker 1: shooting at a Manhattan nightclub, and a lake and navigator
0:35
Speaker 1: that ran eleven red lights before it was pulled over
0:38
Speaker 1: by the NYPD. He was subsequently charged with the legal
0:42
Speaker 1: possession of a gun and bribery charges that threatened to
0:45
Speaker 1: send him to prison for fifteen years. He did all
0:49
Speaker 1: these things while simultaneously building one of the most dominant
0:53
Speaker 1: empires in hip hop, a record label, in a brand
0:56
Speaker 1: that commanded top dollar and defined the commercial apex of
1:00
Speaker 1: the genre in the mid to late nineteen nineties. And
1:03
Speaker 1: when it came to defining himself, the game changing music
1:06
Speaker 1: mogul went by many names, Puff Daddy, Puffy p Diddy. Personally,
1:13
Speaker 1: I'm partial to Diddy, so that's what I'm going to say,
1:16
Speaker 1: because Diddy made great music. Un Like that clip I
1:20
Speaker 1: played for you at the top of the show that
1:23
Speaker 1: wasn't great music. That was a preset loop for my
1:26
Speaker 1: melotron called Sockhop Bop MK two. I played you that
1:31
Speaker 1: loop because I can't afford the rights to Independent Women,
1:34
Speaker 1: Part one by Destiny's Child. And why would I play
1:38
Speaker 1: you that specific slice of I Bought It Cheese? Could
1:42
Speaker 1: I afford it? Because that was the number one song
1:46
Speaker 1: in America on January twenty ninth, two thousand and one,
1:50
Speaker 1: and that was the day that Sean Diddy Combs, one
1:53
Speaker 1: of the most powerful players in the game of hip hop,
1:56
Speaker 1: went on trial for his involvement in a nightclub shooting
1:59
Speaker 1: that left three people injured. On this episode, a stampede,
2:05
Speaker 1: a beatdown, a nightclub shooting. I bought it Cheese, and
2:09
Speaker 1: Sean Diddy Combs, I'm Jake Brennan, and this is disgraceland.
2:39
Speaker 1: Five thousand dollars a day, every day. That's what Sean
2:44
Speaker 1: Diddy Combs has to pay Sting in perpetuity forever again,
2:50
Speaker 1: every single day forever. Sean Ditty Combs has to pay
2:55
Speaker 1: Sting five thousand dollars, five thousand dollars a day, every
3:00
Speaker 1: day forever. Because in nineteen ninety seven, back when Ditty
3:04
Speaker 1: was still calling himself Puff Daddy, he used a sample
3:07
Speaker 1: of in the melody from Every Breath You Take, a
3:10
Speaker 1: song by the rock group The Police, for his own
3:13
Speaker 1: song I'll Be Missing You. Every Breath You Take is
3:16
Speaker 1: one of the biggest songs of all time, and Diddy
3:19
Speaker 1: used it without getting permission from the songwriter, which, as
3:23
Speaker 1: the Beastie Boys can tell you, is an expensive way
3:25
Speaker 1: to do business. The guy who wrote Every Breath You Take,
3:29
Speaker 1: of course, is Sting, a guy who likes to be
3:32
Speaker 1: compensated not only for the songs he writes, but for
3:34
Speaker 1: when those songs are used by other artists, which is
3:37
Speaker 1: why today and tomorrow and the day after that and
3:41
Speaker 1: the day after that Diddy wakes up, puts on his
3:44
Speaker 1: pants one leg at a time like the rest of us,
3:46
Speaker 1: and wires five K to good old Gordo or however
3:49
Speaker 1: did he sends his money? Maybe evenmos I don't know,
3:52
Speaker 1: but in all seriousness, I'm betting his management takes care
3:54
Speaker 1: of it. However, it's done five thousand dollars a day,
3:58
Speaker 1: so let's do the math. That's thirty five thousand dollars
4:00
Speaker 1: a week, one hundred and fifty thousand a month, one million,
4:04
Speaker 1: eight hundred and twenty five thousand a year, all because
4:08
Speaker 1: Diddy chose to sample first and ask questions later. Hold up,
4:13
Speaker 1: I'm being told that Diddy said he was just joking
4:15
Speaker 1: when he threw out the five thousand dollars a day
4:17
Speaker 1: number on Twitter. So let's use another number, a number
4:20
Speaker 1: that Sting threw out there during an interview a few
4:22
Speaker 1: years back with my man Charlotte Maine, the god two
4:25
Speaker 1: thousand dollars a day. That's what Sting said. It was
4:28
Speaker 1: two grand a day. There have been nine thousand, seven
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Speaker 1: hundred and fifteen days between May seventh, nineteen ninety seven,
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Speaker 1: the day of the Puff Daddy single I'll Be Missing
4:37
Speaker 1: You was released in today December twelfth, twenty twenty three.
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Speaker 1: Nine thousand, seven hundred and fifteen days. Multiply that number
4:46
Speaker 1: by two thousand dollars a day, and even by Sting's
4:49
Speaker 1: more conservative estimate, he has earned nineteen million, four hundred
4:54
Speaker 1: and thirty thousand dollars in the last twenty six years
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Speaker 1: from Ditty alone. And you know who doesn't care, did he?
