Drugs and weapons seized in raid of prison where Sean “Diddy” Combs is being held | US News

Federal authorities have confirmed they seized drugs, homemade weapons and electronic devices during a search of the prison where Sean “Diddy” Combs is being held on sex trafficking conspiracy charges ahead of a trial next year.

The Bureau of Prisons, which led the multi-agency search of the Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) in Brooklyn that began Monday, said the operation was not related to Combs' incarceration but was “pre-planned and coordinated to ensure the safety” of staff to ensure and inmates.

The prison, which houses 1,200 people, has been under renewed scrutiny since two men were fatally stabbed in the summer. Five inmates were later charged with murder.

Four other inmates and a guard were also charged with assault, including a man who was stabbed 44 times by three gang members and another where an inmate was stabbed in the spine with a makeshift ice pick.

An MDC officer was also charged with shooting at a car during an unauthorized high-speed chase.

“Violence will not be tolerated in our federal prisons,” said U.S. Attorney Breon Peace, adding that the charges should serve as a “warning to those who would commit criminal behavior behind bars and to all others who enable those crimes: you Behavior will do it. “You will be exposed and you will be held accountable.”

The detention center has held Jeffrey Epstein co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell in recent years and is currently holding cryptocurrency fraudster Sam Bankman-Fried along with Combs, whose lawyers have made poor prison conditions part of their argument for bail .

The music impresario, who faces more than a dozen civil sexual assault lawsuits, has asked the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to grant him his release after he was twice denied bail by two different Manhattan judges. Arguments are scheduled for Monday.

A federal grand jury will also hear new evidence against Combs next week, likely including testimony from a man.

Prosecutors also asked a federal judge in papers filed late Wednesday to reject requests from Combs' defense team for early disclosure of evidence, including the identities of his accusers, calling the request “manifestly unreasonable.”

The Justice Department said the motions were “a thinly veiled attempt to limit the government's evidence at this early stage of the case and manipulate the criminal process to allow the defendant to respond to civil lawsuits” and “posed as a security witness.”

Celebrity news website TMZ recently published a non-disclosure agreement that Combs wanted partygoers to sign if they attended one of his infamous gatherings, the “Freak Offs.”

The NDA document instructs signatories not to photograph, film or record Diddy or anyone close to him – or allow any other person to film or record – without his written consent and specifically names social media sites on which participants Can't post photos without Combs's permission.