Search for contraband underway at federal jail in Brooklyn

Federal law enforcement officers launched a massive search for contraband at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn on Monday, following a string of violent incidents involving illicit items that were snuck into the jail, according to officials and a person in contact with inmates.

A federal Bureau of Prisons spokesperson said in a statement that the operation was preplanned and there was no active threat. As of late Monday, the search was ongoing. The bureau said several agencies were involved, including the U.S. Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General. A reporter's video from the scene shows personnel with the FBI and U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration outside the jail.

The search comes after nine people detained at the Metropolitan Detention Center were charged last month with a string of murders and prolonged and uninterrupted knife fights. The jail has come under intense scrutiny by city and state officials and has been subject to urgent interventions by federal officials. Some judges have refused to send defendants there as they await trial. At the same time, several high-profile defendants have awaited trial there, including Sean “Diddy” Combs, R. Kelly and Sam Bankman-Fried.

People held at the facility said they didn’t know the search was coming and sent a message early on Monday morning saying they were “being hit,” according to Mike Antone, a paralegal who was once incarcerated there and said he is now in daily contact with detainees. He said “being hit” means being searched.

“Everybody's thrown down on the ground, handcuffed, taken out, completely strip-searched,” he said. “Then [they] put them in a dry unit one by one until they tear the unit apart.”

Antone, who also runs a popular social media channel about the jail, said such searches can last six to eight hours depending on what investigators are searching for. He compared Monday’s search to one several years ago at the Metropolitan Correctional Center where a loaded gun was smuggled in. That search lasted several days, Antone said.

Contraband inside the jail was allegedly used in a December 2023 murder-for-hire plot that involved three men communicating via a cellphone to arrange the shooting of rivals outside the jail, according to a recent federal indictment.

“I personally know that guards will bring in phones for $1,000,” Antone said. “They'll pick it up from an inmate's family, the phone and the charger, everything.” Inside the jail, he said phones are then sold for four to 10 times the cost.

Representatives for the correction officers' union did not immediately respond to messages.

One of the recent actions federal officials took to stem violence in the Metropolitan Detention Center was increasing pay for correction officers. Guards in the federal system are paid on a national scale and less than officers at local jails. In January, base pay started at $68,400 a year. That was increased to $84,000 and can go as high as $103,300 after five years, officials said.