5:03
Speaker 1: It's the cost of doing business, the cost to get
5:05
Speaker 1: a pay if you want to be as a boss,
5:07
Speaker 1: and as any successful boss knows, you got a bet
5:10
Speaker 1: big to win Big did He is a music producer
5:13
Speaker 1: and a rapper, but he's a businessman first, and every
5:16
Speaker 1: move he makes, pardon the pun, is calculated to make
5:19
Speaker 1: him even richer. He has drive, determination, and swag, three
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Speaker 1: things that he got from his father. A father he
5:28
Speaker 1: never knew, Melvin Combs. He was a hustler, bought kilos
5:33
Speaker 1: from original American gangster Frank Lucas and chopped him up
5:37
Speaker 1: with Willie Abraham's crew. Willy was a magnet for the Feds.
5:41
Speaker 1: Melvin kept hustling under the watchful eyes of g men.
5:44
Speaker 1: But at a certain point, you can only hustle so far,
5:47
Speaker 1: you can only go so deep. There's always a floor
5:50
Speaker 1: you hit, even in the deep end, there's always a limit.
5:53
Speaker 1: And when he reached that limit, when you hit that floor,
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Speaker 1: it can all end real quick. Melvin's floor came at
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Speaker 1: him fast, a speeding bullet, point blank, while he was
6:04
Speaker 1: sitting in a park car in Harlem. That was nineteen
6:09
Speaker 1: seventy two, didt. He was just three years old when
6:12
Speaker 1: his father was murdered, even though he barely knew him.
6:15
Speaker 1: The memory of Melvin Combs inspired Ditty to be a
6:18
Speaker 1: good son, a son who worked harder who made better choices,
6:23
Speaker 1: a son who was like his father in spirit, even
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Speaker 1: if he didn't fall into the same line of work.
6:29
Speaker 1: Diddy wasn't a hustler, at least not in the way
6:31
Speaker 1: his father would understand. He was an entrepreneur and an entertainer,
6:36
Speaker 1: but not just any entrepreneur and not just any entertainer.
6:40
Speaker 1: A music mogul like David Geffen, only bigger did. He
6:45
Speaker 1: didn't want to be Frank Lucas did. He wanted to
6:47
Speaker 1: be Frank Sinatra, the Black Sinatra. And if you're that big,
6:52
Speaker 1: you take risks comes with the territory. He take melodies
6:56
Speaker 1: and songs from guys like Sting. The risk is worth it.
7:00
Speaker 1: The proof is in the numbers, the bottom line. By
7:03
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety nine, two years after Diddy released the Sting
7:07
Speaker 1: sampling song I'll Be Missing You in memory of his
7:10
Speaker 1: musical partner in crime, the Notorious Big Ditty's label, bad
7:14
Speaker 1: Boy Records, was a juggernaut two hundred and fifty to
7:17
Speaker 1: three hundred million a year in business, depending on who
7:20
Speaker 1: you asked. Four hundred employees. Diddy's own worth was thirty
7:23
Speaker 1: five mil. He had a clothing line, a chain of restaurants,
7:27
Speaker 1: a magazine for upscale urbanites. Two Bentley's worth three hundred
7:31
Speaker 1: k each and a pat in the Hampton's. Go ask
7:34
Speaker 1: Frank Sinatra's ghost. He'll tell you two grand a day
7:37
Speaker 1: to guys like this is nothing chump change. The real
7:41
Speaker 1: money is in the risks. It's the only way you
7:44
Speaker 1: get the huge payoff. Frankie new Riss and Frankie caught
7:49
Speaker 1: heat for some of those risks. But old Blue Eyes
7:51
Speaker 1: never caught heat like this, not like Diddy. Frank Sinatra
7:56
Speaker 1: never hurtled himself into the backseat of a Lincoln Navigator
7:59
Speaker 1: around three in the morning, the sound of gunshots that
8:01
Speaker 1: had been fired inside a packed nightclub, still ringing in
8:04
Speaker 1: his ears, complete in total holy fuck panic, abject confusion,
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Speaker 1: outright terror, catching that heat like a cheap lust and
8:12
Speaker 1: burning bright above your head. December twenty seventh, nineteen ninety nine, Midtown, Manhattan.
8:21
Speaker 1: As soon as Didy was inside the suv, he slammed
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Speaker 1: his door shut and the driver mashed his foot on
8:26
Speaker 1: the gas pedal. The navigator tore down West forty third.
8:30
Speaker 1: The driver had a swerve to avoid hitting a police
8:32
Speaker 1: cruiser with its dome light flashing. Did he looked over
8:35
Speaker 1: at Jennifer Lopez sitting next to him, then to his
8:38
Speaker 1: driver and his bodyguard up front. The expressions on their
8:41
Speaker 1: faces told him this was very real, This was actually happening.
