Rapper Confesses to '93 Shooting, Didn't Know Victim Died

Artist known as G-Dep wanted to clear his conscience

A rapper  who once worked with Diddy confessed to a 17-year-old shooting to clear his conscience, then found out his victim died and that he was admitting to murder.

Trevell Coleman, aka G-Dep, told the New York Post he's been plagued by guilt since the Oct. 19, 1993 shooting and wanted to make things right when he showed up at Manhattan's 25th Precinct last week. That's when he found out his victim, John Henkel, died.

"I was surprised -- for some reason, I really didn't think that he died," Coleman told the Post in an exclusive jailhouse interview. "When they told me, I was like, 'Oh, I'm not going home after this.' "

Manhattan DA spokeswoman Erin Duggan said Coleman, 36, has now been charged with murder and faces life in prison.

Six years after the shooting, G-Dep, whose performing name is short for "Ghetto Dependent," signed with Diddy's Bad Boy label in 1999. He recently signed with Famous Records.

Coleman confessed over the objections of his mom and girlfriend.

"I told my mom and my girlfriend that I wanted to confess, and they both told me to leave it in the past," he said. "[My girlfriend] is pretty peeved."

He said he never knew Henkel and that he was on drugs when he committed the crime.

"That's just the life I was living back then," he said. "I started to wonder if all the bad things that happened to me in my life were karma for what I did . . . you start to think 'My happiness is because of someone else's sadness.'

"I'm just trying to get right with God," he said.

Selected Reading: New York Post, MTV, Sohh.com.

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