Simone Boyce
Appearances
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Now, Diddy would later claim that the memory of this harrowing event inspired him whenever he made a change in his career. It was something that just kind of snaps on you. Don't take less in life and fight back. Those roaches still to this day, whenever I get comfortable, I just remember them.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
I remember living in a situation where babies weren't changed for two or three days and everything smells and there's no food. The memory is the thing that really fuels me to make sure that one day none of us have to live like that. You didn't do anything to make sure none of us had to live like that, and you didn't live like that, right? Yeah. You made sure he don't live like that.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Yeah, you made sure you didn't have to live that way, but... Fair enough. Yeah, fair enough.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Yeah. And it's I mean, like everything, it becomes more oligarchic as it fucking ages and gets sclerotic. But like, it's also not weird. You know, I can say I didn't I wouldn't say I had a hard upbringing. My parents were like poor when I was a little kid. Financial stress is like a lot of my earliest memories. And that's definitely part of why I have gone after money as an adult. Right.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Because like I. I didn't want to have screaming fights in front of my partner about the fact that we couldn't afford rent or whatever. You know, that's yeah, that's absolutely like that. Absolutely. A lot of people have had that experience. A lot of people deal with that now. It sucks ass. Like so I I don't doubt that some version of this is true. Right.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
That he encountered a lot of poverty around his family and was like, well, fuck that shit. Right. Yeah. Yeah. And I do think it's interesting that like his connections with financial desperation are not direct. They're family members. Right. So he always there's always this sense of like I'm separate to from this from the hardship. Right. Like it's not direct to me, which is interesting.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Now, it's worth noting that Diddy, as an adult, told lots of inspirational stories about moments from his childhood that inspired him to later greatness. And maybe all of these are bullshit, but, you know, let's hear them out.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
And I'll even say that's not, you know, that's a thing that rap gets from the same source that a lot of other, because you see that in evangelical Christianity, the whole like, I was, you know, down and out, high rising and low sliding, popping reds and busting heads, kicking into
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
and banging whores and then i met jesus you know that sort of fucking deal um praise the lord it's this thing everybody gets from like you know power of positive thinking like hustle culture where it's like okay you got to have like the down and out story and then i had my realization and like you can do it too it works for everything it's not just mlms yeah and just to tag on to that
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Yeah. Yeah, that's just that's just the way you like frame things if you want Americans to if you want to be a fucking mogul. Anyway, here's a quote from something he said later in a CNN article. One day when he was a child, he asked his mother for a new pair of sneakers, but she couldn't afford them. He recalled in a 2016 CNN interview that his mother almost began to cry upon hearing his request.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
That day, he said, my hustle was born. And he's got a lot of, that day, my hustle was born soon. That was the one day. His mom being like, we had a Cadillac. Maybe she's exaggerating because she doesn't want to admit that things were harder than they were. But I kind of think it might just be more that he wanted expensive sneakers. And his mom wasn't like, no, we don't have the money.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
His mom was like, no, you don't need those sneakers. Yeah. I'm not going to spend $200 on fucking sneakers for you. Like.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Yeah, it's a lot less inspirational to be like my story, which is like, I wanted a computer that could play StarCraft. And my mom said, no, you don't need that. I was like, well, I want to be able to buy my own computers when I grow up, right? Like, that's not an inspirational story. That's not... Like, yeah, nobody's going to put that in the biopic.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
You know, the music swells and you get a fucking razor. Um... So, yeah, one thing that we can definitely mark as a turning point in his life was a football injury that he acquired while playing for Mount St. Michael Academy. He will always say, I was going to be in the NFL. I was good enough to be in the NFL. He'll kind of insinuate he was being scouted by the NFL. I don't know that he was.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
