Copyright The New York Times
Sean Combs has been transferred to the federal correctional institution at Fort Dix, N.J., a spokeswoman for the Bureau of Prisons confirmed on Thursday. Mr. Combs, 55, was sentenced earlier this month to 50 months — four years and two months — in prison for two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution. In July, a jury in New York had acquitted him of two more serious charges, sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy. Accounting for time he has already served in detention since his arrest in September 2024, at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, known as M.D.C., Mr. Combs should be eligible for release in 2028. Prosecutors had accused Mr. Combs, known as Puff Daddy or Diddy, of coercing two former girlfriends to participate in drug-fueled sex sessions with hired male prostitutes; the eight-week trial included grueling testimony from those women, Casandra Ventura and another who testified under the pseudonym Jane. After his sentencing on Oct. 3, Mr. Combs’s lawyers asked the judge overseeing the case, Arun Subramanian, to recommend to the Bureau of Prisons that Mr. Combs be sent to Fort Dix, “in order to address drug abuse issues and to maximize family visitation and rehabilitative efforts.” In his judgment order, the judge did not specify Fort Dix but asked the prison bureau to transfer Mr. Combs “as close as possible to the New York metropolitan area,” and recommended that he be considered for “any available substance abuse program, including the Bureau of Prisons’ Residential Drug Abuse Program.” In legal filings submitted before his sentencing, Mr. Combs’s legal team said that he had used his time at M.D.C. to become sober “for the first time in 25 years,” and that he had led an informal six-week educational program for other inmates known as “Free Game With Diddy,” designed to “equip participants with essential skills in business management, entrepreneurship and personal development.” At his sentencing, Mr. Combs begged Judge Subramanian for leniency, and portrayed himself as a changed man. The judge recognized how Mr. Combs’s success in music and his philanthropy have been an inspiration to many.
