Houston attorney Tony Buzbee said he expects lawsuits to be filed within the next month, with most expected to be filed in New York and Los Angeles. Buzbee described the victims as 60 males and 60 females, and that 25 were minors at the time of the alleged misconduct. One individual alleged he was 9 years old when he was abused, Buzbee said. The allegations cover a period from 1991 to this year.

“This type of sexual assault, sexual abuse, sexual exploitation should never happen in the United States or anywhere else. This should have never been allowed to go on for so long. This conduct has created a mass of individuals who are injured, scared and scarred,” Buzbee said at a news conference.

Following the announcement of the accusations in Texas, an attorney for Combs said the performer “cannot address every meritless allegation in what has become a reckless media circus.”

“That said, Mr. Combs emphatically and categorically denies as false and defamatory any claim that he sexually abused anyone, including minors,” attorney Erica Wolff said in a statement. “He looks forward to proving his innocence and vindicating himself in court, where the truth will be established based on evidence, not speculation.”

Buzbee said more than 3,280 individuals contacted his firm and alleged they were victimized by Combs and that after vetting the allegations, his firm decided to represent 120 people. Other cases are still being reviewed. He said some of his clients have spoken with the FBI.

The individuals that Buzbee’s firm is representing are from more than 25 states, with the majority from California, New York, Georgia and Florida.

The abuse that’s being alleged took place mostly at parties held in New York, California and Florida where individuals were given drinks that were laced with drugs, Buzbee said.

Some of the alleged conduct took place at auditions where “many times, especially young people, people wanting to break into the industry were coerced into this type of conduct in the promise of being made a star,” Buzbee said.

Combs, 54, has been locked up at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn since pleading not guilty Sept. 17 to federal charges that he used his “power and prestige” to induce female victims into drugged-up, elaborately produced sexual performances with male sex workers in events dubbed “Freak Offs.”

Other alleged victims have already filed lawsuits against Combs that include allegations of sexual assault.

Combs has pleaded not guilty to racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking. His attorney said he is innocent and will fight to clear his name.

Combs is one of the best-known music executives, producers and performers across hip-hop, having won three Grammys and worked with artists such as Notorious B.I.G., Mary J. Blige, Usher, Lil Kim, Faith Evans and 112. He founded Bad Boy Records in 1993, the influential fashion line Sean John, a vodka brand and the Revolt TV network. He sold off his stake in the latter company in June of this year.

Buzbee has also represented women who accused NFL quarterback Deshaun Watson of sexual assault and misconduct.

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The former president has made hitting back at opponents and accusers a centerpiece of his political identity, but his performance at his namesake Manhattan office tower was startling even by Trump’s combative standards.

At times, he seemed to relish using graphic language and characterizations of the case brought by advice columnist E. Jean Carroll, which could expose the former president to further legal challenges from Carroll’s attorneys. His remarks were especially striking given that they came four days before Trump will debate Vice President Kamala Harris, with early voting about to begin in some parts of the country and Election Day just two months away.

Trump is doing his best to stay in the public eye while Harris prepares for the debate in private, meeting with her advisers in Pittsburgh. That’s a reflection of their divergent campaign styles, with Trump frequently engaging with reporters — albeit often in friendly settings — while Harris has done just one interview and no news conferences since taking President Joe Biden’s place atop the Democratic ticket.

His team had billed Friday’s appearance as a press conference and Trump repeatedly brought up Harris’ lack of news conferences. But Trump took no questions and instead talked about the cases against him for an hour while hardly mentioning any campaign issues.

“I’m running for president, and I have all these cases all of a sudden come,” he said. “And they’re fake cases.”

Trump’s campaign raised tens of millions of dollars off his previous indictments, convictions and appearances in court. But it’s unclear how focusing on his legal woes will help him now as he works to win over undecided voters — including independents and those on the fence in critical swing states, ahead of a critical debate on Tuesday that will likely draw tens of millions of viewers.

Trump has disregarded his aides’ advice to focus on policy

Trump’s trying to seize the political offensive by bringing up allegations against him recalled 2016 when, in the weeks before Election Day, he attempted to dismiss as simple “locker room talk” a recording of him bragging about grabbing, forcibly kissing and sexually assaulting women, which triggered subsequent allegations of misconduct by a string of women.

But on Friday, standing inside Trump Tower, where he lived for decades before moving to Florida, Trump had many moments that evoked a more distant past.