I'm not entirely sure, but I'm pretty sure he's like 5'9 or something, right? He's not a big guy. He's not a big guy, but there's positions for shorter guys. Sure, for sure.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Now, I will say whether or not he was almost in the NFL, his team was very good. They won the division title in 1986, I think, when he's a junior. So like he does play on a very good team. I'm sure he was not bad at it. I just don't know that he was in the NFL. That said, he does break his leg in his last year of high school badly on the field, which ruins his pro dreams.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Now, man, as a fun aside, well, well, I was right here and I love this. Well, I was researching these articles. I found an old 2012 interview in The New York Times with Diddy. This is back during his, you know, mogul, you know. Generally popular phase. And the article was about a movie that he had helped produce called Undefeated.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
This was based on an Oscar nominated documentary about a real life high school football coach named Bill Courtney, who was apparently pretty good. I don't know much about high school football coaches. You're from Texas. How do you not know much about high school? I fucking played high school football for middle school. I forget which year I was in football, but I played football.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
I did a sport once. I was not almost in the NFL. It wasn't as fun as drugs. Now that I could have gone pro in, Will. Yeah, absolutely. I really could have been in the NFL of drugs. Absolutely. I still feel like I have a chance. Like I feel like I got like a field of dreams chance. In fact, you know, like. I do want to see the field of dreams of drugs.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
It's like they put up a table in a field and just like drugs start materializing. Yeah. Fucking John Belushi walks out of a cloud.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Back to this story. So Diddy produces this movie or helps to produce this movie about this high school football's coach named Bill Courtney. And he's interviewed in the Times about it. And in the interview, Combs talks about his own football experiences in high school. And he laments, I didn't have a coach like Bill Courtney who stood by me and helped motivate me in everything.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
I was envious, to be honest. And he's kind of insinuating that a better of coach might have helped him overcome his broken leg or whatever.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Anyway, the best part of that interview, though, is that Combs was working as a producer on the remake of that documentary with the Weinstein Company. And the interview with him in The Times includes this line next. Quote, Combs said he and Harvey Weinstein had been trying to do something together for seven years.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Now, it was during Sean's high school years that he first acquired... Oh, actually, you know what? Speaking of Sean's high school years, you know what will help you get through high school? Drugs? Well, and the products and services that support this podcast. Fair enough. This podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
There's some dark stuff going on in the world right now, but it's also the holiday season. This is my favorite time of the year. I love going out to Christmas markets. I love going on cold hikes. And when the weather gets crummy, I like staying inside and watching movies.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
But when you're cooped up inside sometimes in these long, dark winters, it can be easy for some of the stuff in our heads that's dark and less pleasant to bubble up and trouble us. therapy is a great way to bring yourself some comfort that never goes away. It can help you work through some of those problematic things in your head.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
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Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Find comfort this December with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash behind today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash behind. Robert Evans here, and I know everybody loves a great deal, but I also know most of us aren't willing to crawl through a bed of hot coals just to save a couple of bucks. Saving money has to be easy to be worth it.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Welcome back to Behind the Bastards, a podcast being recorded on a shockingly good week. We've all been in a real downswing since the election, but some great news lately.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
No hoops, no bull crap, no sending anything in through the mail. So when Mint Mobile said it was easy to get wireless for 15 bucks a month with the purchase of a three month plan, I had trouble believing it, but it turns out it really is that easy to get wireless for 15 bucks a month. The longest part of the process is the time spent on hold waiting to break up with your old provider.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
