Five button-down shirts.
Five pairs of pants.
Five sweaters.
Two pairs of laceless shoes.
Those were Sean Combs’ complete fashion options on this year’s first Monday in May, a day that in other years had seen him shine in elegant outfits among fashion’s biggest stars at the annual Met Gala.
On the first Monday of May in 2023, Combs had arrived at the Metropolitan Museum in a super-high-end black motorcycle jacket that sparkled with hundreds of black pearls. The hip-hop mogul topped it with what Vogue described as a “taffeta puffer cape, all black and adorned with noir camellia flowers growing, as if from fractures in a sidewalk, along the seams.”
But his invitation to the 2024 Met gala was rescinded, after news broke that Combs was the subject of a federal investigation.
This year’s first Monday in May marked the start of Combs’ trial on charges of racketeering and sex trafficking. Manhattan Federal District Court Judge Arun Subramanian had already issued a list of clothing that Combs could wear that day and for the rest of the trial, which is expected to last two months.
In upper Manhattan, the 2025 fundraiser for the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute was preparing to celebrate Black dandyism on Monday evening with the theme “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style.”
Combs chose to arrive in Courtroom 26A downtown for his first day in a white shirt, navy blue sweater, and dark pants. The look was less superfine, more collegiate. Had he not aged so markedly during his seven months of incarceration—his hair and goatee are going white—he could have been the slightly pudgy uncle of the man alternately called “Puffy,” “Puff Daddy,” and “Diddy” who had ascended the steps at the Met exactly two years before.
After Combs took a seat at the defense table, a reporter saw him grab a glimpse of himself via the camera on a laptop set before him. Yes, he was exactly where he was.
Combs retained reasonably good posture, and remained alert and attentive as one prospective juror after another—32 in all—took the witness seat to the judge’s left. He periodically leaned over to whisper something to his attorneys, once to say he needed a bathroom break. The judge was intent on moving things along, but grudgingly granted the request.
“I’m sorry, your honor, I’m a little nervous today,” Combs said.
None of the prospective jurors said they personally knew any of the celebrities on a list they had been given of those who might figure in the case, or in Combs’ life. A heartening majority of the prospective jurors said they had undergone sexual harassment training at work. A discouraging number reported that they or people close to them had been sexually assaulted.
“It was a neighbor across the street,” one prospective juror said of an incident when she was in her teens. “We were in the beginning of a flirtation and he took it too far. He sexually assaulted me in the stairwell of my family’s house.”
The judge inquired if her experience would make her want to side against the defendant in a sex trafficking case.
“I’ve thought a lot about it,” the woman said. “I guess it sounds terrible but it feels like it’s just part of the culture. I think a lot of women have been sexually assaulted and harassed.”
She assured the judge that she could remain impartial, and was among the 19 kept in the jury pool. So, at least for the first round, was a woman who had worked at HBO, though not in the department that produced a highly negative documentary about Combs.
The 13 who were excused included a woman who asked if she could speak privately to the judge about a sexual assault. The judge called her up to the bench for a sidebar while a white noise machine played. Whatever had happened, it was serious enough for the judge to immediately tell her she was free to go.
Also excused was a man whose wife is a former lawyer. She worked on a civil case arising from the deaths of nine people who were crushed in a stampede at a dangerously overcrowded rap concert that was co-promoted by a young Sean Combs at the City College of New York, in 1991.
“She did not have a positive opinion,” the prospective juror replied when the judge asked the wife’s view of Combs after taking depositions in the case three decades ago.
Combs sat blank-faced at this reminder of what could have ended his rise to fame and riches before it even began.
In the late afternoon, the 32 prospective jurors who had passed the first stage were called into the courtroom. Combs examined each face of these people, whom he would barely have noticed in other circumstances.
The next stage was for each juror to read aloud the replies to a biographical questionnaire they had been given. Combs bent over a yellow pad, having gone from sunglasses on other first Mondays to reading glasses on this one. He took notes as if each detail were important: age, home county, education, profession, family status.
At 5:35 p.m., the judge said jury selection would continue on Tuesday. He told the jurors who remained from Monday’s proceedings they would be notified of the next step. He said opening statements are set for May 12.
Back on the 2018 first Monday in May, Combs had gone from that year’s Met gala to an afterparty hosted by Rihanna at the Up & Down club. He was on the up, up, up, becoming all he would have wanted to be.
This first Monday in May ended with Combs being returned to the Metropolitan Detention Center, where he would change back into a prison uniform until the morning, when he will again pick from his approved fashion choices for the two months before 12 jurors decide his fate.
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