Joseph Sherman, a former bodyguard of P. Diddy, accused one of the rapper’s alleged victims of defamation, further asserting that she attempted to ‘blackmail’ him in a new lawsuit

After being named in one of the allegations against Sean “P. Diddy” Combs, the rapper’s former bodyguard is claiming he was defamed.Thalia Graves, who filed a lawsuit against Diddy with allegations of sexual assault, claimed she was raped by his former guard, Joseph Sherman. The complaint filed by Graves in Sept. 2024, claimed Sherman “viciously raped her at the Bad Boy Records studio in New York City,” alongside his former employer. She alleged in court documents obtained by the Mirror that the pair gave her a drink “likely laced with a drug that eventually caused her briefly to lose consciousness. She awoke to find herself bound and restrained.”

However, Sherman, in his own complaint secured by the Mirror, claimed her accusations are false. He claimed Graves filed the lawsuit “without any proof.” The documents further allege that Graves made “outrageous, disgusting, and life altering statements and publishings about the Plaintiff without any regard for the truth.”

Sherman claimed in his lawsuit that he never met Graves, despite her claim that he “was employed by Combs as his bodyguard and head of security during the relevant time period described herein and served in various roles in the Combs Corporations.” Additionally, while Graves claimed the alleged incident occurred “in or around 2001,” Sherman countered in his lawsuit that he stopped working for Diddy in 1999 which was three years prior to when Graves claimed.

The bodyguard claims Graves attempted to blackmail him ( Image: AFP via Getty Images)
According to Sherman, he was not allowed in Bad Boy Records’ studio or near Diddy during the time frame of the alleged assault as he began working at a competitor’s company. “He could not have videotaped or raped Thalia Graves,” he claimed in his allegation.

Diddy’s former bodyguard further alleged that Graves attempted to “blackmail” him after filing her civil complaint. As part of the court filing, Sherman included screenshots of messages between the pair where Graves allegedly wrote “if you will be my witness against Diddy, then my attorneys will leave you out of any proceedings …” and added, “I will make sure the state does not pick up charges or rape charges against you.”

The lawsuit further alleged: “These statements imply that Defendant, Thalia Graves, is aware that Plaintiff, Joseph Sherman, is innocent of any alleged sexual assault but is attempting to leverage baseless allegations as part of her broader litigation strategy.”

A representative for Joseph Sherman told the Mirror: “When we think of the [Me Too] movement we must not forget the thousands of men who have been falsely accused who are screaming [Me too]. Innocent victims of false claims that continue to suffer as a result. And these wrongly accused men aren’t the only victims of false claims, in fact, the thousands of women who are truly sexually assaulted are hurt by these financially motivated claims, because no one hears their cries. The defendants in this lawsuit need to be held responsible for their actions and they need to understand that a ‘cash grab’ based on false claims hurts more people than they can imagine in more ways than they can imagine.”

The Mirror contacted representatives for Diddy and Thalia Graves. Diddy continues to deny all allegations of wrongdoing, including the allegations made by Graves in her lawsuit against him.