To get started, go to mintmobile.com slash behind. There you'll see that right now, all three month plans are only 15 bucks a month, including the unlimited plan. All plans come with high-speed data and unlimited talk and text delivered on the nation's largest 5G network. You can use your own phone with any Mint Mobile plan and bring your phone number along with all your existing contacts.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Find out how easy it is to switch to Mint Mobile and get three months of premium wireless service for $15 a month. To get this new customer offer and your new three-month premium wireless plan for just $15 a month, go to mintmobile.com slash behind. That's mintmobile.com slash behind. $45 upfront payment required, equivalent to $15 a month. New customers on first three-month plan only.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Speed slower above 40 gigabytes on unlimited plan. Additional taxes, fees, and restrictions apply. See Mint Mobile for details.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Something happened that we probably shouldn't joke about, but you know what it is. Bashar al-Assad fled Syria. Nick Fuentes got arrested. And our guest today is one of my favorite people, someone that the audience has not met before, but someone who has been a friend of mine for like 15 years.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
And we're back. I hope you've all graduated and you are ready for the rest of the pod.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
There isn't even a Marine Corps snowboarding team. There ought to be like an Olympic for military recruiter lies.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
So it was during Sean's high school years that he first acquired the nickname Puffy. And we have two different stories for how that happened. Here's the first as related in an article on Hip Hop Insider. He used to puff out his chest to make his body seem bigger, which is where the name originated.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
And there's a slightly different story that he told in 1998 to Jet Magazine. Whenever I got mad as a kid, I used to always huff and puff. I had a temper. That's when my friends started calling me Puffy. Right. Yeah, but, you know, they're not necessarily exclusive.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
I have told some stories about this person. Hold on on the great human stuff. Great human. My humanitarian friend. Greasy Will. Greasy with a Z. Grammy Award winning audio engineer. Yes, and proof that you can accomplish great things with half of a brain. For the album, you win that Grammy for the album Michael by Killer Mike.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Oh, man, and puffer fish, infamous sex criminals. Do not let your friends go home alone with a puffer fish. I remember that in Finding Nemo.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
So with football out of the way, young Sean leaned into the other less discussed aspect of his personality, which was that he was kind of an artsy theater kid. Diddy had a reputation at his private school for being neatly dressed, you know, and in college for wearing designer clothes, which he funded through a variety of legal entrepreneurial ventures.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
For example, in between classes, this is again when he's at college, he's at Howard University. He would operate a shuttle service to the airport and he would also sell his old term papers, T-shirts and soda to his classmates. So, again, entrepreneur, but not exactly a gangster.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Roe Ronan's book, Bad Boy, which covers Diddy's influence on the hip hop industry, paints a picture of a young man who was beyond everything else an opportunist. At one point, while he's at Howard, there's this massive protest campaign on the campus over the presence of Lee Atwater on the University Board of Trustees. And again, Howard is a historically black university.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Lee Atwater is the author of the Republican Party's infamous Southern Strategy, which I cannot relate directly to you without using the N-word repeatedly.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
The basic idea of the strategy that Lee Atwater helps put together is that you can't campaign in 1968. Before 68, you can campaign by just screaming about black people and saying you want to hurt them, right? By 68, you can't do that.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
So you have to instead campaign on issues that will hurt black people, but that you can pretend aren't racist, like fiscal conservatism, cutting programs that help black Americans without calling them slurs, right? That's Lee Atwater. So obviously, Howard University students are like, the fuck is this guy doing on the board of trustees?
