NEW YORK — A Manhattan jury started deliberating the sex trafficking and racketeering case against Sean “Diddy” Combs on Monday, with a possible life sentence on the line for the disgraced Bad Boy Records founder.

The anonymous eight men and four women on the panel got the case at 11:30 a.m. after hearing a two-hour instruction on the law from Manhattan Federal Judge Arun Subramanian and deliberated through lunch. They asked to go home shortly before 5 p.m. and are set to resume at 9 a.m. Tuesday.

A possible impasse was already brewing less than two hours into deliberations when the jury foreperson sent out a note reading, “We have a juror, No. 25, who we are concerned cannot follow Your Honor’s instructions.”

The juror, a man, is a 51-year-old scientist who lives in Manhattan. It wasn’t clear from the foreperson’s note whether Juror No. 25 was unable to follow Subramanian’s instructions because he believed Combs was innocent or guilty.

After conferring with lawyers for the mogul and federal prosecutors, Subramanian responded to the jurors, reminding them of their obligations to follow his instructions and directing them to keep at it.

Combs, 55, has pleaded not guilty to two counts of sex trafficking by force, fraud or coercion, racketeering conspiracy, and two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution.

The jury heard approximately six weeks of testimony from 34 witnesses, including Combs’ exes, Casandra “Cassie” Ventura and a woman who testified anonymously as “Jane,” who alleged he coerced them into drug addled, dehumanizing and sometimes violent sexual performances — so-called “freak-offs” — with male commercial sex workers that ran for days at a time.

The women said that they initially participated willingly in the debauched events out of love for Combs and a desperate desire to please him, but that they became disturbed over time and sought a way out. Ventura and Jane said that Combs became violent when he heard the word “no” and that he sometimes threatened to release humiliating footage he’d shot of them having sex with male escorts.

The Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office alleges the multimillionaire rap producer’s habitual abuse was facilitated by paid members of a criminal enterprise, who procured drugs for the marathon sex sessions, intimidated victims into silence and terrorized anyone who crossed him.

“The defendant used power, violence and fear to get what he wanted,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Christine Slavik said in the government’s closing argument last week.

“That stops now. It’s time to hold him accountable. It’s time for justice.”

To find Combs guilty of racketeering conspiracy, which could carry a life sentence, jurors need to find that alleged members of his enterprise committed at least one of eight predicate acts — sex trafficking, transportation for prostitution, forced labor, kidnapping, arson, witness tampering, bribery and drug distribution — on two occasions.

In another note sent later in the afternoon, jurors asked the court for guidance concerning who the guilty party is when someone requests a controlled substance and another person hands it over. Subramanian told the jury he’d respond to the query first thing Tuesday.

To convict Combs of the sex trafficking counts, which could also carry life behind bars, the jury needs to determine that Ventura and or Jane were trafficked for sex in at least one freak-off out of hundreds cited in trial testimony. That would involve determining that Combs knowingly recruited and enticed them for the illicit sex parties, “harbored and maintained them” in hotel rooms he paid for, and knew or recklessly disregarded that they were only sleeping with strangers at his behest due to force, threats of force, fraud or any combination of the three.

Combs’ defense has maintained that while he has assaulted his romantic partners, he never forced them into freak-offs against their will and did not employ staff to commit crimes — as racketeers — even if they sometimes did.

A guilty verdict on the most straightforward charges facing Combs, alleging he transported individuals for prostitution, requires jurors only to find he was in some way involved in moving people across state lines or internationally for sex work.

Multiple witnesses, including escorts, testified about Combs organizing for male performers to travel across the country and to various Caribbean islands for dayslong freak-off sessions. In closing arguments Friday, his lawyer Marc Agnifilo said the men were technically paid for their time, not sex.

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