The raids of Sean Combs’ homes in Los Angeles and the Miami area this past week raised a barrage of questions about the nature of the inquiry, which a federal official said was at least in part a human trafficking investigation.

The government has said little about the basis for the search warrants, but the raids came after five lawsuits were filed against Combs in recent months that accused him of violating sex trafficking laws. In four of the suits women accused him of rape, and in one a man accused him of unwanted sexual contact. Combs, a hip-hop impresario known as Puff Daddy and Diddy who has been a high-profile figure in the music industry since the 1990s, has vehemently denied all of the allegations, calling them “sickening.” Officials have not publicly named him as a target of any prosecution.

As the lawsuits against Combs illustrate, the term human or sex trafficking has a broader meaning in the law than perhaps the more popularly understood image of organized crime and forced prostitution rings.

“Traditionally you think of trafficking as a pimp who has a stable of victims and then is trafficking them in the traditional sense of the word, for money,” said Jim Cole, a former supervisory special agent with Homeland Security Investigations who oversaw human trafficking cases, “but there are lots of forms of trafficking.”

The breadth of trafficking investigations has grown with the recent uptick in sexual abuse claims and the use of the internet by traffickers. Homeland Security Investigations often leads such criminal investigations, although the department is most commonly associated with immigration and transnational issues.

In the current inquiry, federal investigators in New York have been interviewing potential witnesses about sexual misconduct allegations against Combs for several months, according to a person familiar with the interviews. Some of the questions involved the solicitation and transportation of prostitutes, as well as any payments or promises associated with sex acts, the person said.

The search warrants were executed this week by Homeland Security, which has carried out such investigations since it started operations in 2003. In 2020, the agency created the Center for Countering Human Trafficking in an effort to better coordinate their anti-trafficking work across the department.

With the #MeToo era and its aftermath giving rise to sexual abuse allegations against scores of powerful men, prosecutors have turned more frequently to federal sex trafficking laws to prosecute cases. Those laws allow for federal prosecution of sexual assault — typically a crime handled on the state level — and they have longer statutes of limitation than some abuse charges, allowing prosecutors to try to convict a person on allegations dating back years.

Homeland Security took a leading role in investigating the case that led to the first criminal punishment against R&B artist R. Kelly. It came in a federal trial in New York City that ended in his conviction on a count of racketeering and violations of an anti-sex-trafficking law known as the Mann Act. Ghislaine Maxwell was convicted on sex trafficking and other charges for conspiring to sexually exploit underage girls with Jeffrey Epstein, who hanged himself in his jail cell as he awaited his own trial on similar charges.

And Keith Raniere received a 120-year prison sentence in the Nxivm sex cult scandal for sex trafficking and other crimes. He was convicted after the prosecution overcame an argument from his lawyers that his was not a legitimate sex trafficking case because the charges did not involve sexual exploitation for profit, but rather sex coerced through promises of increased status, among other claims.

“More recently prosecutors have been more aggressive with prosecuting trafficking cases to the fullest extent that they can,” said Elizabeth Geddes, a former federal prosecutor who was part of the team that won the case against Kelly.

Geddes said prosecutors have been effective because the main federal sex trafficking law, passed in 2000, is broad, making it a crime for anyone to use “force, fraud or coercion” to cause a person to engage in a commercial sex act. Courts have interpreted this as receiving anything of value — not necessarily money.

The recent escalation of Combs’ legal troubles began in November, when his former girlfriend Casandra Ventura, who makes music as the singer Cassie, filed a lawsuit accusing him of years of sexual and physical abuse. Ventura accused Combs in the court papers of forcing her to have sex with male prostitutes in front of him. She said he instructed her to use websites and escort services to find prostitutes to participate in what he called “freak offs.”

“Sometimes, Mr. Combs would pay to fly male sex workers to his location, including to multiple cities in the United States as well as abroad,” the lawsuit said. “He required Ms. Ventura and his staff to help him make these arrangements.”

Ventura’s lawsuit was filed shortly before the deadline for the Adult Survivors Act, a New York law that provided a window for plaintiffs to file sexual abuse claims outside the statute of limitations. The suit was settled in a single day, with both sides saying it had been resolved “amicably,” temporarily giving the impression that Combs’ team might have contained a problem.

But four more lawsuits followed, including the most recent one filed by the male music producer, who accused Combs of forcing him to hire prostitutes and participate in sex acts with them. A lawyer for Combs responded to the lawsuit by saying that the producer was “shamelessly looking for an undeserved payday.”

