Foxy Brown News

Foxy is officially uncaged.

Foxy Brown was released from Rikers Island Friday morning after serving eight months of a yearlong sentence for a series of probation violations.

The 29-year-old hip-hop star, whose real name is Inga Marchand, had been locked up at the Rose M. Singer facility at the New York prison since October.

Police were present as Brown made the walk out of the compound to her waiting fleet of vehicles, taking time out to hug and take pictures with the scores of fans and well-wishers who had come to cheer her on. Several bore signs reading "Welcome home" and T-shirts stating "Free Foxy Brown."

Also present were Brown's mother, Judith Marchand, New York City councilman Charles Barron and a hair and makeup artist. For her walk to the car, the rowdy rapper changed into a brown leather jacket and wore a dotted scarf over her hair.

Brown eventually made her way into the backseat of a chauffeured white Rolls-Royce Phantom and was driven off with a caravan of security and paparazzi behind her.

In September, she was sentenced to 12 months for a series of violations in the wake of her October 2006 guilty plea for misdemeanor assault in a well-publicized 2004 case involving two workers at a Manhattan nail salon.

After her plea, Brown was placed on three years' probation. But she couldn't manage to behave herself and repeatedly ticked off officials by leaving the state without the court's permission, getting thrown out of an anger-management program for allegedly threatening a worker and for additional assault allegations after she reportedly hurled a BlackBerry at her Brooklyn neighbor.

Even Brown's Rikers stint was not without incident.

Last October, shortly after entering the system, she got into a tussle with another inmate outside the ladies' dining hall that resulted in her spending 40 days in solitary confinement before reentering the inmate population.

She also tried to get out of jail early, but a judge denied her request to fly to California to have her cochlear ear implant repaired and reprogrammed.

As for the rapper's future, she already has at least two projects lined up.

First up is filming on an untitled reality show that will chronicle her adjustment back into life as a free woman. Last week, her rep told Billboard she was in talks with several networks for the project, with VH1 reportedly the frontrunner.

Brown is also expected to make some promotional rounds in support of her oft-delayed new album, Brooklyn's Don Diva, due out May 13.

Her manager, Chaz Williams, told Billboard that his star client is eager and ready "to get on top of her career again.

"She's ready to hit the ground running and do anything she needs to do to get her career back on point."