Combs Testifies He Didn’t Have a Gun

Taking the witness stand at his trial for weapons possession and attempted bribery, Sean “Puffy” Combs said Thursday he thought he was the target when shots were fired at a dance club near Times Square.

Three people were wounded in the December 1999 melee. Combs denied taking a gun into the club.

One of the most successful entrepreneurs in the sometimes violent world of rap music, Combs said he didn’t know how a pistol turned up in the sport utility vehicle in which he and his then-girlfriend, actress Jennifer Lopez, were passengers when they hurriedly left the club after the gunfire.

“I heard gunshots. I put my hands to my head. I flinched,” Combs said. “I just thought I was being shot at.”

He said he fell to the floor of the Club New York in the early morning hours of Dec. 27, 1999, and people fell on top of him.

“I heard four shots,” he told the jurors, who listened intently in the packed courtroom. Scores of people stood outside in a corridor hoping for seats.

During his testimony, the 31-year-old rapper denied offering Wardell Fenderson, his driver, a $50,000 bribe to say he owned the gun found in the Lincoln Navigator, which contained hidden compartments.

Clearly, Combs’ appearance, which drew a swarm of reporters from the U.S. and abroad, was a calculated risk. Whether the jury believed him could affect the outcome of the case.

Prosecutors charged during the month-long trial in Supreme Court in Manhattan that the hip hop millionaire tried to hide the gun in one of the vehicle’s compartments before police stopped the speeding car after a chase.

A second gun was thrown from the vehicle while police were in pursuit.

Prosecutors charged that Combs pulled out a gun and fired it once in the club after an argument. Several witnesses testified they either saw him with a weapon or shooting at the ceiling. Jamal “Shyne” Barrow, who was in the club with Combs, was charged with attempted murder for wounding three people.

Combs’ testimony on Thursday was designed to bolster statements by several people at the club who told the court Combs did not have a gun.

“Did you have a weapon on you on Dec. 26 or 27?” Benjamin Brafman, one of Combs’ lawyers, asked.

“No,” Combs replied.

“Did you know there was a gun in the Navigator?”

“Absolutely not,” said Combs, who could face up to 15 years in prison on weapons possession and bribery charges.

Combs said he and Lopez decided to visit the club before they were about to start a Caribbean vacation.

He told the jury he danced on a table holding a champagne bottle in each hand and ran up a $4,000 tab. After complaining that he was overcharged for a couple of bottles of champagne, Combs said, he paid the bill.

He said on the way out of the club he saw someone “mouthing off . . . in a very aggressive way,” but denied, as prosecutors have contended, that the man taunted Combs about his wealth and that someone hurled a handful of money at him as an insult. Prosecutors said that Barrow opened fire at the man who argued with Combs and wounded three bystanders.

“Did you see money thrown in the air?” Brafman asked. “Did any money hit you?”

“No,” Combs said.

Combs said that later at a police station, he asked his chauffeur and his bodyguard who were in a holding cell with him about the gun found under a seat in the vehicle.

“I am upset. I am saying, ‘So nobody knows whose gun it is,’ ” he told the jury. “I did not get a response to this.”

But he testified that most of the time at the police station, he was on the phone trying to find a lawyer--a task he found frustrating.

He said it seemed like every lawyer he called “was in St. Martins or something.”

Prosecutors have not charged Lopez in the case.