Luc Cohen
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Despite being found not guilty of the worst offenses in his sex trafficking trial, Sean Diddy’s comb will still await a sentence in a notorious Brooklyn prison and violent Brooklyn prison where music superstars have lived in nearly a decade of lockdown and battle.
Combs, 55, has been held at the Metropolitan Detention Center since his arrest in September 2024. The facility also holds convicted sex traffickers such as British socialites Ghislaine Maxwell and Rhythm and Blues Singer R. Kelly, a far cry from the luxurious Los Angeles and Miami Building combs until last year.
Combs’ attorneys asked U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian to release him on $1 million in bonds ahead of the verdict, which is expected to take place in October.
The judge said, “I know you don’t know, Mr. Coms doesn’t want to go back to MDC.” The comb shook his head.
His hopes were quickly cleared after the more serious charges were returned to one of the houses and the family’s hugs. The judge denied Combs’ bail request using evidence of the violence presented during the trial.
In recent years, MDC has been plagued by ongoing shortages of staff in prisoners’ food, power outages and debris. Two weeks after Comms’ arrest, prosecutors announced criminal charges against nine MDC inmates, including crimes, attempted murder and murder in the months before Comms’ arrival.
Last January, a federal judge in Manhattan refused to order a man charged with a drug offence to be detained at the MDC trial, saying the conditions there were “ongoing tragedy.”
Last August, another judge said he would convert the nine-month prison sentence of an older defendant to family incarceration if he was taken to the MDC, citing the “dangerous, savage condition” of the prison.
The U.S. Prison Service, which runs the MDC, said in a statement that it is engaged in “a strong effort to improve the conditions in Brooklyn.” The agency said drugs, weapons and other contraband were confiscated during multiple-day scans in prison last October and November.
During the eight-week trial, the U.S. Marshal transported combs daily from a court in Lower Manhattan to a facility near Sunset Park in Brooklyn, which also housed former cryptocurrency entrepreneurs Sam Bankman Fried and Luigi Mangione, accused of killing a health insurance company.
Bankman Fried has since been transferred to a low-security prison in California and appealed for his fraud conviction and 25 years in prison. Mangione pleaded not guilty to murder.
A jury sentenced to life imprisonment on Wednesday on charges of sexual trafficking and extortion, but he was convicted of two counts of prostitution, which could put him in jail for several years. He pleaded not guilty to all charges.
Combs’ defense attorney Marc Agnifilo said in court Wednesday that the combs were placed in “a very difficult part of the MDC” where the fight took place. His attorney, Alexandra Shapiro, said in a court filing in November 2024 that frequent lockdowns at the facility undermined the comb’s ability to prepare for trial.
Combs’ lawyers praised the MDC staff on Wednesday, who said they promoted their contact with him during the trial.
“While the MDC is in a terrible state, I want to thank the good people who work there,” defense attorney Teny Geragos told reporters after the verdict.
(Reported by Luc Cohen, New York; Editors by Noeleen Walder and Bill Berkrot)
