A timeline of the rise and fall of Sean 'Diddy' Combs

For more than two decades, Sean “Diddy” Combs was one of hip-hop's most opportunistic entrepreneurs, spinning his hitmaking talents into a broad business empire that included a record label, a fashion brand, a TV network, deals with liquor companies and a key role in a reality TV show.

But U.S. prosecutors say behind the scenes, Combs was coercing and abusing women with assistance from a network of associates who helped silence victims through blackmail and violence.

Combs has pleaded not guilty and denied the allegations. Testimony in his trial began Monday.

Here is a timeline of major events in his rise and fall:

1990: Combs, then a student at Howard University, gets his start in the music business with an internship at Uptown Records in New York.

Dec. 28, 1991: Nine people die at a celebrity basketball game promoted by Combs and the rapper Heavy D when thousands of fans try to get into a gym at the City College of New York. A mayoral report lays part of the blame for the catastrophe on poor planning by Combs.

1992: Combs is one of the executive producers on “What’s the 411?,” the debut album by Mary J. Blige.

1993: After being fired by Uptown, Combs establishes his own label, Bad Boy, which quickly cuts a lucrative deal with Arista Records.

1994: Bad Boy releases Notorious B.I.G.’s album “Ready to Die." Two months later, Tupac Shakur survives a shooting in New York and accuses Combs and Biggie of having prior knowledge of the attack, which they deny. Shakur was later killed in a 1996 shooting in Las Vegas.

1996: Combs is convicted of criminal mischief after he allegedly threatened a photographer with a gun.

1997: Biggie is killed in Los Angeles. Combs, then known as Puff Daddy, releases “I’ll be Missing You” in honor of his slain star.

1998: Combs wins two Grammys, one for best rap album for his debut “No Way Out” and another for best rap performance by a duo or group for “I'll Be Missing You” with Faith Evans. Also that year, Combs' Sean John fashion line is founded.

April 16, 1999: Combs and his bodyguards are charged with attacking Interscope Records music executive Steve Stoute in his New York office in a dispute over a music video. Combs is sentenced to an anger management course.

Dec. 27, 1999: Combs is arrested on gun possession charges after he and his girlfriend at the time, Jennifer Lopez, fled a shooting that wounded three people at a New York City nightclub. Some witnesses tell police Combs was among the people shooting in the club. He is later charged with offering his driver $50,000 to claim ownership of the 9 mm handgun found in his car.

March 17, 2001: Combs is acquitted of all charges related to the nightclub shooting. One of his rap proteges, Jamal “Shyne” Barrows, is convicted in the shooting and serves nearly nine years in prison. Two weeks after the trial, Combs announces he wants to be known as P. Diddy.

2002: Combs becomes the producer and star of “Making the Band,” a talent search TV show.

Feb. 1, 2004: Combs performs at the Super Bowl halftime show along with Janet Jackson, Justin Timberlake and others. A week later, Combs, Nelly and Murphy Lee win a Grammy for best rap performance by a duo or group for “Shake Ya Tailfeather.”

April, 2004: Combs makes his Broadway acting debut in “A Raisin in the Sun.”

2005: Combs announces he is changing his stage name to Diddy, getting rid of the P.

March, 2008: Combs settles a lawsuit brought by a man who claims Combs punched him after a post-Oscar party outside a Hollywood hotel the previous year. In May, Combs is honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

2015: Combs is arrested after a confrontation on the campus of UCLA, where one of his sons played football. Assault charges are later dropped.

2016: Combs launches a Harlem charter school, the Capital Preparatory School. Also that year, he announces he is donating $1 million to Howard University.

2017: Combs is named the top earner on Forbes' list of the 100 highest-paid celebrities, which says he brought in $130 million in a single year.

2018: Kim Porter, Combs' former girlfriend and the mother of three of his children, dies from pneumonia at age 47.

2022: Combs receives a lifetime honor at the BET Awards.

Sept. 15, 2023: Combs releases “The Love Album — Off the Grid,” his first solo studio project since 2006's chart-topping “Press Play.”

Nov. 16, 2023: R&B singer Cassie sues Combs, alleging he subjected her to years of abuse, including beatings and rape. A day later, the lawsuit is settled under undisclosed terms. Combs, through his attorney, denies the accusations.

Nov. 23, 2023: Two more women accuse Combs of sexual abuse in lawsuits. Combs’ attorneys call the allegations false. Dozens of additional lawsuits follow by women and men who accuse Combs of rape, sexual assault and other attacks. Plaintiffs include singer Dawn Richard, a “Making the Band” contestant who alleged years of psychological and physical abuse. Combs denies all the allegations.

March 25, 2024: Federal agents search Combs' homes in Los Angeles and Miami Beach, Florida.

May 17, 2024: CNN airs video that shows Combs attacking and beating Cassie in a Los Angeles hotel hallway in 2016. Two days later, Combs posts videos on social media apologizing for the assault.

Sept. 16, 2024: Combs is arrested at his Manhattan hotel. A sex trafficking and racketeering indictment unsealed the next day accuses him of using his business empire to coerce women into participating in sexual performances. Combs denies the allegations. His attorney calls it an unjust prosecution of an “imperfect person.”

May 5, 2025: Jury selection began for Combs' trial.

May 12, 2025: A jury is selected and testimony begins in Combs' trial.

