Former New York Yankees pitching prospect Brien Taylor, indicted earlier this month in federal court on three counts of distributing crack cocaine, was ordered held in custody during a detention hearing Tuesday.
Taylor, who had been facing state charges, was indicted on June 5 in the U.S. Eastern District Court in North Carolina and transferred into federal custody.
The federal indictment supersedes the state charges.
Taylor, 40, was arrested on March 1. Police said he sold large quantities of cocaine and crack cocaine to an undercover narcotics agent over a span of several months.
Taylor, the No. 1 overall draft selection in 1991, got a then-record $1.55 million signing bonus from the Yankees. But after excelling at Double-A in 1993, he got into a fight that winter and injured his pitching shoulder. He was never the same after major surgery.