Diddy Wants Sequestered Jury Selection Process for Upcoming Trial

Diddy and federal prosecutors are at odds over the jury selection process for his upcoming criminal trial ... and his defense team wants to cast a wide net.

According to new legal docs, obtained by TMZ, Diddy's legal squad wants to begin jury selection on May 5 ... and they want to pick from a massive pool of 600 jurors.

Prosecutors, meanwhile, want to get started with jury selection next month ... proposing an April 21 start date, which Diddy's camp is balking at because they want more time to prepare his defense.

Diddy's camp wants prospective jurors to fill out written questionnaires, which would be collected and reviewed before both sides can find an agreement on 12 jurors for the trial.

The feds say they want any potential questionnaire limited to scheduling conflicts for jurors and nothing more. Diddy's camp is not indicating what exactly they want to ask potential jurors.

What's more, the Bad Boy Records founder wants a sequestered jury selection process to question jurors individually outside the presence of other jurors.

Diddy and prosecutors are also butting heads on a potential start date for the trial .... the feds want a jury seated for opening statements on May 5, while Diddy's side wants to start jury selection on May 5 and do the opening statements once they pick the jury.

The requests are part of Thursday's explosive court filings ... included in the same document where Diddy's camp claims CNN altered the Cassie beating footage and then destroyed the only known original copy of the video.