In addition to claims of sexual assault and battery, Ventura’s lawsuit cited the federal sex trafficking statute. Douglas H. Wigdor, one of the lawyers representing her, said in a recent interview that his client’s claims fit the framework for sex trafficking, and pointed to allegations in the lawsuit that Combs used force and coercion to induce Ventura into sex acts.

“It meets the definition,” he said. “It includes isolation, confinement and monitoring, and there’s obviously force.”

The statute of limitations for the federal sex trafficking law is 10 years. Ventura’s allegations span the mid-2000s through 2018.

The investigation into Combs, 54, burst into public view on the afternoon of March 25, when local television footage surfaced of agents from Homeland Security Investigations entering his mansion in the Holmby Hills neighborhood of Los Angeles. His home in Miami Beach, Florida, was raided the same day, and Combs was met by federal agents at a Miami-area airport where he had been planning to leave on a flight to the Bahamas. Arrested at that time was a 25-year-old associate named Brendan Paul, who was charged with cocaine possession. Among the items that agents recovered in the raids were electronic devices, weapons and ammunition, a federal official said.

A lawyer for Combs, Aaron Dyer, called the raids a “gross overuse of military-level force” and “nothing more than a witch hunt based on meritless accusations made in civil lawsuits.”

Plaintiffs’ lawyers have been increasingly turning to state and federal trafficking statutes as a means of possible recourse with the passage of legislation like the Adult Survivors Act in New York, and a similar law in California.

Ann Olivarius, a lawyer who has used such statutes in sexual misconduct lawsuits, said that the influx of such lawsuits will likely lead the courts in the coming years to make decisions as to the proper interpretation of trafficking laws, which she said are relatively untested.

“It’s a young area of the law,” Olivarius said. “The whole notion of sex trafficking is really under review.”

Sean 'Diddy' Combs' luxury yacht draws comparisons to Epstein Island amid sex trafficking probe

With federal investigators looking into Sean "Diddy" Combs in a sex trafficking investigation after multiple women and at least one man accused him of bad behavior, the hip-hop mogul is drawing comparisons to Jeffrey Epstein.

Like Epstein, a financier who had his own private island in the U.S. Virgin Islands, Combs has been accused of luring victims with his luxurious lifestyle and – in some cases – assaulting them aboard a yacht he rented for trips to the Virgin Islands and Saint Barthelemy.

Some of the most explosive allegations have come from a February lawsuit producer Lil Rod, whose real name is Rodney Jones, filed against Combs, alleging a pattern of sexual assaults and sex trafficking he claims are recorded on hidden cameras throughout the mogul's homes.

Combs' mansions in Los Angeles and Miami were raided earlier this week in connection with a federal human trafficking investigation, months after similar accusations emerged in a series of lawsuits.

The lawsuit also alleges Combs had an aide who played a role similar to Ghislaine Maxwell's, Epstein's madame who is now a convicted trafficker.

Just a few weeks ago, Combs, 54, was riding high, receiving the ceremonial key to New York City and celebrating the release of his first album in years on the same day.

"The bad boy of entertainment is getting the key to the city from the bad boy of politics," Mayor Eric Adams said as he presented a giant key to Combs in Times Square, according to FOX 5 New York.

"He escaped a lot because of who he was," said Derrick Parker, a former member of the NYPD's rap intelligence unit who investigated the 1999 nightclub shooting that landed Combs and Jennifer Lopez in handcuffs. "Now, a lot of stuff is just coming back to him."

From a deadly stampede early in his career, to a nightclub shooting where a protégé took the fall and recent sex trafficking allegations, Bad Boy Records founder Combs has largely prevailed in his legal battles.

Combs has been acquitted of gun and bribery charges and been mentioned in connection with hip-hop feuds that led to real-life violence without being implicated in any crimes.

But the recent lawsuits kicked off a federal investigation that resulted in raids on his mansions in Los Angeles and Miami last week. Combs and his lawyers denied any misconduct.

The hip-hop icon and founder of Bad Boy Records rose to prominence in the music industry in the early 1990s, then branched out into clothing design, liquor and other businesses, making himself a billionaire.

He came from humble beginnings. His early rise to prominence involved a feud between emerging hip-hop stars on the country's East and West coasts.