8:46
Speaker 1: The navigator jumped the curve, hugged a corner, and suddenly
8:50
Speaker 1: they were on Eighth Avenue, heading north. The tires squealed
8:53
Speaker 1: and the engine gurgled as they picked up speed, and
8:55
Speaker 1: they blew past a red light and then another, each
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Speaker 1: one of blur, just like what happened in the club
9:03
Speaker 1: was a blur. Didy Jayla sequestered well behind the velvet
9:07
Speaker 1: rope and VIP with Ditty's new protege Shine. The kid
9:11
Speaker 1: wasn't Biggie, but then again, nobody was. The music was loud,
9:15
Speaker 1: and the champagne was popping. Some guy hovering on the
9:18
Speaker 1: outskirts of VIP was running his mouth. That was nothing new.
9:22
Speaker 1: Guys were always running their mouths. This mouth running turned
9:26
Speaker 1: into an argument, though, or so it seemed. It was
9:29
Speaker 1: hard to tell at this hour, at this volume. The
9:31
Speaker 1: place was so loud he could hardly think, not that
9:34
Speaker 1: anyone was thinking, especially now when the glint of gun
9:37
Speaker 1: metal caught someone's eye and then the muzzle flash lit
9:40
Speaker 1: up the VIP corner like an M eighty in a
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Speaker 1: shoe box. The shots pierced he already deafening hum in
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Speaker 1: the room. One blast, then another, and another. They fired
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Speaker 1: off no time. The sound of screams followed in an
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Speaker 1: instant and the pulse of hysteria. Bodies pushing and shoving
9:57
Speaker 1: to make it through the eternity get stretched out in
9:59
Speaker 1: front of them and the the door, the front door.
10:02
Speaker 1: To step ahead, a few more steps, just keep moving,
10:06
Speaker 1: just push on through. That scene from the club played
10:10
Speaker 1: over and over in Diddy's head. As the Lincoln Navigator
10:13
Speaker 1: ran another red leg. Police sirens howled in the near distance.
10:17
Speaker 1: Diddy and j Lo huddled in the back seat and
10:19
Speaker 1: feared the worst. What the hell it just happened? The
10:23
Speaker 1: fuck were they going to do now? And where was Shine?
10:26
Speaker 1: The sirens were even closer now, and the road ahead
10:29
Speaker 1: was closing in on them like they were back inside
10:31
Speaker 1: the club, fighting to push themselves out but coming up short.
10:34
Speaker 1: Gasping for air, the driver pulled the navigator over to
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Speaker 1: the side of the road. It Within seconds, NYPD officers
10:42
Speaker 1: surrounded the vehicle. All four passengers rolled their windows down,
10:46
Speaker 1: and they were told to step outside. When they did,
10:49
Speaker 1: they were all first j Lo, Diddy, Diddy's driver, and
10:53
Speaker 1: Diddy's bodyguard. The cops didn't find anything, but then they
10:58
Speaker 1: searched the navigator. It was there on the floor beneath
11:01
Speaker 1: one of the seats that they found a handgun. And
11:04
Speaker 1: it was then that Diddy found the floor of his
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Speaker 1: own personal deep end. There was only one reason to
11:36
Speaker 1: play the game, to win, to be the best fuck
11:40
Speaker 1: that everyone gets a trophy. Bullshit. Games weren't played for fun.
11:45
Speaker 1: Having fun was child's play. Adults played to win. If
11:50
Speaker 1: you weren't winning, you were losing. In his business, the
11:54
Speaker 1: music business, the entertainment business was a game, and it
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Speaker 1: most certainly was then you won that game, just like
12:01
Speaker 1: Patrick Ewing or actually Derek Jeter is a better example,
12:05
Speaker 1: you worked hard, harder than everyone else playing that same game,
12:08
Speaker 1: and you never stopped. Nineteen ninety one for budding concert
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Speaker 1: promoter and A and R Man Sean Ditty Combs. There
12:15
Speaker 1: was always work to be done. There was a venue
12:18
Speaker 1: to lock down, handbills to print tickets to sell, and
12:22
Speaker 1: there were ears to bend Palm's degree security to hire.
12:25
Speaker 1: Working not to work, but working to win. That was
12:29
Speaker 1: the only reason Sean Diddy Combs was in this game
12:32
Speaker 1: to begin with. Working hard came naturally to Ditty, even
12:37
Speaker 1: back when he was just twenty one years old, calling
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Speaker 1: himself Puff Daddy, a quick study who shot up from
12:43
Speaker 1: intern to VP of A and R and Uptown Records
12:45
Speaker 1: the place you first met a rapper by the name
12:47
Speaker 1: of the Notorious Big and helped Shepard Mary J. Blige
12:50
Speaker 1: to start up, all the while working side hustles as
12:53
Speaker 1: time permitted. That hustle, that drive and determination, it was
12:58
Speaker 1: in his blood. He knew the drill. A plan was
13:01
Speaker 1: necessary to win. Whether the game was his father's game,
13:05
Speaker 1: which was drugs, or the game was Diddy's game, which
13:08
Speaker 1: was music. The strategy was the same. Come up with
13:11
Speaker 1: the plan, execute the plan, learn from any mistakes so
13:15
Speaker 1: that the next time you don't just win again, you
13:17
Speaker 1: win more. But in December of nineteen ninety one, the
13:23
Speaker 1: charity basketball game did he was helping to promote at
13:25
Speaker 1: City College in New York wasn't feeling like a win
13:29
Speaker 1: because nothing was going according to his plan. People arrived
13:34
Speaker 1: at the gymnasium in droves, thousands of them, five thousand
13:38
Speaker 1: to be exact. Problem was the venue only held twenty
13:42
Speaker 1: seven hundred. They weren't there for our guy. Did he here?
