'Studio sex' and 'hitman threats': Insiders speak out about Diddy's 90s music empire

Former music executive Daniel Evans recalled that in 1997, Sean "Diddy" Combs, then known as Puff Daddy, threatened a colleague in the New York office of his Grammy-winning music company, Bad Boy Records. "I have so much money now I can hire somebody to kill you and nobody will know. Nobody's going to miss you. Nobody is going to know anything."

Evans stated that Combs was often "volatile," but power was changing him. Just days before, the hip-hop mogul received his biggest reward to date—$6 million—in recognition of the record label's success, which boasted platinum-selling artists like The Notorious B.I.G. That year, Combs' music career reached its peak, and his empire soon expanded into fashion, alcohol, and even his own television network.

Nearly three decades later, Combs' legacy lies in ruins. He is embroiled in legal battles, awaiting trial for sex trafficking and racketeering, while also facing dozens of lawsuits alleging that he drugged and assaulted individuals at lavish parties, upscale hotels, and record label studios. He denies all allegations. The BBC interviewed more than 20 people who worked with Combs at Bad Boy Records, including former executives, assistants, and producers, who described for the first time the disturbing events they witnessed during the company's rise in the 1990s.

Some executives stated that they had seen Combs engaging in sexual acts with women in the studio, including one instance where an employee said the young woman appeared unresponsive when he walked in. Another employee complained that Combs asked her to get him condoms. The BBC also learned that company funds were used to fly women from across the United States for sexual encounters at the request of artists and other employees. "Over time, the behavior became more egregious, and this behavior dates back to the '90s," said Toni Buzbee, an American lawyer representing dozens of alleged victims, including one who claims Combs threatened to kill her in similar terms to the incident Evans witnessed. His client alleges that Combs raped her on a bathroom floor at a promotional party for the record label's biggest star, The Notorious B.I.G., in 1995. In her lawsuit, she said that afterwards, Combs told her not to tell anyone or "you'll disappear."

Combs' legal team accused Buzbee in a statement of being "more interested in media attention than the truth" and stated that the hip-hop star "has never sexually assaulted or trafficked anyone." The 55-year-old said they had not been provided with sufficient details about the BBC's allegations to provide facts that could "refute these fabricated claims." "As we have said before, Mr. Combs is not going to dignify every publicity stunt or transparently ridiculous claim with a response. He is confident that the truth will prevail in the judicial process: these are allegations pure fiction," they said.

Sean Combs was a bold go-getter who became a millionaire overnight when he founded Bad Boy Records in 1993, home to a roster of top-tier artists. This was Combs' first entrepreneurial venture, after he had already made a name for himself as a talent director at another music company, Uptown Records, at the young age of 19. Former Uptown Records colleague Jimmy Maynes recalled, "He said he wanted to be one of the biggest artists in the world, whether I believed him or not." Maynes remembered Combs having a short temper in the office, sometimes "slamming his hands on the table" and yelling like a "spoiled kid" if he didn't get what he wanted. Combs was eventually fired from Uptown and founded Bad Boy Records at the age of 23.

Daniel Evans stated, "He was the hardest-working person I'd ever met, always wanting people to get to his level of energy." Evans was a senior executive who managed Bad Boy's recording budget and artist contracts from 1994 to 1997. Combs described himself as "The Great Gatsby" and quickly became known for hosting coveted celebrity parties at New York nightclubs, on the beaches of Cancun, Mexico, and later at the infamous Hamptons "White Party" (named for its all-white dress code). Evans said that even President Donald Trump attended the events in the 90s, and he once saw Trump sitting on Combs' golden throne at his 30th birthday party, exclaiming: "I'm the real King of New York!" Daniel Evans, who was in charge of managing the record label's budget, said that funds were used to fly women in for sexual encounters.

Evans recalled, "We were all young then. I was 24 years old," he was one of the record label's original employees. "People wanted to party, have fun, hook up, and create great memories." But looking back, Evans said he was disturbed by some of what he witnessed regarding his boss's behavior and the company culture. Around 1995, he said he walked in on Combs having sex with a young woman at Daddy's House, Bad Boy's New York recording studio near Times Square. "I was getting ready to go home for the night and was looking for my coat. I opened the door and he was having sex with this girl," Evans said, who assumed the studio was empty because it was quiet. Combs cursed and yelled at him to leave. "I thought I was going to get fired," he said.

Evans remembers that the young woman had been brought to the studio by a party promoter, a friend of Combs, possibly for a visit. He said his boss seemed sober, while she was quiet and didn't talk much, and he wondered if she was on drugs or just shy. He said it didn't seem strange at the time. But recalling that the woman didn't react when he entered the room, he said, "Knowing what I know now, people have a lot of speculation about what state she was in at the time... Usually both parties are very active in the sexual act."

