After nearly two months of testimony, dozens of witnesses and mountains of evidence presented, jurors found Sean “Diddy” Combs not guilty of the three most serious charges against him and guilty of two lesser prostitution-related charges.
Moments after the verdict was read, Combs fell to his knees and prayed in court, leaning on his chair.
Jane Rosenberg
How did Combs react when the verdict was read?
“Sean Combs pumped his fist at one point when they said that first ‘not guilty.’ When the jury foreperson, that’s juror number five, was the one who was reading the verdict, he pumped his fist,” CBS News New York’s Alice Gainer said. “After the verdict was read and once everyone, the judge and the jury, left the courtroom, man, the applause was thunderous from his family.”
Jane Rosenberg
Combs’ three daughters, his sons, his mother, other family and friends, and supporters were in the courtroom Wednesday.
“They were just cheering. He was clapping. And it’s such an interesting visual, because, again, he’s by the defense table. It’s not like he can run up and hug them. He’s not a free man. He was convicted of two of the five counts,” Gainer said.
Combs’ mother gave a thumb’s up outside court.
Selcuk Acar/Anadolu via Getty Images
High interest surrounding the case
Gainer has covered numerous high-profile cases, such as the recent Harvey Weinstein retrial. But she said the Combs trial garnered a different level of interest.
“There’s just so much going on, and there’s such huge interest in this case. It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before, actually,” Gainer said. “I get asked so many questions. People on social media are so interested. They are following me now to try and see our daily updates we’ve been posting on Instagram.”
“I’ve never seen crowds of this magnitude throughout the trial — not just at openings or closings and verdict day. There’s been a steady stream of people here curious about it, like I said before, streaming about it, giving their own personal takes on what’s been going on. They had to set up multiple overflow rooms at one point just to make sure they could meet the demand. Because not everyone could get into the main courtroom, so they have these overflow rooms set up with a feed of what’s going on in the main courtroom that people can then watch themselves,” Gainer added.
The NYPD set up barricades outside court to help control crowds after the verdict was read.