13:46
Speaker 1: Few even knew who did he was at the time.
13:49
Speaker 1: They came for the A list hip hop celebrities participating
13:52
Speaker 1: in the ballgame. Boys to Men Run, DMC, Big Daddy came.
13:57
Speaker 1: People came regardless of whether or not they'd bought tickets,
14:00
Speaker 1: and the line stretched all the way down one hundred
14:02
Speaker 1: and thirty eighth Street, People standing out in the cold.
14:05
Speaker 1: The whole situation pissed them off. Their anger grew as
14:09
Speaker 1: people began jumping the line, many of them without tickets.
14:12
Speaker 1: People holding tickets began to panic, thinking that the event
14:16
Speaker 1: had been over sold, that just because they had a
14:18
Speaker 1: ticket in their hand didn't mean that they'd be able
14:20
Speaker 1: to get in. So tensions rose, blood boiled, and the
14:24
Speaker 1: orderly line that had held together for over an hour
14:26
Speaker 1: began to fall apart. People argued, They pushed and shoved,
14:30
Speaker 1: and eventually this mass of pissed off, impatient people said
14:34
Speaker 1: fuck it stormed the building. They tore the front doors
14:37
Speaker 1: right off their hinges, a crush of human bodies into
14:40
Speaker 1: the lobby like a river pouring from a busted dam.
14:43
Speaker 1: Diddy and his co promoter heavy d of heavy d
14:46
Speaker 1: in the boys thought they had planned properly for this event.
14:50
Speaker 1: Sixty plus NYPD officers out on the sidewalk, another forty
14:54
Speaker 1: private security guards on detail inside the venue, and twenty
14:57
Speaker 1: members of the Nation of Islam known as the x
14:59
Speaker 1: Men men who were tasked with watching the lobby, the
15:02
Speaker 1: space between the outside doors and the inside doors at
15:05
Speaker 1: the bottom of a stairway that entered the gymnasium. But
15:08
Speaker 1: no number of cops or guards or x Men could
15:11
Speaker 1: make sense of the blur of bodies running for the gym.
15:15
Speaker 1: They swarmed through the lobby and then down the stairs.
15:18
Speaker 1: The doors at the bottom of the stairs that led
15:20
Speaker 1: into the gym were shut tight, and those doors only
15:23
Speaker 1: opened inward, so the crush of human bodies at the
15:25
Speaker 1: bottom of the stairs made it impossible for anyone to
15:28
Speaker 1: actually get inside the gym where the game was about
15:30
Speaker 1: to begin. Bodies squeezed up against other bodies, flesh on flesh.
15:36
Speaker 1: There was nowhere to go, no moving forward and no
15:39
Speaker 1: moving backward. People were trapped, screaming, chests compressed, unable to breathe,
15:45
Speaker 1: they gasped for air. Some fainted bodies hit the floor,
15:49
Speaker 1: trampled underfoot. By the time the crush eased up enough
15:57
Speaker 1: to allow the doors to swing open, nine people been
16:00
Speaker 1: trampled or crushed to death and another twenty nine were injured. And,
16:06
Speaker 1: with New York's collective blame being leveled on him the promoter,
16:11
Speaker 1: Diddy's burgeoning career in the entertainment business was in serious jeopardy.
16:16
Speaker 1: He didn't need the families of the victims to tell
16:18
Speaker 1: him this. He went to bed every night and woke
16:20
Speaker 1: up every morning with the City College stampede on his mind.
16:24
Speaker 1: It was something he had to deal with, a weight,
16:27
Speaker 1: a burden, a tragic mistake from which he had to learn.
16:31
Speaker 1: He also knew that whatever hardship or pain he experienced
16:34
Speaker 1: as a result of the tragedy paled in comparison to
16:37
Speaker 1: the pain that the families were continuing to go through,
16:40
Speaker 1: a pain from which there was no way out through.
16:45
Speaker 1: That was the only way out through did He may
16:52
Speaker 1: have inherited his strong work ethic from his father, but
16:55
Speaker 1: he was not Melvin Combs. He wasn't going to sit
16:58
Speaker 1: here and wait for the inevitable bullet. He was going
17:00
Speaker 1: to navigate away from failure and toward the next success.
17:04
Speaker 1: His bosses at Uptown Records didn't blame him for City College.
17:08
Speaker 1: They knew that he had planned to the best of
17:09
Speaker 1: his ability, and despite those best laid plans, shit happened.
