CNN
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The detention center where music mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs is now living has been described as “disgusting” and the conditions are “appalling,” but it’s a far cry from the mansions in Miami and Los Angeles where he once lived.

“He wakes up and stares at white walls painted with cinder blocks instead of the furnishings of his mansions,” Michael Cohen, a former lawyer for President Donald Trump, told CNN on Wednesday.

Cohen should know. He’s one of many high-profile inmates who’ve served time at New York City’s notorious Metropolitan Detention Center. The facility has been home to singer R. Kelly, “Pharma Bro” Martin Shkreli, socialite Ghislaine Maxwell, former crypto expert Sam Bankman-Fried and rapper Fetty Wap. It currently holds alleged cartel leader Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada Garcia as he awaits trial on murder and drug trafficking charges.

A federal judge on Wednesday denied Combs’ bail, saying his defense attorneys’ bail offer was “insufficient” to address the court’s concerns. Judge Andrew Carter said there were “no conditions” that would mitigate the risk of witness tampering or obstruction in Combs’ case. As such, the entertainer must remain in federal custody until he is tried on charges of racketeering, conspiracy and sex trafficking. Combs has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

With no trial date set for the 54-year-old hip-hop artist, it’s not yet known how long Combs will be held in the Brooklyn jail. But after Wednesday’s hearing on his bail denial, his attorney said he would appeal the decision.

The Brooklyn prison, notorious for poor living conditions, staff shortages, inmate violence and power outages, is currently the only federal corrections facility serving the nation’s largest city, after the Federal Bureau of Prisons closed its Manhattan complex shortly after multimillionaire financier and accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide in 2019.

When asked about current conditions at the MDC, a spokesperson for the Federal Bureau of Prisons said the agency “takes seriously our obligation to protect the individuals in our custody” and as such “reviews security protocols and implements corrective actions as necessary.”

The Bureau of Prisons earlier this year established an Urgent Action Team “to take a holistic look at the challenges at MDC Brooklyn,” spokesman Emery Nelson said in an email.

“The team’s work is ongoing, but it has already increased permanent staffing at the facility (including COs and medical staff), addressed more than 700 overdue maintenance requests, and provided a continued focus on the issues raised in two recent court rulings,” Nelson said.

“It’s a very difficult place to be incarcerated,” Combs’ attorney Marc Agnifilo argued in court Wednesday, telling the judge that it would be difficult for his client to prepare for trial if he were placed there.

The Metropolitan Detention Center was built in the 1990s to address overcrowding in New York City’s jails. It houses prisoners awaiting trial in the federal courts in Brooklyn and Manhattan.

“He wakes up on a steel bed with a 1.5-inch mattress, no pillows, in an 8-by-10-foot cell that I can assure you is disgusting,” Cohen told CNN on Wednesday. Cohen, who served time at the prison in 2020, said inmates in the facility’s Special Housing Unit, where Combs is housed, essentially have a 3-by-5-foot space to move around in.

“There are no books in the beginning, so he’s really busy right now,” Cohen said of what to expect from Combs’ first days at the facility.

In June, an inmate awaiting trial on weapons charges, Uriel Whyte, was stabbed to death by another inmate, according to a news release from the Bureau of Prisons. A month later, inmate Edwin Cordero died in a brawl that broke out at the prison. Cordero’s attorney told The New York Times that his client was “another victim of MDC Brooklyn, an overcrowded, understaffed and neglected federal prison that is hell on earth.”

In January 2019, a prolonged power outage plunged the prison into crisis, leaving inmates in near-total darkness for a week and exposed to the frigid temperatures that have plagued the Northeast. The incident prompted a Justice Department investigation into whether the Bureau of Prisons had “adequate emergency plans” in place to address inmates’ living conditions. According to a lawsuit filed on behalf of the inmates, prisoners were reportedly locked in their cells for days at a time and forced to endure non-functioning cell toilets and other unsanitary conditions.

The Bureau of Prisons settled the lawsuit last summer, paying 1,600 inmates a total of about $10 million in damages for the freezing and inhumane conditions resulting from the power outage.