FILE - Rapper Sean "Puffy" Combs arrives at the Manhattan District Attorney's office in New York, on Jan. 4, 2000, where Combs and his girlfriend Jennifer Lopez were to appear before a grand jury investigating the Times Square nightclub shooting that left three people injured in late Dec. 1999. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens, File)

FILE - Law enforcement personnel walk on a street near after federal law enforcement executed a raid at a property belonging to Sean "Diddy" Combs on March 25, 2024, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Eric Thayer, File)

FILE - A law enforcement agent carries a bag of evidence to a van as federal agents stand at the entrance to a property belonging to rapper Sean "Diddy" Combs, on March 25, 2024, on Star Island in Miami Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell, File)

FILE - Federal enforcement officers stand outside the Metropolitan Detention Center, where Sean "Diddy" Combs is incarcerated on Oct. 28, 2024, in the Brooklyn Borough of New York. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura, File)

FILE - Rap artist and music producer Sean "Puffy" Combs, center, leaves a court hearing at New York's Manhattan Criminal Court on April 16, 1999, after Combs was charged with beating rap record executive, Steven Stoute, the previous day. (AP Photo/Robert Mecea, File)

FILE - Rapper-producer Sean "Puffy" Combs answers questions at a news conference on Dec. 28, 1999, in New York, a day after he was arrested and charged with weapons possession after police allegedly found a stolen pistol in his car as he and actress-singer Jennifer Lopez left a nightclub where three people were shot and wounded. (AP Photo/Suzanne Plunkett, File)

FILE - Nominated for four Grammy Awards, Sean "Puffy" Combs appears at Arista Records' pre-Grammy party in New York on Feb. 24, 1998, in New York. (AP Photo/Stuart Ramson)

FILE - Cassie Ventura, left and Sean Combs appear at The Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute benefit gala on May 4, 2015, in New York. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP, File)

FILE - Cassie Ventura, left, and Sean "Diddy" Combs appear at the premiere of "Can't Stop, Won't Stop: A Bad Boy Story" on June 21, 2017, in Beverly Hills, Calif. (Photo by Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP, File)

FILE - Rapper Sean "Puffy" Combs, center, speaks to the media outside of court in New York after his assault case was postponed on June 24, 1999. (AP Photo/Lynsey Addario, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump's glowing account of progress under his watch Wednesday was out of tune with the experience of price-squeezed Americans and the story told by some of his government's own statistics.

In a speech from the White House, Trump assailed the record of his Democratic predecessor and boasted expansively about his record so far. Not all of those boasts were credible.

Among them:

TRUMP: He blamed Democrats for handing him an “inflation disaster,” “the worst in the history of our country,” and said that now, the prices of turkey and eggs have come down and "everything else is falling rapidly. And it’s not done yet. But boy, are we making progress.”

THE FACTS: His claim that prices are falling rapidly is not seen in the inflation numbers, which are about where they were when he took office, after having fallen significantly before the end of Joe Biden's presidency. Nor is it true that the Biden era gave the country its worst inflation ever.

The consumer price index was 3% in September, the same rate as in January, a tick up from 2.9% in December, Biden's last full month in office. In an AP-NORC poll this month, the vast majority of U.S. adults said they’ve noticed higher than usual prices for groceries, electricity and holiday gifts in recent months.

Biden-era inflation peaked at 9.1% in June 2022, a consequence of supply chain interruptions, potentially excessive amounts of government aid and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine driving up food and energy costs. Americans have known even worse and more sustained inflation than that: higher than 13% in 1980 during an extended period of price pain. By some estimates, inflation approached 20% during World War I.

Inflation had been falling during the first few months of Trump’s presidency, but it picked back up after the president announced his tariffs in April.

TRUMP: “I secured a record-breaking $18 trillion of investment into the United States.”

THE FACTS: Trump has presented no evidence that he’s secured this much domestic or foreign investment for the United States. Based on statements from various companies, foreign countries and the White House’s own website, that figure appears to be exaggerated, highly speculative and far higher than the actual sum.

Even the White House website offers a far lower number, $9.6 trillion, and that figure appears to include some investment commitments made during Biden’s presidency.

Trump has routinely claimed rosy investment numbers, without offering the details to support them. Trump nailed down some of the investment terms in an October trip to Japan and South Korea, but they’re over multiple years and it remains to be seen how ironclad those commitments and others will be.

TRUMP: “I was elected in a landslide, winning the popular vote and all seven swing states and everything else, with a mandate to take on a sick and corrupt system.”

THE FACTS: Trump won a decisive victory but hardly a landslide one, however you define a landslide. Trump, who became president with 312 electoral votes, won fewer than Democrats Barack Obama in 2008 (365) and 2012 (332) and Bill Clinton in 1992 (370) and 1996 (379).

The electoral performance of those men pales in comparison with the sweeps by Franklin Roosevelt in 1936 (523), Lyndon Johnson in 1964 (486), Richard Nixon in 1972 (520) and Ronald Reagan (525) in 1984.

Trump did win more popular votes than his Democratic opponent, Kamala Harris, but not quite a majority of them. His win in 2024 ranks among the more narrow.

Associated Press writers Josh Boak and Melissa Goldin contributed.

Find AP Fact Checks here: https://apnews.com/APFactCheck.

President Donald Trump speaks during an address to the nation from the Diplomatic Reception Room at the White House, Wednesday, Dec. 17, 2025, in Washington. (Doug Mills/The New York Times via AP, Pool)