Moses “Shyne” Barrow finally tells the whole story of how Sean “Diddy” Combs landed him in prison for a decade in the new Hulu documentary The Honorable Shyne.
“It’s all coming to light and people believe it,” Barrow says in the film, “Because when I said it, everyone was partying and having a great time with Diddy, while I was left to rot in prison,” the ex-rapper says in the doc, which premieres Nov. 18 on Hulu.
Barrow, who served eight years of his 10-year sentence, was at a nightclub with Combs and then-girlfriend Jennifer Lopez in 1999 when a shooting broke out that left three people injured. He was subsequently deported to his home country of Belize, where he became an influential politician.
ADVERTISEMENT
The film relies on footage from Barrow’s time at the top of the rap industry and as one of Combs’ Bad Boy Records artists, telling his story from a troubled beginning, including frequent run-ins with violence in the streets of Brooklyn, to his becoming leader of the opposition of Belize. Considerable time is spent, however, on the infamous shooting and its aftermath, framing the incident as the catalyst for Barrow changing his life.
“I go to Club New York; I go in there and nobody searches me,” Barrow says, describing the night of the shooting. “I think I actually had two weapons on me that night—I have one in my boots and one in my waist.” After a disagreement broke out between Combs and others at the club, Barrow was caught in the middle. One of the men involved in the tussle “reached for his weapon,” he says, “and that’s when I reached for my weapon.”
After Barrow was taken into custody, along with Combs and Lopez, the celebrity couple made bail. Combs left Barrow on the inside and stopped taking his calls. “Instinctively, I think Puff’s lawyers advised him that ‘You gotta stay away from this guy. You gotta act like you don’t even know this guy, like you just gotta distance yourself.’ I spent a week in The Tombs ’cause I couldn’t make bail,” he says.
Natania Reuben, who was shot in the face that night, has always said publicly that Combs was the one who shot her—but Barrow, then 19, was the only person convicted for the shooting.
Barrow says in the documentary that after producer Lil Rod Jones accused Combs in a 2024 lawsuit of admitting he’d set Barrow up to take the fall for the shooting, the alleged comment “slashed open a scar that had healed.” Barrow then broke his silence after 25 years, telling the press that Combs “ruined his life.” In the documentary, he revealed that Combs contacted him following those comments.
“He reached out and I said, ‘Listen, it is what it is, those are the facts, right? I wasn‘t being unkind, I wasn’t being mean. I didn’t get into your other allegations and accusations. But as far as it goes with me, you know what the facts are,’” Barrow recalls telling Combs in the film. “‘You apologized back then, and we’ve moved on, and I’ve healed, but I’m not going to restate the facts.’” He also says he told Combs, “‘If it weren’t for you, I would have made the case. I would have walked just like you.’”
Barrow alleges in the doc that Combs went so far as to manipulate his lawyers to ensure he’d be convicted for the incident while Combs walked free. “It was clear that [my lawyer] was throwing the case,” Barrow said, “All the witnesses came in there to acquit and vindicate Puff.”
In a statement to The Daily Beast, a spokesperson said, "Mr. Combs categorically denies Mr. Barrow’s allegations, including any suggestion that he orchestrated Mr. Barrow to ‘take the fall’ or ‘sacrificed’ him by directing witnesses to testify against him. These claims are unequivocally false."
Combs was acquitted of all charges related to the 1999 New York Club incident.
After Barrow was released from prison nearly a decade later, he decided to put the drama behind him, leaning on the strength of his newfound religious faith. “It took time [and] it took a lot of years” before he would forgive Combs and ultimately make public appearances with him, he says, even performing as part of Diddy’s Lifetime Achievement tribute on BET—which he’s since clarified he’d only done for the “benefit” of Belize. The reunion would be short-lived, however. Barrow says in the film, “When the Cassie video came out with Diddy brutally assaulting her, I had to disassociate myself from him and condemn those actions.”
As for naysayers who say Barrow only changed his story about the night of the shooting because Combs is behind bars awaiting trial on trafficking and racketeering charges, the documentary offers several audio clips from interviews in which the ex-rapper accused Combs of letting him take the fall.
“Puff pretends to be sorry,” Barrow says in one old soundbite in the film from shortly after his prison release. “He just can’t find that part of himself. When he says ‘God is great,’ I think he’s talking about himself.’” Barrow adds in the present day in the film, “The idea that he and I are best friends or brothers, and now I’m maybe changing my tune, is just not rooted in reality.”
“I didn’t betray my friends,” he continues. “I didn’t get on the stand and snitch and get everyone else in trouble—as devastating as it was, as excruciating as it was. I did that. I sacrificed my entire career and life and family to be someone with integrity, with honor, with character, with humanity.”
This story has been updated with a statement from Combs' spokesperson.
