The agency has pushed for repairs at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn as inmates, attorneys and judges continue to raise alarms about “unsafe and barbaric conditions,” rampant violence and multiple deaths. Some judges have refused to send people to the facility, the only federal prison in the nation’s largest city.
Mr. Combs’ lawyers are pushing for him to be transferred to a New Jersey prison, arguing that the Brooklyn jail, known as MDC Brooklyn, is not suitable for pretrial detention.
Sean “Diddy” Combs, 54, is being held in the facility’s special housing unit, confined to his cell for up to 23 hours a day with 24-hour surveillance. His attorney, Marc Agnifilo, said that’s routine for high-profile new arrivals.
MDC Brooklyn is getting much-needed attention from a group of senior Bureau of Prisons officials known as the Urgent Action Team, which is focused on getting the facility back to adequate staffing levels and ensuring it is in good repair.
The agency said Friday that it had increased staffing at the Brooklyn jail by 20%, bringing its total number of employees to 469. Even so, there are 157 vacancies. The new hires include correctional officers and medical staff. Before the increase, the facility was operating at about 55% of its full staff, according to court documents.
At the same time, the facility’s inmate population has dropped from about 1,600 at the start of the year to about 1,200 as of Friday.
A senior Bureau of Prisons official told The Associated Press that members of the Urgent Action Team have made repeated visits to MDC Brooklyn and meet weekly to address issues at the prison.
The official was not authorized to publicly discuss the ongoing review and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity.
In addition to hiring, the Bureau of Prisons says it is addressing a major maintenance backlog at the Brooklyn jail. In the four weeks since spring, temporary workers have completed more than 800 work orders for repairs and infrastructure improvements. These have included electrical and plumbing upgrades, as well as repairs to the food service, heating and air conditioning systems.
Unsanitary conditions, trafficking and violence
MDC Brooklyn has been plagued by problems since it opened in the 1990s. Part of the property, near the waterfront in the Sunset Park neighborhood, is a centuries-old former Navy warehouse.
The Bureau of Prisons closed its other New York prison, the Metropolitan Correctional Center, in 2021 after Jeffrey Epstein’s suicide exposed poor security, crumbling infrastructure and dangerous and squalid conditions there.
Inmates at MDC Brooklyn have long complained of frequent violence, horrific conditions, severe staff shortages and widespread smuggling of drugs and other contraband, which is facilitated by some employees.
At the same time, they say they were subjected to frequent lockdowns during which they were forbidden from leaving their cells for visits, calls, showers or exercise.
In recent months, inmates have also alleged that food served at the prison contains maggots. The senior Bureau of Prisons official who spoke to the AP about the work of the urgent action team said all food at the prison was tested after that claim and no maggots were found. An assistant warden also tests food before it is served, the official said.
The agency’s focus on fixing MDC Brooklyn comes amid increased congressional scrutiny and a new law overhauling oversight of the embattled federal prison system. Combs’ detention at MDC Brooklyn has only further galvanized public interest.
