Reggae superstar Buju Banton will be barred from recording any new materials if he is sent to a United States (US) federal prison when he is sentenced in a Florida court tomorrow.
However, Buju, whose real name is Mark Myrie, might not have to cut off his trademark dreadlocks and will be allowed to practise his Rastafarian beliefs under strict supervision.
Chris Burke, a public affairs specialist at the Federal Bureau of Prisons in Washington, DC, said federal prison guidelines bar inmates from conducting "business activities" while they are incarcerated, but added that they do not "normally" require inmates to remove body hair.
Burke said a number of federal prisons have music programmes that include instruments which inmates are allowed to play, but made it clear that recording equipment is banned from these facilities.
"It (recording music) is on our list of prohibited activities for which inmates are subject to disciplinary action," he wrote in an emailed response to The Gleaner.
The bureau is the agency responsible for the custody and care of inmates being held in the 116 federal prisons in the US.
Buju was convicted in February on three of four federal drug and gun charges in the US Middle District Court, Florida Division, in Tampa.
He faces 15 years to life in prison when he is sentenced tomorrow.
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