As they unsuccessfully fought to keep Sean "Diddy" Combs out of jail after his sex trafficking arrest , the music mogul's lawyers highlighted a litany of horrors at the Brooklyn federal lockup where he was headed: horrific conditions, rampant violence and multiple deaths.
Combs, 54, was sent to the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn on Tuesday - a place that's been described as "hell on earth" and an "ongoing tragedy" - after pleading not guilty in a case that accuses him of physically and sexually abusing women for more than a decade.
The facility, the only federal jail in New York City, has been plagued by problems since it opened in the 1990s. In recent years, its conditions have been so stark that some judges have refused to send people there. It has also been home to a number of high-profile inmates, including R. Kelly , Ghislaine Maxwell and Michael Cohen .
In a statement, the federal Bureau of Prisons said: "We also take seriously addressing the staffing and other challenges at MDC Brooklyn." An agency team is working to fix problems, including by adding permanent correctional and medical staff, remedying more than 700 backlogged maintenance requests and answering judges' concerns.
A judge on Wednesday denied a request by Combs' lawyers to let him await trial under house arrest at his $48 million mansion on an island in Miami Beach, Florida.
