Disgraced rapper Sean “Diddy” Combs is plotting a major career comeback following his not guilty verdict last month, according to his attorneys.
“He’s going to be back at Madison Square Garden,” his lead attorney, Marc Agnifilo, told CBS News’ Jericka Duncan in his first network interview since Combs’ highly publicized trial in New York.
Duncan asked the attorney whether the mogul had discussed a return to music, despite facing a jail term of 20 years.
“Honestly, he has not. But one thing he said was that he was going to be back in Madison Square Garden. He said, ‘I’m going to be back in Madison Square Garden.’”
“Doing what?” Duncan asks.
Agnifilo responds, “I guess being on stage, and I said, ‘I’ll be there.’”
A grand jury acquitted Combs of the two most serious charges against him, sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy, last month, which surrounded allegations that he coerced two long-term girlfriends into drug-fueled “freak-offs” with hired male escorts.
However, Combs was found guilty of two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution, a lesser charge that carries a maximum of 10 years in prison for each conviction.
Despite facing jail, Agnifilo said the singer was determined to reinstate himself in society and reclaim his musical empire.
“He wants people to know that he has reflected on the blessings that he’s been given, the imperfections that I think he sees in himself. I think he wants to get out of jail and reestablish a loving present relationship with all of his seven children. He wants to take care of his mother.”
When talking about his return to music, he said, “I think he is someone who is always going to strive to do something exceptional and probably demanding and challenging.”
Agnifilo stressed that Comb’s main priorities now were to be reunited with his children and his mother.
In a separate interview, Nicole Westmoreland, another attorney working for Combs’ defense team, told CNN that “conversations” had taken place with Trump officials about the possibility of clemency.
“It’s my understanding that we’ve reached out and had conversations in reference to a pardon,” Westmoreland told CNN.
When asked previously, the president seemed to consider that a pardon for Combs may be possible, though recent remarks suggested otherwise.
“He was essentially sort of half-innocent, I don’t know what, he’s still in jail or something,” President Trump said when asked about the Combs last week.
“He’s celebrating a victory, but I guess it wasn’t as good a victory. Probably, ugh, you know, I was very friendly with him, I got along with him – great. He seemed like a nice guy. I didn’t know him well.”
“But when I ran for office, he was very hostile.”
Trump said that Combs’s comments at the time had “clouded his judgment” and made the decision more difficult to make.
The Independent approached the White House for comment on the matter.