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
That is essentially the tenor of the protest campaign. Now, Sean's peers rightly thought it was fucked up for this guy to have a seat on the Howard board, and they do win. Spoiler, he winds up stepping down.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Right. Protests work. Protests can work. So there's this big protest campaign. There's like clashes with riot police. They occupy buildings on campus. It's a whole thing.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
In the book, It Was All a Dream, culture journalist Justin Tinsley writes this of sophomore Sean Combs' involvement in this protest campaign. For Combs, the student protest in the spring of 89 presented an opportunity to unite the student body and put some money in his pockets at the same time.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Combs took images from the protests, photos of students and police clashing and students being whisked away and printed up some posters. And he like sells posters based on this. Oh my goodness. So he's like, he's a profiteer. A write-up by Chris Malone goes further.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Future producer and co-worker of Diddy's Derek D. Angeletti was at Howard at the same time as Diddy and saw how he made a quick buck from the protests. In the 2003 Notorious B.I.G. documentary Unbelievable, he spoke about Diddy's photo enterprise during the protests. He made hundreds of them and sold them for $10 and $15 a piece, Angeletti said. That's the type of guy I saw.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
All this protest shit is well and good, but who's getting paid off it? He was ready.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
This was back when a dime bag cost $10, and that wasn't cheap.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
we had onions on our belts it was a style at the time yeah yeah uh amusingly enough in 2009 diddy made statements in support of another protest movement at howard promising i got y'all back and saying do what we did and take it over let's go and do it in a peaceful way but do it and again you did not take anything over you sold pictures of people doing that you
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
My audience will also know you as the other person in that story where I had a light bulb fight in Santa Monica. Oh, man. Amazing times.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
He was always doing something. You're not facing a riot line to get Atwater fucking fired.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
If you're one of those, if you or your parents did, good for them. That's pretty cool. Yeah, good for them, man. Yeah. So a good deal of our knowledge of college age Diddy comes from Derek Angeletti, who I quoted earlier. He's the guy who described young Puffy as a flashy guy. Quote, he was always out at the clubs and the young girls loved him. That's a creepier line. And
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Now, modern context, he'd be in the middle of the floor doing all the new dance moves and his style of dress was a little more colorful, bolder. Everyone took notice of this cool, overconfident young dude. I was DJing at the time and one night he came up to me and said, I'd like to throw a party with you. You're pretty popular. And that's kind of how Diddy did.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
He's really good at recognizing people that other people like. That's his primary talent. He becomes a billionaire off the basis of that.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Yeah, and that's like, I mean, honestly, like that's also just an entertainment industry thing. Like, you know, Sophie and I, that's a skill we have in a different way, right?
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Yeah, a year or so ago, I'm reading this Ed Zitron guy and I'm like, I bet he could be a podcaster. You know, like that's just, that is just kind of the industry too. That's like how you, you know, and he's going, Diddy's going to be one of the best at it, right?
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
takeover or start an east coast west coast podcast rivalry get ed shot in a fucking conflict with one of the npr guys oh my god oh man another movie idea you guys are welcome yeah great movie i'm i'm making ed the biggie smalls of podcasting here Sorry, man, you cooked. Enjoy the next couple of years, buddy.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
So Combs took things a few steps further than most people who throw popular parties on campus by sometimes successfully convincing or paying celebrities to show up. He included his name on flyers with their name, which is part of how he would brand himself, right? You're attaching yourself to celebrity.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
You're also just making sure everyone who goes to this huge party with like 1,500 people knows that's a ditty party, right? Yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
That and he's good at reputation management. He prints business cards for himself that he hands out. They have his name engraved on them as Sean in parentheses Puff Combs. Just one F. So he's still working on the nickname, right?
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Just a boardroom of guys? Oh, man. That's one of my... By the way, speaking of wasted old people are lying, one of my... Because this comes up periodically when people will lie about having been in the military or special forces. If anyone ever tells you they served and they had a really cool nickname, full of shit. Nobody gets called the Avenger or fucking killer or whatever.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