17:14
Speaker 1: Know what concerned Uptown as the years went by was
17:17
Speaker 1: Ditty's full throttle drive. He was a threat. So in
17:21
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety three he was fired did He chocked it
17:25
Speaker 1: up as another lesson, not as a loss. He walked
17:29
Speaker 1: and took his friend, the notorious Big, with him. Biggie
17:33
Speaker 1: was all he had. He didn't even have an office.
17:36
Speaker 1: He formed bad Boy out of his mom's house in
17:38
Speaker 1: Mount Vernon, and the next year, nineteen ninety four, Bad
17:41
Speaker 1: Boy released Biggie's debut album, the executive produced by Ditty.
17:47
Speaker 1: Ready to Die had an undeniably slick commercial sound matched
17:52
Speaker 1: with raw lyrical prowess, and the combination did Gangbusters business
17:58
Speaker 1: certified gold in just two months. Overnight, the Midas touch
18:02
Speaker 1: of Ditty and bad Boy were in high demand. Diddy
18:06
Speaker 1: didn't sit back and count the green. He kept working
18:09
Speaker 1: a minimum of fourteen hours a day, some days as
18:12
Speaker 1: much as twenty hours. Bet big to win Big wasn't
18:16
Speaker 1: just about the money, It was about the hustle. Music
18:19
Speaker 1: Vet Clive Davis knew this. Clive himself was a stone
18:23
Speaker 1: cold music biz champ, who, like Diddy, made it his
18:26
Speaker 1: goal to win despite being fired by CBS Records, and
18:30
Speaker 1: who also formed his own label in the wake of
18:32
Speaker 1: that rejection. Clive's label, Arista Records, was on an upswing
18:37
Speaker 1: in the nineties, cementing a partnership with La Face Records
18:40
Speaker 1: to corner the urban music market. But Clive wanted more
18:44
Speaker 1: and even bigger win. He wanted Ditty and bad Boy,
18:48
Speaker 1: and it would cost him forty million up front. Clive
18:53
Speaker 1: didn't hesitate. Three years later, after Biggie's Life After Death
18:57
Speaker 1: Double LP, after Ditty's debut, after the huge success of
19:01
Speaker 1: I'll Be Missing You, Didty doubled down. He went to
19:05
Speaker 1: Clive and asked for another fifty million advance on future earnings.
19:09
Speaker 1: Clive paid, and Diddy went to work the next year,
19:15
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety nine, six years after he was fired from
19:18
Speaker 1: Uptown and eight years after the City College stampede deep
19:22
Speaker 1: into the holiday season, on December twenty seventh, Ditty was
19:26
Speaker 1: still working, and he was working hard. But not on
19:30
Speaker 1: concert promotion, not on music production, not on mergers and acquisitions.
19:36
Speaker 1: He was working the room holding court the VIP section
19:42
Speaker 1: of Club New York in Midtown Manhattan. As the music pounded,
19:45
Speaker 1: bodies grinded on the dance floor and Champagne flowed, j
19:49
Speaker 1: Lo on his arm, protege Shine by his side, and
19:53
Speaker 1: Benjamin's in the bank. But things were changing. The new
19:58
Speaker 1: Millennium was on the horizon, the notorious Big was dead,
20:02
Speaker 1: and Ditty was a cheeseball hack. At least that's what
20:06
Speaker 1: people were saying. His second solo album, Forever, did well
20:09
Speaker 1: on the charts, but laid bare the fact that Ditty's
20:12
Speaker 1: strengths weren't the same strengths possessed by his close confidant,
20:15
Speaker 1: Biggie Small's Rest in peace. Diddy read all about it,
20:19
Speaker 1: and heard all about it too, in the papers, the press,
20:22
Speaker 1: and out in the streets, in the club, all the
20:25
Speaker 1: love and all the hate, all the accolades and all
20:29
Speaker 1: the trash talk. Even here in a space that should
20:32
Speaker 1: have been safe, a space cordoned off for winners only,
20:36
Speaker 1: it was like Big said, man Mo money mo problems,
20:40
Speaker 1: problems like this fucking guy over here picking a fight
20:43
Speaker 1: just because Ditty was Ditty. Why Because Diddy worked, because
20:47
Speaker 1: he made money, because he was a quote cheeseball hack.
20:50
Speaker 1: It was all confusing, so was what happened next. The
20:54
Speaker 1: guns coming out, the shots ringing loud, one woman screaming.
