'Puffy' Trial: Revelations

By Stephen M. Silverman

04/23/1998 at 12:00 AM EDT

Sean "Puffy" Combs and Matthew "Scar" Allen, the man with whom the rap mogul argued before a 1999 nightclub shooting in which three people were wounded, allegedly wanted to wipe one another out, a newly unsealed court transcript shows. Combs, who was acquitted last Friday after a seven-week gun possession and bribery trial, was accused by Allen of setting him up to be killed in order to prevent him from testifying about the club shooting, according to the transcript. It also reportedly shows that Combs's lawyer, Benjamin Brafman, said that at the same time Allen accused Combs of trying to set up his alleged plot, Combs received a death threat over the phone. The call came to Combs's office, according to Brafman, who said that the caller, whose identity was reputedly uncovered by Brafman's investigator, "gave us detailed information concerning a contract on Mr. Combs's life." The dueling murder plots, as Brafman termed them, were discussed in the courtroom on March 14 out of the jury's presence, reports the Associated Press. The subject arose when prosecutor Matthew Bogdanos complained about possible witness tampering.