Rapper Combs settles with club shooting driver

Sean “P Diddy” Combs has settled a $3m (€2.3m) million) lawsuit filed by his former driver, who said he suffered emotional damage after a nightclub shooting four years ago.

US Supreme Court Justice Harold Beeler announced the settlement and dismissed the Manhattan jury which had been hearing the lawsuit filed by Wardell “Woody” Fenderson.

Lawyers for both sides, having agreed to keep the settlement terms secret, refused to disclose details. They would say only that “the matter has been resolved to the satisfaction of all parties”.

Mr Fenderson’s lawsuit arose after three people were wounded at Club New York early on December 27, 1999. He said he was outside the club in Combs’s vehicle waiting for the rapper and then-girlfriend Jennifer Lopez.

Moments after people began fleeing the club, Combs, Lopez and Combs’s bodyguard, Anthony “Wolf” Jones, ran out, jumped into the vehicle and ordered him to drive and “don’t stop for anybody”.

Mr Fenderson, 45, testified during the three days of the hearing that being ordered to drive and continue despite a police officer’s orders to stop, knowing there were guns in the vehicle, and his subsequent arrest caused him emotional trauma.

He told the jury he became a near-hermit and a heavy drinker because of the experience. His lawsuit alleged false imprisonment – although he admitted he could have stopped the vehicle and got out any time he wanted – and assault, although he admitted that no one touched him in anger that night.

After the shooting and car chase, everyone in the Navigator was taken into custody. A Combs rap protégé – Jamaal “Shyne” Barrow, then 19 – was arrested separately when he ran from the club with a gun in his waistband.

Mr Fenderson was arrested and then the charges were dropped and he later testified at trial against Combs, Jones and Barrow. No charges were filed against Lopez.

Combs and Jones were acquitted of gun possession charges. Barrow was convicted of gun possession and assault and sentenced to prison for firing a gun in the crowded club and hitting at least one of the wounded people after a patron insulted Combs.