The explosive lawsuit that alleges Sean “Diddy” Combs and R&B singer Aaron Hall took turns raping a highly intoxicated 16-year-old girl at a private residence in 1990 has added Jodeci member DeVanté Swing as a co-defendant. In a new, amended complaint filed in federal court in New Jersey, plaintiff Liza Gardner alleges Swing, born Donald DeGrate, was present at Hall’s New Jersey residence in 1990 when Combs allegedly pulled Gardner’s underwear to the side and “forcefully” raped her, leaving her “shocked and traumatized.” “Unbeknownst to Ms.
Gardner at the time, Defendant Swing was in the room when this assault took place and did not take any steps to prevent this abuse from occurring,” the amended lawsuit obtained by Rolling Stone states. The new filing follows after a woman submitted a sworn statement in the case last May stating she was a fellow minor accompanying Gardner that night and allegedly saw Swing “leaning against the wall or furniture or something, watching whatever Puffy was doing to Liza.” In the new filing, Gardner alleges Swing was 20 or 21 years old at the time, a few months older than Combs.
She says she had traveled to the New York area with Swing and a group of friends from her hometown in North Carolina and was staying with him in his New Jersey housing allegedly “subsidized” by Jodeci’s label at the time, Uptown Records, a subsidiary of MCA. The lawsuit says Combs was working as an A&R executive at Uptown and was assigned .