So these parties with Diddy grow to be sizable affairs, but the biggest of them was a homecoming event at a Masonic temple. 1500, which actually does sound pretty cool. Yeah, it sounds banging. Yeah, 1,500 attendees were expected, but Sean's marketing of the event was so successful, more than 4,500 people showed up, which causes a problem when three times as many people show up.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
And this is going to be a continuing problem for him. Angeletti later claimed, the D.C. police shut down the whole block and brought out the dogs. We had to get on our knees and beg them not to lock us up, which again, not super gangster.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
That was Martha Stewart's friend. Weekly parties were all well and good for getting attention, but Sean wanted much more out of life, and he quickly decided a business administration degree from Howard wasn't going to get it for him. So he drops out and he starts begging record executives in New York for jobs, using his party planning career as a resume. This did not work.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
But when he reduced the request from job to unpaid internship, he got a yes from Uptown Records' Andre Harrell. Now, this is not a guy I'd heard of before, but Sheila Flynn for The Independent describes him as the man who, quote, famously coined the term ghetto fabulous. So, yeah, that's Andre Harrell. He's a big guy in the industry. She describes his time interning for Uptown this way.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Combs initially commuted weekly between college and his hometown, working 80-hour weeks as he literally ran to complete errands for his record superiors. And it wasn't long before he quit Howard altogether. By 1991, Harrell had installed him as an A&R executive, and Combs was forging a reputation for identifying and molding top-tier talent.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
So he goes very quickly from unpaid intern to paid executive. He's very good at this. He works like crazy, and he's got an incredible eye for talent. And this is also 91. Rap is exploding.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Well, there you go, folks. You could have your own Grammy. You're welcome. And maybe even be a guest on this podcast. And more tips like this on my TikTok, GreasyWillMusic.com. I don't have any tips for becoming a journalist or a writer. It's very hard and it seems like no one's doing it anymore.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Type the Lord of the Rings into ChatGPT and you too can be a novelist. Yeah. Or sued by the Tolkien estate. Either way, same diff. Yeah. So he's, you know, by 91, he's an A&R executive. So he's doing, like, while he does that, he continues throwing parties. He understands that that's, number one, that's how I'm going to meet people.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
That's how I'm going to run into DJs, the people that I'm going to, like, poach, you know, as talent. He would throw what is described in one source as racially mixed daddy's house parties for street kids and preppy students from Columbia University and New York University. Right.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Uh, and this is where that's a Ronan who wrote a book about, you know, his role in hip hop says, quote, that's where he saw what fans were dancing to and wearing. So this is also how he stays plugged in. Uh, now, you know, it's, uh, I should say it's also how he's, uh, going to be committing a lot of his sex crimes, but we'll get to that in a minute.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Yeah. Uh, daddy's house parties don't go great for a lot of people. Oh yeah. You brought your soundboard.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
And he makes the choice next to kill nine people.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
He's going as Puff with one F. He's a college dropout and an employed record executive. And one of the acts that Sean helps bring to prominence is Jordaki. J-O-R-D-E-C-I. Jordash?
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Curious about queer sexuality, cruising, and expanding your horizons? Sniffy's Cruising Confessions is the podcast for you. Hosted by Gabe Gonzalez and Chris Patterson Rosso, they dive deep into gay culture, share candid stories, and offer real advice to help you navigate your journey. This holiday season, Gabe and Chris are back with a special episode.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
As a representative of the hip-hop industry, it's appropriate that we are gathered here today to talk about P. Diddy. Oh, my God.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Jordache is an R&B duo who are blowing up by 91. Oh, Jodeci?
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Is it Jodeci? Okay, we'll say it's Jodeci. If that's an R&B duo, yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Then it's called... Look, I don't know these. You know me and fucking pop culture.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
There's a D in there. Yeah, I mean, you know, it could be, I don't know. Jodeci.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Yeah, Combs decided a good way to increase Jodeci's visibility was to throw a charity basketball game, pitting two teams of rappers against each other while fans watched. The event was to be held in the City College of New York gym. Once again, Diddy did what he does best, which is promote, and so a shitload of people show up.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
In fact, several times as many people as can fit in the actual gym itself. This becomes a problem because Sean doesn't do anything but promote the event.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