20:57
Speaker 1: His blood spurted from her nose. The smoke from a
21:00
Speaker 1: nine millimeter spiraled into the air and caught the light
21:03
Speaker 1: of a strobe. There was no time to think, only
21:06
Speaker 1: time to react, to move to work, and right now
21:10
Speaker 1: working meant heading for the nearest exit and praying to
21:13
Speaker 1: God that whatever just happened, it was a simple mistake
21:16
Speaker 1: that could be explained and overcome. On this long and
21:20
Speaker 1: bumpy road to victory, We'll be right back after this word,
21:28
Speaker 1: word word. The line of hopeful spectators standing outside the
21:39
Speaker 1: State Supreme Court in Manhattan wasn't moving. Rubberneckers eager to
21:44
Speaker 1: snag one of the few remaining seats in the courtroom's
21:47
Speaker 1: gallery were beginning to realize that they had little chance
21:50
Speaker 1: of that happening. Inside. The courtroom was packed with people,
21:55
Speaker 1: all them focused on one man straight ahead. Did he
21:59
Speaker 1: shifted uncomfortably in his seat at the defense's desk, nerves
22:02
Speaker 1: at ten, but otherwise dressed to the nines, custom suit,
22:07
Speaker 1: necktie and cuff links as slick and shiny as one
22:09
Speaker 1: of his signature chark topping beats. The charges before him
22:14
Speaker 1: were serious, four counts of a legal possession of a gun,
22:18
Speaker 1: one count of bribery. The consequences for those charges were
22:21
Speaker 1: equally dire. Fifteen years in prison, fifteen years in which
22:26
Speaker 1: he couldn't do the thing he lived to do. Work.
22:29
Speaker 1: Not working meant not making things, and not making things
22:33
Speaker 1: meant not delivering things. And not delivering things meant that
22:36
Speaker 1: Ditty would be in breach of bad Boy's contract with Arista,
22:40
Speaker 1: and then everything would fall apart for real, and fall
22:43
Speaker 1: apart for good. Guys like Clive Davis would shake their
22:47
Speaker 1: heads and keep on winning. Sean Ditty Combs would lose,
22:53
Speaker 1: that is, if the jury found him guilty. There were
22:59
Speaker 1: sixty witnesses in total at Ditty's trial for his involvement
23:02
Speaker 1: in the December nineteen ninety nine shooting at Club New York.
23:05
Speaker 1: Many of them said they'd seen the same thing, a
23:08
Speaker 1: fight between a man and members of Ditty's entourage. Insults
23:12
Speaker 1: were traded, a wad of cash was tossed to Ditty's
23:14
Speaker 1: face as a sign of disrespect, then the gunshots went off.
23:19
Speaker 1: Three witnesses said they saw Ditty at the club with
23:22
Speaker 1: a gun that evening. Some, including the woman who was
23:25
Speaker 1: shot in the nose, said that Ditty and Shine were
23:27
Speaker 1: the ones who fired the weapons. The handgun that the
23:30
Speaker 1: NYPD found underneath the seat of the Lincoln Navigator, the
23:33
Speaker 1: car that ran eleven red lights as it carried j
23:36
Speaker 1: Lo Ditty, Diddy's bodyguard, and Ditty's driver away from the scene.
23:40
Speaker 1: That car that they found that gun in. That gun
23:44
Speaker 1: wasn't used in the shooting, but it wasn't a good look.
23:48
Speaker 1: Neither was the other handgun the cops found in the
23:50
Speaker 1: middle of a Manhattan street. Old fashioned police work had
23:54
Speaker 1: sussed that one out. Someone had tossed it from the
23:56
Speaker 1: navigator's window as it made its getaway. To the prosecution,
24:01
Speaker 1: where there was smoke, there was fire, or rather where
24:04
Speaker 1: there was a discarded handgun on the escape route Ditty's
24:07
Speaker 1: navigator took. There was probable cause. And then there was
24:12
Speaker 1: the case of Ditty's driver. He testified that he watched
24:15
Speaker 1: Ditty stick a gun in his waistband as they entered
24:17
Speaker 1: the club that night. According to the prosecution, soon after
24:21
Speaker 1: they were taken into police custody, Diddy asked his driver
24:24
Speaker 1: to take the fall for the gun and found in
24:26
Speaker 1: the Navigator in exchange for fifty grand in a diamond ring.
24:31
Speaker 1: Did He denied at all the weapon, the guilt, the bribery,
24:36
Speaker 1: He said, and I quote, I do not own a gun.
24:39
Speaker 1: I do not carry a gun. And it was true.
24:42
Speaker 1: There was no hard evidence to put a gun in
24:44
Speaker 1: his hand that evening. He just had a stick to
24:47
Speaker 1: his story, not just the story of what happened that night,
24:50
Speaker 1: but the story of his life, the story of a mogul,
24:53
Speaker 1: of a man who was David Geffen, and then some
24:57
Speaker 1: the story of the black Frank Sinatra, guilty by association only,
25:02
Speaker 1: the story of a hit maker, an era definer, an
25:05
Speaker 1: empire builder, the story of a winner. Didty was convinced
25:12
Speaker 1: that he would be vindicated. But even so, even if
25:15
Speaker 1: he did beat the charges, he wouldn't be able to
25:17
Speaker 1: put this whole thing behind him, not right away anyway,
25:21
Speaker 1: Just like the City College stampede still wasn't behind him.
25:24
Speaker 1: That tragedy continued to haunt him, not only in his
25:27
Speaker 1: mind but in the court system, where a judge had
25:30
Speaker 1: recently ruled that he was in fact responsible for the events.
