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The male prisoner suing Diddy over an alleged 1997 sexual assault inside a Holiday Inn introduced an alleged witness in court, In Touch can exclusively report.
Derrick Lee Cardello-Smith, who is currently locked up in a Michigan facility, submitted an affidavit of fellow prisoner Dephonso Wilson.
In his affidavit, Dephonso claimed that he had knowledge relevant to Derrick’s lawsuit against Diddy, 54.
Dephonso he was used by Michigan police for nefarious things when he was 17.
“What was good about it was that I met a lot of people, like Sean Combs,” he claimed. In his affidavit, Dephonso claimed to have witnessed a meeting between Diddy and Derrick following the alleged assault.
He claimed a government official was present. Dephonso alleged the government official threatened Derrick to keep quiet about the incident.
“I was scared about all this because this is Sean Combs and he had a lot of power … So I stayed quiet. Then I saw Combs got arrested and I also saw that Derrick had sued him and so, I am coming forward now,” he wrote.
Dephonso said he will testify that he witnessed a government official cover up Diddy’s alleged crime.
“I will testify to these facts if you want me to because they happened,” he wrote.
Diddy’s lawyer, Erica A. Wolff, tells In Touch, “The allegations in this new filing, like the claims in this lawsuit, are ridiculous and totally false. The notion that some twenty-seven years after the alleged events at issue and after a court already found his claims ‘unlikely . . .[to] succeed on the merits,’ Mr. Cardello-Smith just located a key witness who just so happens to be incarcerated in the very same correctional facility in which Mr. Cardello-Smith resides is, to put it charitably, as implausible on its face as Mr. Cardello-Smith’s allegation that Sean Combs promised to give Mr. Cardello-Smith forty-nine percent of Mr. Combs’ assets in exchange for $150,000.”
Diddy’s lawyer claimed Derrick had a history of “filing utterly meritless” lawsuits.
The lawyer ended, “We are confident that the court will grant our pending motion to dismiss because Cardello-Smith’s Complaint is absolutely meritless.”
As In Touch previously reported, Derrick claims he met Diddy while working as a bartender in Detroit in 1997. He claimed the entertainer invited him to a sex party at a hotel.
The man said at the party Diddy sexually assaulted him. He said that Diddy gave him a drink at the party and told him he had “added a little something” to it for him. Derrick claimed he fell asleep and woke up to Diddy having sex with a woman. He claimed Diddy told him, “I did this to you too!”
In his lawsuit, Derrick accused government officials of covering up Diddy’s alleged crimes.
Derrick demanded $400 million in monetary, punitive and compensatory damages. Diddy has denied all allegations of wrongdoing.
His lawyer previously told TMZ after the lawsuit was filed, “This man is a convicted felon and sexual predator who has been sentenced on 14 counts of sexual assault and kidnapping over the last 26 years. His resume now includes committing a fraud on the court from prison, as Mr. Combs has never heard of him let alone been served with any lawsuit.”
In court, Diddy’s lawyer argued accused Derrick of “baselessly” accusing the mogul of sexual assault. Diddy’s legal team claimed Derrick made up a “fantastical set of allegations that numerous high-ranking [government] officials engaged in a vast cover-up with [Diddy].” Further, they pointed out that “incredibly, in two different complaints filed in two different courts, [Derrick] alleges that this purported assault occurred in two different counties on the same day.”
Diddy’s team demanded the suit be tossed due to the claims being brought past the statute of limitations.
“Because the assault allegedly occurred in June 1997, any claim [Derrick] might have had expired in June 2000—more than two decades before [Derrick] commenced this litigation,” Diddy’s lawyer argued.
Earlier this month, Diddy was hit with several lawsuits over alleged assaults, including one that accused him of threatening to kill a 19-year-old after an assault inside a New York hotel room.
Diddy’s rep released a statement after the new lawsuits were filed. They said, “Mr. Combs and his legal team have full confidence in the facts, their legal defenses, and the integrity of the judicial process. In court, the truth will prevail: that Mr. Combs has never sexually assaulted anyone—adult or minor, man or woman.”
As In Touch previously reported, Diddy has remained behind bars since he was arrested on September 16 on charges of sex trafficking and racketeering.
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