He has two of his assistants, who have never run large gatherings, do that. And he does not inform them, by the way, every time I do something, several times as many people as we can actually support show up. Could be a problem. He just tells his assistants to handle it and then forgets all about it.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Largely because his attention is occupied by executing fraud to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars. Because the game had been advertised as a charitable event... But like, he hadn't told anyone what charity.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
So there's no beneficiary actually selected for this party and for the more than $24,000 in 1990s money that had been raised for the event. Further blame for what's about to happen goes to the police on duty. Sean's assistants had only coordinated with Pinkerton security guards hired by the university. Yeah, there's Pinkertons in this.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
And the university had incorporated to the number of security guards to 23 because they started getting worried before the event. But the NYPD just sends a few guys. And when it becomes clear that more than twice as many people as expected showed up, the sergeant on scene doesn't call for backup until it's too late.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Eventually, there are like 60 something officers in attendance, but it takes a while. And the sergeant on duty also ignores repeated calls by the university being like, there's way too many people. There's way too many people. You need to do something. There's going to be a riot. And in fact, there is. Yeah, they ignored the neighbors at our parties, too, man. They just did not listen to them.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
So once it becomes clear, because they have to tell this huge crowd, most of you are not getting in. And then the crowd gets rowdy and violent and a riot begins. The NYPD officers who are there are as useless as the NYPD tends to be when they're ever there actually needed for something. And things go very badly at 7 p.m. with far too many people crowded into the venue. Oh, my God.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
It is like one of the best survival advice pieces I can give you is if you are ever in any kind of event and upon entering your like your only way to get in is to push through a crowd of people with absolutely no gaps in it. And you immediately have like the hair stand up on the back of your neck and wonder, are there too many people in this room? Fucking back the hell out.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Don't fuck around with situations like that.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
So this is a horrible. Again, nine people die because of this thing that Diddy has orchestrated. One EMT.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
There's two episodes. There's more deaths to come.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
I don't know. Maybe we'll see. We'll see what happens. One EMT who showed up on scene described the result as a plane crash without a plane. There were bodies all over. People calling for help. That's a very bad way for your party to be... Although, you and I have both thrown parties that I would describe as looking like a plane crash afterwards. Yeah, for sure.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
This would mark the first time that Sean Combs drew media attention in a big way. New York Newsday was one of the papers who first got reporters on scene, and years later, one of them recalled being told by a colleague, the organizer was some guy called Puff Daddy. In the days that followed, it became clear that a substantial amount of the blame for this disaster lay with Puff Daddy. Puff Daddy.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Puff Daddy. A report compiled afterwards by the mayor's office read, Mr. Combs spent little time making the actual preparation for the game and delegated most, if not all, of the arrangements to Lewis Tucker and Tara Getter, both of whom claimed to have no prior experience with such events.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
I found a fun article in the Columbia Journalism Review by one of the reporters who covered the crush, and this is, you know, him writing after Diddy has been disgraced. His piece ended with this line, I do remember thinking, man, this puffy guy can't have much of a future after this. Ha ha ha ha ha!
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
A lot of being happy, especially being happy about how you spent your 20s, is getting as close to that line as you can get without crossing over into the killing nine people at City College.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Yeah, the edge is a place, but it's also a place that's called the edge for a reason because sometimes nine people fall off of it.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Hunter Thompson wrote eloquently about the edge and also died unable to hold in his bowels. You know, that is the consequence. It's not a long life. It's not a long life. It's not a long life. So, because this is America, getting a bunch of people killed due to your own staggering negligence does not mean that you don't have... None at all.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
And Puff Daddy proves immune to consequences for his actions, even though, again, every review of the disaster is like, he's to blame for a lot of this. Now, again, I don't want to say all of it, because let's not forget the NYPD. Yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
That's part of their, that's what they get paid for, of course. The NYPD operates one of the largest surveillance apparatuses on the planet so that they can know more places to get kids killed. So, Puff Daddy winds up testifying in court about the disaster when the families of the dead and the survivors sued the college.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
After a 1998 court appearance, he told reporters... Oh, so they didn't go after him at all?