He suggested women have accused him of wrongdoing because he is famous. He made a trio of references to how he was already famous in some circles in the 1970s, and talked about his work in the real estate and construction worlds in the 1980s — before millions of today’s voters were born. At one point, he referenced the New York Post’s famous “Page Six” gossip section, whose writers have spent decades covering him, as being the internet of its day.

Trump called Carroll’s case against him “Monica Lewinsky Part II,” referencing the then-White House intern who had a sexual relationship with President Bill Clinton, and recalled an infamous dress that played a pivotal role in the late-1990s impeachment proceedings against Clinton.

The former president also repeatedly implied he would not have assaulted two of his accusers due to their looks. He said of a woman who has accused him of sexual misconduct on a plane in the 1970s “she would not have been the chosen one,” and of Carroll, “I never touched her. I would have had no interest in meeting her in any way, shape or form.”

Harris, a former California attorney general, says frequently of her opponent’s criminal record, “I know Donald Trump’s type.” She had no public schedule as she continued debate preparation on Friday, but has built her campaign partly around the idea of prosecuting the case against him — and the accusations Trump brought up Friday could give her more lines of political attack.

Trump’s supporters and aides have urged him to focus on policy contrasts with Harris instead of personal attacks during the final stretch of a race that remains extremely close.

But, as Trump spoke, two of his top political advisers were on a call with Republican members of Congress, criticizing the media as being too soft on Harris while saying they felt confident about the race for the White House. Instead, the former president was flanked by his lawyers, some of whom also spoke in defense of their client.

Trump faces unprecedented criminal and civil jeopardy for a major candidate

His comments came after Trump was in court to hear his lawyers argue for overturning a jury’s $5 million verdict finding him liable of sexually abusing Carroll in 1996.

Juries now have twice now awarded Carroll huge sums for Trump’s claiming she made up a story about him attacking her in a department store dressing room to help her sell a memoir. But that hasn’t stopped Trump from continuing to make nearly identical statements to reporters. On Friday, he said again that Carroll was telling a “made up, fabricated story.”

Carroll’s lawyer, Roberta Kaplan, warned in March after a jury awarded Carroll another $83 million that she would continue to monitor Trump’s comments and would consider suing again if he kept it up. In a speedy response to his Friday comments at Trump Tower, Kaplan said in a statement, “I’ve said before and I’ll say it again: All options are on the table.”

In the meantime, Trump faces unprecedented criminal and civil jeopardy for a major-party nominee.

He has separately been convicted on 34 felony counts in a New York state case related to hush money payments allegedly made to a porn actor. The judge in that case announced separately Friday that he would postpone sentencing until after Election Day on Nov. 5.

Trump has also been ordered to pay steep civil fines for lying about his wealth for years.

And he’s still contending with cases alleging his mishandling of classified documents, his actions after the 2020 election and his activities during the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 — though none are likely to go to trial prior to Election Day.

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WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. military academies must improve their leadership, stop toxic practices such as hazing and shift behavior training into the classrooms, according to a Pentagon study aimed at addressing an alarming spike in sexual assaults and misconduct.

U.S. officials said the academies must train student leaders better to help their classmates, and upend what has been a disconnect between what the cadets and midshipmen are learning in school and the often negative and unpunished behavior they see by those mentors. The review calls for additional senior officers and enlisted leaders to work with students at the Army, Navy and Air Force academies and provide the expanded training.

The report, which was released Thursday, says that too often discussions about stress relief, misconduct, social media and other life issues take place after hours or on the weekends. The report recommends that those topics be addressed in classes and graded, to promote their importance.

The study comes on the heels of a report this year that showed a sharp spike in reported sexual assaults at the academies during the 2021-22 school year. It said that one in five female students said in an anonymous survey that they had experienced unwanted sexual contact. The survey results were the highest since the Defense Department began collecting that data many years ago.

Student-reported assaults at the academies jumped 18% overall compared with the previous year, fueled in part by the Navy, which had nearly double the number in 2022, compared with 2021. The anonymous survey accompanying the report found increases in all types of unwanted sexual contact — from touching to rape — at all the schools. And it cited alcohol as a key factor.

In response to the spike in assaults, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin ordered on-site evaluations at the U.S. Naval Academy in Maryland, the Air Force Academy in Colorado and the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in New York, to explore the issues and identify solutions. The new report, expected to be released Thursday, makes several immediate and longer-term recommendations to improve assault and harassment prevention and eliminate toxic climates that fuel the problems. Austin is ordering quick implementation of the changes.