25:33
Speaker 1: In December nineteen ninety one, that led to the death
25:36
Speaker 1: of nine people, and the families of those victims had
25:39
Speaker 1: named Ditty in multiple ongoing lawsuits, just like he was
25:43
Speaker 1: now being named in one point four billion dollars worth
25:47
Speaker 1: of civil lawsuits filed by the victims of the City,
25:50
Speaker 1: New York night club shooting. But Ditty had confidence, He
25:54
Speaker 1: had swag. He knew this was only a test, a
25:58
Speaker 1: test of his resilience, cost of doing business. He would
26:02
Speaker 1: emerge victorious, not because he could see into the future,
26:06
Speaker 1: because he'd done this before. April fifteenth, nineteen ninety nine,
26:13
Speaker 1: Manhattan Interscope Records executive Steve Stout was rattled. He just
26:19
Speaker 1: hung up the phone in his office on the sixth floor,
26:21
Speaker 1: or rather, the caller on the other end of the
26:23
Speaker 1: line hung up first. That caller was Diddy, and Ditty
26:28
Speaker 1: was pissed. Diddy was pissed before Stouting and answered he
26:31
Speaker 1: had a bone to pick with the Interscope exec He
26:34
Speaker 1: called while the music video for NAS's new single Hate
26:37
Speaker 1: Me Now was playing live on MTV for the first time,
26:40
Speaker 1: a video in which Diddy appeared crucified on a cross
26:43
Speaker 1: a crowd of Thorton's on his head after shooting the
26:48
Speaker 1: video and before its world premiere on television, Diddy had
26:51
Speaker 1: a change of heart. He felt the crucifixion scene was
26:54
Speaker 1: disrespectful and sacrilegious. Yeah, you think Diddy was one of
26:59
Speaker 1: the richest, most powerful music men in the world. True,
27:02
Speaker 1: but comparing himself to the son of God was going
27:04
Speaker 1: a little too far, even for him. He asked Stout,
27:08
Speaker 1: not only president of Black Music at Interscope, but also
27:10
Speaker 1: NAS's manager, to cut the offending scene out of the
27:13
Speaker 1: video before it was beamed into the houses of millions
27:16
Speaker 1: of Americans. Interscope, on the other hand, had spent an
27:20
Speaker 1: additional fourteen thousand dollars just to put Ditty in the
27:23
Speaker 1: video in the first place. At this point, his personal
27:26
Speaker 1: convictions were beside the point. The video had been signed, sealed,
27:29
Speaker 1: and delivered. Plus, this was the music business. Controversy was
27:33
Speaker 1: part and parcel of the whole operation. So the cut
27:36
Speaker 1: never happened. And when the video aired on MTV, which
27:39
Speaker 1: in nineteen ninety nine was the unchallenged arbiter for all
27:42
Speaker 1: that was cool and commercially viable in music, Diddy, along
27:46
Speaker 1: with the rest of the country, watched himself strike at
27:49
Speaker 1: Jesus Christ pose like a real fucking herb. He couldn't
27:52
Speaker 1: believe it. What in the actual fuck? What in the
27:59
Speaker 1: actual fuck? A question that may have been bouncing around
28:01
Speaker 1: Steve Stout's head after Ditty's phone call, he was still
28:05
Speaker 1: processing the whole thing when his phone rang again. This
28:08
Speaker 1: time there was someone, a bad boy. They told Stout
28:11
Speaker 1: to get ready. Diddy was on his way over, and
28:14
Speaker 1: he was pissed, according to Stout. Minutes later, the door
28:20
Speaker 1: to his office flew open. Diddy allegedly walked in, posseing
28:24
Speaker 1: it toe. He didn't say a word, He just went
28:27
Speaker 1: straight up to where Stout was sitting at his desk
28:29
Speaker 1: and decked the interscope exec in the face. Did He
28:33
Speaker 1: then grabbed Stout's off his phone and proceeded to beat
28:35
Speaker 1: Stout with it over and over, each smash hit, driving
28:39
Speaker 1: Stout closer and closer to the ground until he was
28:42
Speaker 1: cowering on the floor, balled up in the fetal position,
28:45
Speaker 1: knees pulled to his stomach, his hands over his head.
28:48
Speaker 1: One of the guys did he brought with him, picked
28:50
Speaker 1: up a chair and slammed it down on Stout's battered body.
28:54
Speaker 1: Another kicked him over and over, and then it stopped
28:58
Speaker 1: Stout could taste the blood out in his mouth, his
29:01
Speaker 1: jaw on his head pounded with pain. He couldn't move
29:04
Speaker 1: his arm. He opened his eyes from down on the
29:06
Speaker 1: floor and watched as Ditty flipped over his desk. Rallied
29:09
Speaker 1: his crew and left The details of the alleged beatdown
29:15
Speaker 1: of Interscope executive Steve Stout by Sean Ditty combs come
29:18
Speaker 1: from Steve Stout. Though Ditty turned himself in the next day,
29:22
Speaker 1: and though there was a security camera with footage of
29:25
Speaker 1: Ditty and his crew entering Interscope six floor offices, sources
29:29
Speaker 1: close to him denied the attack ever happened. Ditty has
29:32
Speaker 1: never gone into details about what happened, but he later
29:35
Speaker 1: admitted that he apologized to Stout, saying quote, I basically
29:38
Speaker 1: just played myself. I let my emotions get the best
29:41
Speaker 1: of me, and I just made a mistake. One reason
29:45
Speaker 1: Ditty didn't go into details is because just a few
29:47
Speaker 1: months later, he and Stout came to a gentleman's agreement
29:51
Speaker 1: in the ordeal which put five hundred thousand dollars in
29:54
Speaker 1: Stout's pocket. For his role, Didty was sentenced to anger
29:58
Speaker 1: management class for one day. One day a slap on
30:02
Speaker 1: the wrist, a minor loss, but in the eyes of
30:05
Speaker 1: a winner, it wasn't a loss at all. It was
30:08
Speaker 1: actually a win. It was all part of the game,
30:11
Speaker 1: a game of risks. Did. He was nothing if not
30:14
Speaker 1: a successful boss. And as any good boss will tell you,
30:18
Speaker 1: that Big win Big. March sixteenth, two thousand and one, six' ten.