In 1991, Combs promoted a benefit event at the City College of New York that turned deadly when an altercation in the crowd led to a stampede of fans that crushed eight people to death.

Combs and girlfriend Jennifer Lopez were arrested in New York City in 1999 on weapons and bribery charges after an altercation with another man led to a gunfight at Club New York that injured three people.

The couple left, but after blowing a red light, police found a gun in their car.

Paul Mauro, a retired NYPD inspector and now a Fox News contributor, happened to be working in the same precinct the following morning but was not involved in the investigation.

"Diddy was not there, I remember that," he recalled. "She was all distraught. I just remember she had her head down, and I have this recollection of her looking very small and very, very diminutive and kind of shellshocked."

Police held Lopez for about 14 hours before releasing her without charges. Combs was later indicted and then acquitted of gun charges and of bribing his bodyguard to take the fall.

His friend, rapper Shyne, wound up in prison for assault in connection with the bar brawl and recorded part of his next album behind bars.

One of the three people wounded in the Club New York shooting, Natania Reuben, told NewsNation Thursday that it was Combs' bullet that struck her, not Shyne's, whose real name is Jamal Barrow.

"I literally watched them pull out the guns," she told the station. "I had a clear point of view. I mean, for God's sake, I got shot in my nose."

Even after becoming a well-established leader in the music industry, allegations of violence continued to follow Combs. Police in Los Angeles arrested Diddy in 2015 after he allegedly attacked an assistant coach at the University of California's LA campus with a kettlebell. He claimed self-defense, and the district attorney declined to prosecute.

Jones, in his lawsuit, alleges Combs continued exhibiting violent tendencies in 2022 and 2023.

Last year, his ex-girlfriend, Casandra "Cassie" Ventura, filed an explosive federal lawsuit alleging rape, forced prostitution and physical abuse. They settled the lawsuit a day later — without Combs admitting wrongdoing.

But more allegations emerged of abuse spanning decades.

Joi Dickerson-Neal filed another lawsuit, alleging Diddy drugged, raped and abused her on tape while she was a college student at Syracuse University in 1991.

Another woman, Liza Gardner, also filed a lawsuit, claiming Combs allegedly coerced her into having sex at a party and that his friend also raped her. Days later, according to the civil complaint, Combs allegedly beat her up.

He was also named in a third lawsuit from a Jane Doe who was underage at the time of her alleged sexual assault. In 2017, a former personal chef sued him, claiming he made her work during sex parties. They settled the case two years later.

Filings in the Jones case are so alarming that his lawyers included a "trigger warning" at the top of the civil complaint.

Jones alleges that there are "HUNDREDS of hours of footage and audio recordings of Mr. Combs, his staff, and his guests engaging in serious illegal activity" at mansions in multiple states and on a yacht that traveled to the U.S. Virgin Islands and Saint Barthelemy.

Jones, whose lawyers describe him as a musical prodigy, spent a year living with Combs and producing nine songs for Diddy's new album, "The Love Album: Off the Grid," the record released the same day he received his key to the city.

During that time, he claims to have witnessed Combs "providing laced alcoholic beverages to minors" and prostitutes and committing other crimes.

The lawsuit also alleges two unnamed individuals, one a rapper and the other an R&B singer, were "consorting with underaged girls" on Combs' yacht and at his Los Angeles mansion. Jones also claims actor Cuba Gooding Jr. assaulted him in a studio onboard the yacht.

Gooding did not immediately respond to a request for a response to the allegations.

"It is like Epstein," Parker told Fox News Digital. "It borders on that … and the reason being is that these video tapes are going to be very interesting."

An expert on the intersection of crime and the hip-hop industry who has written a book on the issue, Parker said he expects HSI investigators to be pouring through any footage seized in the raids to determine if any crimes were committed and if any other high-profile people were present.

The more lawsuits that emerge, the more accusers Parker said he expects to come forward.

And the evidence in the lawsuits, even those that were settled, will likely play a role in the ongoing federal investigation, Mauro said.

"That stuff is very penetrative," he said. "[Federal prosecutors] are going to subpoena all of that stuff."

Diddy has denied wrongdoing. In a statement pinned to his X profile, the mogul said accusers have been trying to "assassinate" his character.

"Sickening allegations have been made against me by individuals looking for a quick payday," he wrote. "Let me be absolutely clear: I did not do any of the awful things being alleged. I will fight for my name. my family and for the truth."