Rap mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs had a go at courtroom sketch artist Jane Rosenberg on Thursday for making him look like a “koala.”
“Soften me up a bit, you’re making me look like a koala bear,” Combs said, according to Rosenberg, who was cited by Reuters.
Combs, 55, faces life in prison on charges including racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking. He was arrested in September and has since remained at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, New York.
He has pleaded not guilty to all the charges against him.
With cameras banned in Manhattan federal court, well-known courtroom sketch artist Rosenburg has been documenting Combs’ trial, which began on May 12.
But Combs is apparently not a fan of his courtroom makeover. He turned to the artist in the first row, asking her to make his pictures more flattering.
“During the four weeks of his trial, he has worn sweaters and sported graying hair and a goatee,” Reuters reported.
Diddy isn’t the first big-name defendant to raise an eyebrow at Rosenberg’s courtroom sketches.
Earlier this year, Rudy Giuliani reportedly joked that Rosenberg’s drawing of him looked like his dog.
And back in 2023, Donald Trump Jr. went full vanity project, telling Rosenberg during a civil fraud trial to “make me look sexy.” According to Reuters, he asked her to come up with a “portrait that could boost his romantic appeal.”
The courtroom sketch artist, with more than four decades in the industry, previously recalled sketching the late convicted sex offender and disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein.
“He’s totally a sicko, weirdo,” Rosenberg said in an interview with the New York Post in 2020.
She’s also drawn Epstein’s longtime associate Ghislaine Maxwell, who was pictured in a courtroom illustration during her sex trafficking trial in 2021 staring directly at Rosenberg and drawing her back.
That image went viral, with some X users pointing out how “terrifying” that courtroom picture looked.
Trump hasn’t ruled out the possibility of pardoning Combs, saying last month he was aware that he might be asked for clemency.
“Nobody’s asked,” he told reporters, when pressed on the matter by Fox News’ Peter Doocy. “But I know people are thinking about it. I think some people have been very close to asking.
“First of all, I’d look at what’s happening. And I haven’t been watching it too closely.
“I haven’t spoken to him in years.
“He used to really like me a lot, but I think when I ran for politics, he sort of—that relationship busted up, from what I read, I don’t know. He didn’t tell me that, but I’d read some little bit nasty statements in the paper all of a sudden,” said Trump.
“So, I don’t know. I would certainly look at the facts. If I think somebody was mistreated, whether they like me or don’t like me, wouldn’t have any impact,” he added
He added: “It’s not a popularity contest, so I don’t know. I would certainly look at the facts.”
The rapper’s trial is expected to last five weeks.