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
No, no, go after the college. I think at this point, the college is who has money. He's not rich. Yeah, yeah, yeah, he's a kid.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Yeah, what's he gonna do for you? After a 1998 court appearance, he told reporters that, like, I think about it every day. I think about, you know, the dead every single day. You know, I'm always, my thoughts are always with them. Quote, but the things that I deal with can in no way measure up to the pain that the families deal with.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
I just pray for the families and pray for the children who lost their lives every day.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
get the hits man play the hits i can't wait till we have our first dictator who takes a note out of who like fucking like uses chemical weapons on a crowd of protesters and is that then gets in like a studio and sings i'll be missing you
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
pro tip for the future dictators who listen to this podcast there's gotta be one of you have a banger ready to go have a banger ready to go and look if you do succeed in becoming a dictator just give me a province just one province is all I ask for oh hell yeah
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
I mean, let me, you know, I'll make a golden house for my, of course I'm going to make a golden house, you know, but like, it'll be, it'll be gold plated. I'm not that much of a crook. As one does. As one does. You can bring your Grammy over to my gold plated house, Will. Yeah, man. We'll take shots out of it. Hell yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Now, speaking of I'll be missing you, I'm going to be missing you all because this is the end of part one, but don't worry, folks. We have a lot more coming. This is, this, this whole week is going to be diddy week here at Behind the Bastards.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
So, Will, my friend, you have a TikTok to plug.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Yes, yeah, yeah. I send you telegrams, but entirely about our oil business down in the Arizona territory. I drank your milkshake. That's right, that's right. That's how you and I spend our free time. Be an old-timey oilman. It's a great time, everybody. Well, until next week, folks, become an old-timey oilman yourself, you know? Start an oil rig somewhere. Next week. Next part. Next part, yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Next part. Not next week. We'll be back tomorrow, probably. Yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
We're going to keep recording, yes. Anyway, I love you all. Go to hell.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
That is the story that opens this podcast. Oh, great. Yeah, because you started by being like, in the industry, I've been hearing fucking rumors about P. Diddy for years. Well, roughly a year ago, my goat had little baby goats, and one of them was a hybrid Nigerian Angora mix with the softest hair I have ever felt on an animal that's not a chinchilla. Beautiful animal.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Previously, I had gone with the rubric of naming my livestock after famous historic dictators because it amused me to have to, for example, cut the shit out of Joseph Brodstito's ass dreadlocks. Like, that's just kind of funny, right? But this particular goat was really cute, so I decided I wanted to give him a mirthful name. And I told Sophie, my producer, I'm going to call him P. Diddy.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Now, let me say here, I'm not a pop culture guy. I didn't know anything other than, like, P. Diddy was, like, a rapper. I actually didn't realize how into gangster rap he was, because, again, not super aware of all this stuff. I was just like, oh, he's like a Snoop Dogg-type figure, right?
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Yeah, sure. And yeah, so like that was, I was like, oh, just named P. Diddy. That's a fun name, right? Anyway, Sophie did her job, which is to dive in front of bullets for her host as a producer. It's called the Wednesday. Yeah. And said, no, you cannot name your goat after Diddy because he's a monster. And I was like, oh. And I looked into him and there wasn't a ton out at the time.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
They'll talk about where to hook up when family is in town, creating queer spaces, and why the night before Thanksgiving is the horniest night of the year. Tune in to Sniffy's Cruising Confessions holiday special, sponsored by Gilead, out now in the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
And then he got righted by the FBI a few months later. And I was like, oh, Sophie was right. It only took a minute. Yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Don't hang out with Diddy. I had even watched earlier this year that movie Blink Twice. And I was like, oh, this is kind of interesting. And then I find out later like, oh, it's supposed to be about Diddy. Like this was a veiled way of talking about this guy.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
So if you're like me or if you're someone who knows more about Diddy, you know, the question is, how did how did all this like how did this guy get to where he is and get to do what he did for so long without having a downfall? And we are going to answer that question and more this week on Behind the Bastards, a podcast about people I almost named goats after. And we're back.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
So, Sean John Combs, which is kind of Sean John, which is the name of the clothing brand he's going to make later, was born on November 4th, 1969 in Harlem, New York. He was the son of Janice Combs, a former model who worked as a teacher's assistant, most of his childhood. His father, Melvin Earl Combs, had served in the Air Force, but later in life became a drug dealer.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
He also, he worked for a guy named Frank Lucas. And does the name Frank Lucas mean anything to y'all? Hmm, no. He is, if you've seen American Gangster, that's the guy Denzel plays, an American gangster. Oh, Denzel, right. Okay, all right. Sean's dad works for a very serious gangster, like played by Denzel serious, right?