30:43
Speaker 1: Pm the judge asked the defendant to. Rise Did he
30:48
Speaker 1: stood up, straight his wrinkled suit telegraphing the wrong message
30:53
Speaker 1: that he was nervous and that he was, defeated which
30:56
Speaker 1: was far from the. Truth he had faith in. Himself
31:01
Speaker 1: he had confidence in his ability to perform in this,
31:04
Speaker 1: game the game of, business the game of. Life from
31:08
Speaker 1: an early, age he had been determined to change that,
31:11
Speaker 1: game first with his good Friend Christopher wallace aka The Notorious,
31:15
Speaker 1: big and then with his label in his own solo,
31:18
Speaker 1: career his so called, family a collective of producers and
31:22
Speaker 1: mcs and singers who put their stamp on mid to
31:25
Speaker 1: late nineties hip hop and popular, culture a stamp that
31:28
Speaker 1: left its mark on superstars From mariah To, Aretha Busta
31:32
Speaker 1: rhymes and LL coolj and J lo And. Mace he
31:35
Speaker 1: had the drive the determination and the swag of his,
31:38
Speaker 1: Father Melvin, combs a man, who despite being murdered When
31:42
Speaker 1: ditty was only, three taught his son lessons about the deep,
31:45
Speaker 1: end about the, floor lessons about one, story how you
31:49
Speaker 1: tell it and how you stick to. It and, so
31:55
Speaker 1: after a long seven weeks on, trial did he stood
31:58
Speaker 1: in front of the judge in a jury of his
31:59
Speaker 1: peer is not with, fear but with, confidence with the
32:02
Speaker 1: kind of faith that only an ingenious game player and
32:05
Speaker 1: a true game changer can. Possess and with that confidence
32:09
Speaker 1: he received the jury's. Verdict the foreman spoke not, guilty
32:16
Speaker 1: not guilty of all four counts of a legal possession
32:19
Speaker 1: of a, gun not guilty of one count of. Bribery
32:23
Speaker 1: But ditty's, Protege, shine would not be so. Lucky on
32:27
Speaker 1: the same, day he was found guilty of, assault reckless,
32:30
Speaker 1: endangerment and criminal possession of an illegal. Weapon he was
32:34
Speaker 1: sentenced to ten years in. Prison In june twenty, eleven
32:39
Speaker 1: a full decade after he was acquitted of all, charges
32:42
Speaker 1: did he settled the civil lawsuit with the three victims
32:45
Speaker 1: from The Club New york. Shooting according To The New York,
32:48
Speaker 1: post which interviewed the nightclub's. Owner the woman who was
32:51
Speaker 1: shot in the face received one point eight million, dollars
32:54
Speaker 1: and the other two victims received five hundred thousand dollars
32:57
Speaker 1: and fifty, thousand. Respectively if those numbers are, accurate that's two,
33:01
Speaker 1: million three hundred and fifty thousand. Dollars that's more than
33:05
Speaker 1: did he pay to Interscope Steve, stout and though actual
33:09
Speaker 1: numbers are not, known likely more than he paid for
33:12
Speaker 1: his responsibility in The City college stampede back in nineteen ninety.
33:15
Speaker 1: One but all those numbers pale in comparison to the
33:19
Speaker 1: reported two thousand dollars a day he continues to dole
33:22
Speaker 1: out To sting for using every breath you take without.
33:25
Speaker 1: Permission the nineteen, million four hundred and thirty thousand dollars
33:29
Speaker 1: he has invested in that sample to this. Date these
33:34
Speaker 1: payouts are all drops in the proverbial. Bucket the real,
33:38
Speaker 1: money As David geffen Or Frank sinatra Or diddy will tell,
33:42
Speaker 1: you is in the. Risks it's the only way you
33:45
Speaker 1: get the huge, payoff the only thing separating you from
33:50
Speaker 1: being a winner and from being a total. Disgrace I'm Jake,
33:56
Speaker 1: brennan and this Is. Disgraceland disgraceland was created By Yours
34:13
Speaker 1: truly and is produced in partnership With Double. Elvis credits
34:16
Speaker 1: for this episode can be found on the show notes
34:18
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34:22
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