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On Friday morning, as the federal government approached the end line of its case in opposition to Sean “Diddy” Combs, a federal prosecutor introduced to the courtroom that the federal government was calling Brendan Paul to the stand.
Paul was, for a couple of yr and a half main as much as the hip-hop mogul’s downfall, one among Combs’s a number of private assistants. It was his third day in courtroom after a collection of delays earlier within the week—a particular agent’s testimony went longer than anticipated, a juror known as in sick with vertigo—and he confirmed up on every in a tightly cropped go well with, a completely buttoned shirt with no tie, and Y2K-era wraparound sun shades. Paul was arrested in March 2024 on the Miami-Opa Locka Executive Airport for cocaine possession whereas there with Combs, the identical day that federal brokers raided Combs’s Miami and Los Angeles residences.
When he lastly spoke in courtroom, he appeared comfy and unhurried.
“My charges have been dropped,” Paul advised the jury, “because I have a really good lawyer.”
A couple of months earlier than Paul’s arrest, Casandra “Cassie” Ventura had sued Combs for sexual and bodily abuse, setting into movement a wave of additional civil fits and a federal indictment on racketeering and intercourse trafficking prices. (Ventura and Combs shortly settled; Combs had denied wrongdoing in reference to the extra fits and pleaded not responsible in his prison case.) With intrigue round Combs’s authorized troubles peaking, and Paul’s mugshot showing on TMZ, the 26-year outdated music producer shortly grew to become a minor however absorbing participant within the total saga. The little that was recognized of him got here primarily from his days as a walk-on school basketball participant. At Syracuse University, he roomed together with his former prep college teammate Buddy Boeheim, the son of the basketball workforce’s long-tenured coach Jim. There, he advised The Athletic in 2020, he was among the many two greatest dressed gamers on the workforce: “For us, it’s the way you put it together.” In press protection surrounding his arrest, Paul was sometimes described as Combs’s “drug mule,” together with his identify showing in an identical capability in three of the civil fits filed in opposition to Combs. (Paul was not named as a defendant in these fits and has denied wrongdoing in reference to them.)
Paul’s drug prices have been dismissed after he accomplished a pretrial diversion program, and he testified at Combs’s trial after he was subpoenaed and granted immunity. He volunteered on Friday that he had been carrying the cocaine in a Goyard bag; he stated that it belonged to Combs and that he had discovered it after sweeping Combs’s room, forgetting that he was carrying it.
After Paul graduated from school in 2022, he testified, he moved again to his hometown of Cleveland, the place he and his father constructed a music studio within the basement of his dad and mom’ residence. An affiliate made him conscious of the chance to work as Combs’s assistant, providing some recommendation: “If you have a girlfriend, break up with her.” He was advised he wouldn’t see his household, such have been the calls for of the function, and that his purpose needs to be to “get in, get out” after amassing a Rolodex from the adjacency to Combs.
Given Paul’s background in music and sports activities, his duties included plans for the discharge of Combs’s 2023 album and exercise and meal regimens. He was additionally tasked, he testified, with rolling joints in Combs’s Los Angeles storage and acquiring weed, cocaine, ketamine, and tusi for Combs that his boss would carry in a Gucci pouch. At a Coachella afterparty, Paul stated, Combs requested him to check some tusi for him to make sure that it was good. He stated he did so out of loyalty—the identical cause, he stated, that he didn’t inform regulation enforcement whom the cocaine actually belonged to when he was arrested. Combs, Paul stated, “used to say he wants us to move like SEAL Team Six.”