Sean Combs sues over 'Diddy: The Making of a Bad Boy' documentary. It’s a good strategy to ‘change the public narrative,’ says expert.
Combs is suing over the Peacock documentary exploring the allegations against him, but "it's very hard to win a defamation lawsuit as a celebrity," a legal expert tells Yahoo.
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There’s been a flurry of documentaries examining the Sean “Diddy” Combs allegations and the rap mogul is suing for defamation over one of them. The case will be “very hard to win,” one legal expert told Yahoo Entertainment, but a “good strategy … to change the public narrative,” said another.
Combs’s $100 million lawsuitCombs filed a $100 million defamation lawsuit against NBCUniversal, Peacock and Ample Entertainment over Diddy: The Making of a Bad Boy in New York on Feb. 12. It claims the defendants “falsely, recklessly, and maliciously” accuse Combs of “horrible crimes, including serial murder and sexual assault of minors — knowing that there is not a shred of evidence to support them."
The film premiered Jan. 14 on Peacock and featured new interviews with singer Al B. Sure, producer Rodney Jones, attorney Ariel Mitchell and others.
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Combs’s legal team said in the filing that the documentary alleged that Combs sexually assaulted minors “based entirely on a false claim by an anonymous interviewee.” Also, they claim it "maliciously" tried to tie Combs to the deaths of his friends and rivals, including his ex-girlfriend Kim Porter, rappers Christopher "Biggie" Wallace and Heavy D and music exec Andre Harrell, as well as the alleged attempted murder of Sure.
Combs’s attorney Erica Wolff told Variety in a statement that the media company behind the doc was “racing to outdo their competition for the most salacious Diddy exposé” and in doing so, “made a conscious decision to line their own pockets at the expense of truth, decency and basic standards of professional journalism.”
A representative for NBCUniversal has not yet responded to Yahoo Entertainment's request for comment.
While Combs — who maintains his innocence — has been sued left and right since his ex Cassie Ventura brought her bombshell sexual abuse lawsuit against him in Nov. 2023 and other allegations of abuse followed. Now, we’re seeing a shift in his legal team hitting back.
On Jan. 22, Combs, who’s awaiting trial on federal sex trafficking and racketeering charges, filed a $50 million defamation lawsuit against NewsNation, Combs court witness Courtney Burgess and Burgess’s attorney Mitchell. In November, Burgess, a grand jury witness in Combs’s federal case, claimed in a November Banfield interview to have flash drives with video from Combs’s alleged “freak offs,” including footage of eight other celebrities and multiple minors. Combs’s attorneys said in the lawsuit that Burgess is lying and no such tapes exist.
Combs has an ‘uphill battle’ in defamation lawsuits: Legal expert“It's very hard to win a defamation lawsuit as a celebrity because not only does the celebrity have to prove that the statement at issue was a false statement of fact and not an opinion, but they have to prove that the publication knew it was false or had a reckless disregard to its truth,” attorney Dina Doll, of Doll Amir Eley in Los Angeles, told Yahoo Entertainment.
Of Combs’s “uphill battle,” Doll said “the documentary featured statements of various people that were arguably just their opinions. Publishing an opinion doesn’t create liability under our defamation laws. In addition, as a public figure, Combs will have to prove NBCUniversal and others acted with malice which is a very difficult standard. Basically, a publisher is allowed to get things wrong and not be liable, as long as they were not reckless regarding the truth or knowingly lied.”
Attorney Jeff Lewis, of Jeff Lewis Law in L.A., said he’d be very surprised if NBCUniversal didn’t have “lawyers who fact-checked this movie in advance” to prevent this very thing from happening. Another challenge Combs faces, according to Lewis, is New York's anti-SLAPP law, which protects people from being sued for exercising their First Amendment rights. MSNBC host Rachel Maddow filed an anti-SLAPP motion when she was sued in New York by One America News Network in 2019 and she received not only a dismissal of the lawsuit but a quarter-million dollars in attorney's fees.
Diddy: The Making of a Bad Boy premiered Jan. 14. (Peacock)
Trying to take control of an out-of-control narrative could be behind Combs’s new lawsuits.
“His team obviously wants to change the national conversation from ‘Diddy is a criminal defendant facing sex charges’ to ‘Diddy is on offense filing lawsuits against anyone who accuses him of sexual misconduct,’” says Lewis.
Doll agreed that Combs “has had a lot of negative press since the criminal charges against him were brought, and especially after the video with Cassie Ventura was leaked,” showing him allegedly assaulting her at a hotel in 2016. “These new defamation lawsuits are a good strategy on his part to change the public narrative and deflect attention from his criminal case.”
Lewis said that flooding the zone, so to speak, with lawsuits filed by Combs could help with future jurors.
“Everyone in the public has heard about large quantities of baby oil,” he said. “Any jury that is seated to hear this case will have those headlines in mind.” However, they now “might also remember headlines about Diddy filing lawsuits to clear his good name.”
Celebrity defamation lawsuits dominate the newsRight now, another defamation lawsuit — Justin Baldoni versus Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds — has been frequently featured in the news. Chris Brown recently sued Warner Bros. over what he claimed was a defamatory documentary about him. And the Johnny Depp v. Amber Heard defamation case was one of the biggest headlines of 2022.
“We are seeing more defamation lawsuits brought by celebrities because it is a very effective way for them to counter any bad press,” Doll said. “There is such a thing called the ‘litigation privilege,’ which allows the parties of a lawsuit to make claims and state facts that may or may not be true, all without being sued. It has become the premier PR strategy in that it protects Diddy and his lawyers from themselves being sued for defamation because as long as they say it in a litigation filing, it has broad protection under what is called the litigation privilege.”
She continued, “Ironically, defamation lawsuits are being used to protect celebrities from themselves making potentially defamatory statements. The statements in the filings then get widely reported by the press. The press is doing the PR work for them, all protected under the litigation privilege.”
Lewis said Depp besting his ex-wife in that vicious court battle gave hope to other celebrities considering suing for defamation.
“Johnny Depp proved that a person with a very bad public reputation, given enough attorney's fees and time, can convince a jury he should win,” Lewis said. “I think many celebrities who doubted they could overcome bad press feel emboldened by the outcome of the Depp trial.”
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