In a memo, Austin acknowledges that the academies “have far more work to do to halt sexual assault and harassment.” He says the increase in assaults and harassment “is disturbing and unacceptable. It endangers our teammates and degrades our readiness.”

Elizabeth Foster, executive director of the Pentagon’s force resiliency office, told reporters Thursday that the study will set up ways to measure whether the changes are working. But she cautioned that “not only are they going to take time to implement, but cultural change does take time.”

Foster and Andra Tharp, the senior prevention adviser for the force resiliency office, said that while the academies offer a lot of strong programs, toxic and unhealthy command climates make them less effective. When cadets and midshipmen learn one thing about leadership or prevention in the classroom, but they don’t see it reinforced in other settings, it sends mixed messages about what to expect, about how to be treated and how to treat others.

Such mixed messages, they said, create cynicism and distrust.

The report points to the Air Force Academy’s longstanding system that treats freshmen differently and badly, promoting hazing and an unhealthy climate. Tharp said those students may leave the academy with a poor sense of what good leadership looks like.

“What was striking was that the message was, this is okay here and this is how we treat each other,” Tharp said. “Unfortunately, that didn’t stop once they left their freshman year.”

The officials added that a contributing factor to the behavior problems is that — like other college students around the country — many more cadets and midshipmen are arriving at the academies with previous bad experiences, ranging from assaults and harassment to thoughts of or attempts at suicide. On top of that, the report says incoming students then face a lot of stress as they grapple with their education and the military training.

In many cases, the report says that student leaders aren’t trained or equipped to handle those issues or provide proper support to the students.

Another problem, officials said, is the ever expanding influence of social media, where bullying and harassment can go on unchecked. The report pointed to Jodel, an anonymous social media app that focuses on a specific location and is in wide use by academy students.

The report said students can get inaccurate information about assault prevention, reporting, resources and military justice from the app, making them less likely to seek help.

It said training at the academies has not kept pace with change, including the ever-evolving social media platforms and how students differ today from in the past.

The report also noted that alcohol plays a significant role in misconduct. Asked about additional alcohol restrictions, Tharp said the academies can “implement all the alcohol prevention or responsible drinking as much as we want,” but if those policies are implemented in a toxic command climate they won’t have the intended impact.

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U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Mary F. Walrath on Tuesday approved the disclosure statement that will be sent to the women and the procedures that’ll be used to solicit their responses.

This version of the settlement still includes a $17 million sexual misconduct claims fund, an $8.4 million liquidation trust settlement payment to cover bankruptcy claims not related to sexual misconduct, and about $9.7 million toward defense costs for former representatives of the company, not including Weinstein himself. And instead of getting its own line item for more than $1.1 million in legal fees for services rendered to the debtors prior to the petition, Seyfarth Shaw will become an unsecured creditor and receive a pro rata share of the liquidation trust.

A sexual misconduct claims examiner will review each claim that’s filed, along with the documents and statements offered in support of it, and assign a “point award.” Those points will be used to determine how much money each woman receives. (If Jane Doe’s claim is assigned 10 points and the total points assigned across all claims is 100, she’d get 10 percent of the total victim’s fund.)

Once a sexual misconduct claim is allowed, each accuser will have the choice whether or not to release all future claims against Weinstein. If a woman chooses to release him, she’ll get what the examiner determines to be her full share. Those who choose not to release him will only receive 25 percent of the value assigned to their claim using the points system, and the rest will go to the insurance companies. (The deal includes a mandatory perpetual release of claims against The Weinstein Company and TWC board members and execs, including Bob Weinstein).

Three different ballots will be used to determine whether the settlement has sufficient support to move forward — one for sexual misconduct claims, one for other tort claims and one for general unsecured claims. (Read the order and see the ballots in the document below.) The court can approve the plan if it’s approved by at least two-thirds of the total voters and more than one-half of voters in each of the classes.

Ballots must be completed and delivered by 5 p.m. ET on Dec. 18.

Any objections to the settlement — of which there could be many given the extremely critical public response to earlier iterations of the deal — must also be submitted in writing to the court by Dec. 18.

A confirmation hearing is currently set for Jan. 14.

This article originally appeared in THR.com.

-Ashley Cullins

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