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
As an aside, if your goal is to make a movie about crime is bad, don't have Denzel play the gangster.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
It was like the Gladiator 2 movie really would have been a totally different film.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
I watched the whole movie and thought he was a good guy.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
I was just like, oh, man. He should be the emperor. Yeah. This seems fair. Yeah. So, tragically, Melvin Combs was never played by Denzel in a movie. Instead, he was assassinated, shot dead in his car in Central Park when he was 33 years old. Yikes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That is Diddy's dad. That is a young one. Yes, yes. Sean is two years old at the time, so he never really knows his father.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
As a little boy, his dad's death served as a constant reminder of the consequences of crime as a lifestyle, or at least that's what he would say. I don't know how true that is because, again, very involved in crimes.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Yeah, don't be a private, be a general. Yeah. Yes, yes. So his mom moved the family out of Harlem not long after Melvin's death, taking them to Mount Vernon, a suburb in Westchester County.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Now, as an adult going by the name P. Diddy, Sean would make a lot of statements about the poverty he was raised in, because if you are coming up in hip-hop in the way he did, you want to, like, act like you came from a really hard background.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Yeah, yeah. Whereas, I mean, we're going to talk about Biggie. Biggie does come from, like, a rough background. Right, selling cocaine instead of making record deals. Yeah. Now, and obviously, Sean is massively exaggerating how rough his background was. I don't want to minimize, like, his dad getting shot when he's two.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
But his mom is, like Tupac's mom, one of these people who works incredibly hard and is very responsible. She gives her kid a service. a good degree at kids, a lot of stability and comfort. Sean goes to a prestigious private school, Mount St. Michael. It's a Catholic school. His family is very Catholic. He wears a uniform. He plays football.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
His mom describes him in interviews as having been an entrepreneur from a young age, starting his own paper, and not in the way that you often mean that in Hip Out. He starts a paper route as a kid, right?
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
In order to make money. She told the New Yorker, we had a Cadillac car and a house, and he liked life like that. Right? Huh. So, yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
When your kid says he wants to be a CEO, look, I'm not saying you should do this legally, but maybe get him into drugs.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
And winning a Grammy. And winning Grammys. Yeah. So one story Diddy likes to tell is of the time his aunt babysat him at her home, which was in a public housing project called the Patterson Houses in the Bronx. So again, his mom gets out to the suburbs. They own a home. Other members of his family obviously are a lot less comfortable. And the story he tells is that he wakes up.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
Sometimes he'll say, I woke up with 15 cockroaches on my face, which... You didn't count the cockroaches. Nobody would in that situation.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
And in other recitations, he's less specific. I'm not saying this didn't happen. I think it probably did, just knowing the other stuff about his life.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
This apparently inspired him to seek wealth and success. Quote, and this is from him years later, I was like, no, I'm not going to do that. I'm going to get out of here. I'm going to be somebody. I'm going to own something and be able to take care of my family. I don't want to live in these conditions no more. And again, you know, I'm not maybe something like this happened.
Behind the Bastards
Part One: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
He also does bring it up exactly the way you would if you're trying to, like, throw out in interviews scenes that people will put in a biopic about you. Right.
Behind the Bastards
Part Three: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
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Behind the Bastards
Part Three: P. Diddy: A Life in Crimes
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Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
This is Simone Boyce from The Bright Side. Beauty is about more than just beauty. It's about worth. individuality, and the power that comes from being your truest self. At L'Oreal Paris, beauty means embracing who you already are, enhancing the diverse features, experiences, and personality that makes you, well, you.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
L'Oreal's beauty essentials combine innovative products with that classic Parisian touch to help you feel like your most confident self. Because taking on the world is a little less scary when you feel ready for your close-up. L'Oreal Paris. Because you're worth it.