EXCLUSIVE — Asked Thursday about a challenge to whether Sean “Diddy” Combs’ $100 million defamation suit belongs in federal court at all, his attorney Erica Wolff gave U.S. District Judge John P. Cronan what she called a preliminary response. Combs had come to New York before the suit was filed intending to stay, she said, and “the Miami home has been sold.”
Property records say otherwise. Combs owned two mansions on Miami Beach’s Star Island. The one that sold is the house next door. The one he lived in, the one federal agents raided in March 2024, still belongs to a Florida company that lists him as its chief executive.
Sean Combs as been in the spotlight recently with his attorneys at N.Y. law firm Sher Tremonte asking the judge to remove them from the case, citing lack of payment and a lack of communication. Many critics question whether Combs could even find new attorneys, given his horrible and violent reputation. The word on the street is that he threatens his attorneys.
Did Diddy’s Attorney Misrepresent His Miami Home Sale to the Judge?
Combs bought 2 Star Island Drive in November 2003 for $14.5 million and built it into a 9-bedroom, 12-bath compound the county now values at $45 million. It is the house with the gate that Homeland Security agents rammed open with an armored vehicle, the one where they found the 25 bottles of baby oil shown to jurors at his criminal trial. It is the house he paid off an $18.8 million mortgage on weeks before his arrest and then offered as collateral for a $50 million bond. And it is the address on his Florida voter registration, which lists Sean Love Combs as an active voter at 2 Star Island Drive, no party, last ballot cast Nov. 3, 2020.
The Miami-Dade Property Appraiser shows no sale of that parcel since 2003. The owner of record is 2 West Star Island LLC. The company’s amended annual report, filed with the Florida Division of Corporations on May 26, 2026, names Sean Combs as CEO, Tarik Brooks as controller and Robin Greenhill as manager. Greenhill is the power of attorney Combs’ own lawyers served with their motion to withdraw on Monday. Greenhill was previously accused of providing payments to sex workers in Rodney ‘Lil Rod’ Jones lawsuit against Combs.
What did sell is 1 Star Island Drive, the neighboring lot Combs bought for $35 million in 2021, formerly the residence of Gloria Estefan. County records show 1 West Star Island LLC, managed by Brooks, sold it on June 26, 2026, for $55 million to JFSTAR LLC, a two-month-old company with a Virginia mailing address and no officers listed.
Wolff did not say which house she meant. She has told the court she cannot reach her client, and Judge Cronan gave her until Oct. 19 to report whether Combs will hire new counsel or represent himself.
Sher Tremonte represent Combs in at least 27 different civil cases, and it remains to be seen if they will be asking for reprieve in those cases as well.
Possible replacement attorneys names being thrown around by critics, include Teni Geragos‘ father, Mark Geragos. As our readers know, Combs longtime attorney Mark Geragos, has been seemingly perpetually involved in scandals and misconduct, even being labeled as a “liar for hire” for his alleged role in an $213 million extortion against the Michael Jackson estate.
“Plaintiff cannot have it both ways”
The distinction matters because the case is in federal court only on diversity of citizenship. Ariel Mitchell, the attorney Combs is suing, lives in Miami. If Combs was a Floridian when he filed in January 2025, there is no diversity and no case. His complaint sidestepped the question by stating that he “presently resides in Brooklyn.” At the time, that was the Metropolitan Detention Center.
Steven Metcalf, Mitchell’s lawyer, has now put Combs’ own filings in other courts in front of Cronan. In O’Marcaigh v. Combs, a sexual assault suit in Los Angeles, Combs moved to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction. On March 31, 2026, Judge Dolly Gee granted it, “relying on the evidence Plaintiff himself submitted establishing that he is a permanent resident and domiciliary of Florida,” Metcalf wrote. “Plaintiff obtained dismissal on the O’Marcaigh case – on this basis – while confined at the MDC.”
Metcalf added that Sher Tremonte, the same firm now trying to quit, removed a New Jersey case against Combs to federal court in July 2024 on the strength of diversity jurisdiction, which required representing that Combs was not a New Jersey citizen.
“Overall, Plaintiff cannot have it both ways,” the filing says, “where he claims a Florida domicile to defeat jurisdiction in California; while simultaneously, in this case Plaintiff relied on a Brooklyn detention cell to create it here.”
Courts generally treat a prisoner’s domicile as the one he had before he was locked up. Combs was arrested in a Manhattan hotel in September 2024 and has been in federal custody since. Everything in the public record before that date points to Star Island.
Jurisdiction in Question
Cronan did not rule on the domicile question Thursday. He extended Combs’ time to respond to Metcalf’s letter and put off Mitchell’s motion to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction until the representation issue is sorted out. Nexstar, which spent 20 months narrowing the case against it to a single statement about drug-laced baby oil, asked that if Mitchell’s presence defeats jurisdiction, the claims against her be severed rather than the whole case dismissed.
We reported the telephonic hearing Thursday. The sale Wolff described is real. It is just not the house that matters.
Sources: Sept. 17, 2026, telephone conference in Combs v. Burgess, No. 1:25-cv-00650 (S.D.N.Y.); letter from Steven A. Metcalf II to Judge Cronan; Miami-Dade Property Appraiser, folios 02-4204-001-0020 and 02-4204-001-0010; Florida Division of Corporations, 2 West Star Island LLC (L03000045966), 1 West Star Island LLC (L21000126474) and JFSTAR LLC (L26000228456); Florida voter roll via floridaparcels.com; O’Marcaigh v. Combs, No. 2:25-cv-03650 (C.D. Cal.), Dkt. 37; Gardner v. Combs, No. 2:24-cv-07729 (D.N.J.); New York Post; Realtor.com.
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This is an opinion article.