Major Lazer’s Diplo Reportedly Faces Criminal Charges For Sexual Misconduct

Record producer Diplo of the Jamaican American electronic dance music trio, Major Lazer, may be facing criminal charges for sexual misconduct following a police investigation.

According to BuzzFeed News, the Los Angeles city attorney’s office is considering charging Diplo for the misdemeanors of invasion of privacy, recording and sharing a video without a person’s consent, and intentionally giving someone a sexually transmitted infection.

Diplo, whose real name is Thomas Wesley Pentz, was accused by a 25-year-old of allegedly recording sexually explicit videos of her without her permission, distributing at least one without her consent, and knowingly infecting her with chlamydia. Diplo has repeatedly denied those allegations and has also secured a temporary restraining order against her and has sued her for stalking, trespassing and distribution of private materials.

One video under investigation was posted in October 2020 and was tweeted multiple times by users expressing support. The woman alleges that the video was only shared with Diplo and that she believed he was responsible for the tweets. As such in November 2020, a state superior court judge granted her a temporary restraining order, prohibiting Diplo from distributing any image of her intimate body part or of her engaged in any sexual activity of sorts.

However, the allegations do not end there. The 25-year-old, whose identity has not been revealed also reported that Diplo had raped her in his Las Vegas hotel room after one of his concerts in July 2019. Though Diplo admits to having been in a relationship, their recollection of their sexual encounters differs drastically. Diplo’s lawyers acknowledge the 25-year-old to be an obsessive fan who stalked him.

The police however have not filed any criminal charges in relation to the alleged rape.

Despite these allegations, a documentary about Major Lazer is set to release today, October 6, on their YouTube channel.

According to Major Lazer in a tweet, “Since day one our mission has been to make the world smaller by making the party bigger. Watch our journey to accomplish that in the new Major Lazer documentary out tomorrow on our YouTube channel”

The documentary is dubbed Worldwide.

This allegation and potential charges also come on the heels of the music trio’s nomination for the Latin Grammy award for their single Diplomatico featuring Puerto Rican rapper Guayeno. Diplomatico which was released March this year has been nominated for Best Urban Fusion/Performance.