A-list stars attended Combs' lavish "White Parties," which had a monochrome dress code, but lawsuits allege that the parties had a dark side. Felicia Newsome, who worked as the manager of Daddy's House recording studio from 1994 to 2000, said that misconduct was rampant throughout the music industry at the time. "It wasn't normal if someone reported it, but it wasn't not normal for it to happen," she said. Newsome said that one employee once called her to the studio in the middle of the night because Combs was in his underwear and about to have sex with a model and another woman. She recalled that he asked the staff to get him condoms. "I told Puffy, never let anyone here get condoms," Newsome said, who said they were getting redressed when she arrived. "He replied: 'I don't need stuff like that, Mom,' and never did it again."

Newsome, who was in her 30s at the time, said she felt that Combs was reasonable and that he changed his behavior when she challenged him. Once, when the studio first opened in 1995, she said Combs was unhappy with the appearance of the countertops and called her a "bitch" in front of the staff. She said she demanded a public apology and temporarily closed the studio, asking him: "How do you expect me to treat women if I bring them into this 24-hour space?" She said that Combs responded that he wanted it to be an inclusive and safe environment. But Newsome managed the studio with an "iron fist," and she said other employees were less willing to call out Combs. "Bad Boy Records was a madhouse, with a lot of young people wanting to touch the king's robe," she said.

Former employees said the record label was run by executives in their twenties and a large number of interns, some of whom were school-age children. They said that sexual relationships between employees and interns were common. Evans remembered an unpleasant incident with a 14-year-old girl on his own team who he said made advances toward him. "She said to me, you work really hard. If you want to relax, you and I should hang out... but not tonight, I have a curfew." One of the lawsuits included a photo that showed Combs with a 17-year-old girl in his studio who claims he raped her. Evans said he sent her home and called her the next day to tell her not to come back to work. He didn't report her, but she returned to work in the mailroom two weeks later.

The former executive said that Combs' record label artists and other employees would also sometimes request that women be flown to the studio for sexual encounters. "If they had any specialties [sexually], they would get flown in," Evans said, who told the BBC he knew because he controlled the budget. He said that the money for the flights would be set aside and recorded under travel expenses. "It could be like thousands of dollars," Evans said. "I don't think it happened all the time, but it was definitely a recording expense." Evans said that Combs' own requests were managed by his personal assistants. One assistant told the BBC that Combs would often ask them to fly in women he was "messing with" and put them up in hotels, although the assistant said they were not sex workers.

Two former employees said that in the 2000s, Daddy's House recording studio further transformed into a "sex, drugs, and rock and roll" culture. Combs would often bring "random women" there to party, arriving with a group consisting of "three white Jeeps with white rims and white leather seats." According to one former executive, other artists would request suitcases full of Ciroc vodka, and someone even brought a monkey to a session. The studio is one of the locations where women later accused Combs of drugging and raping them. Model Crystal McKinney alleges that the mogul plied her with alcohol and marijuana before sexually assaulting her there in 2003. In the same year, one woman claimed that Combs and two associates gang-raped her at the studio when she was 17. Combs' lawyers said he "looks forward to proving his innocence" and added that McKinney's claims were "baseless."

Combs' homes—including this one in Miami—were searched last year as part of a sex trafficking investigation. Many former employees say they still find it difficult to reconcile the allegations with the person they knew. Jeffrey Walker, a member of Bad Boy's original production team and a close friend of Combs, said: "These allegations came as a surprise to me, and I believe many people in our circle were also surprised. I've been to white parties and, of course, to the studio, and I didn't personally see any of the things he's being accused of happening."

Evans was also skeptical of some of the claims until he saw the video of Cassie Ventura (Combs' former partner and a former Bad Boy artist) being brutally beaten by the rapper at a Los Angeles hotel in 2016. Ventura was the first to sue Combs in November 2023, claiming that he trapped her in a cycle of abuse, violence, and sex trafficking during their relationship. Combs settled the lawsuit the next day for an undisclosed amount. "It wasn't the first time I'd seen his temper," Evans recalled of the death threat he witnessed in 1997. "It's hard to see. The guy in the video with Cassie is almost exactly the same guy who threatened the employee. So, you wonder, what's changed?"

Over the years, Sean Combs has constantly reinvented himself—from Puff Daddy to P Diddy, and in recent years, to "Love." He said in a 2015 interview: "If I'm acting crazy, like 'Ah!' That's Diddy. If I'm dancing smooth with a girl, that's Puff Daddy. If I seem nervous, scared, or shy, that's Sean." With more details likely to emerge at his trial in May, many who were close to the rapper are questioning whether they knew the real Sean Combs. Jimmy Maynes, who grew up with Combs in Mount Vernon, New York, said: "People might think he's just a disgusting person, but that's not my memory of Puff." But he paused, adding: "Or maybe money just gives people the freedom to be who they really want to be, and he's always been that person."