Metro

Rapper G. Dep says prosecutors have matched him to wrong shooting

Right perp, wrong shooting.

The rapper G. Dep has turned the tables on the same hard-ball-playing Manhattan prosecutors who wouldn’t give him less than 15 years on his confession to a cold-case shooting.

The rapper is taking his case to trial and insisting only now that while he was indeed a shooter, the DA has matched him to the wrong victim — a tactic that has sent prosecutors scrambling to review their two-decade old Harlem shooting cases to prove they have it right.

“Why are we here?” defense lawyer Anthony Ricco told a Manhattan Supreme Court jury. “You have to decide whether he is guilty of the crimes charged.”

G. Dep, 37, had walked into a Harlem precinct in 2009, saying that he wanted to unburden himself. When he was 17, or 18, or maybe 19, he shot a man three times during a botched robbery at Park Avenue and 114th Street, he told cops.

Authorities quickly matched his confession to the cold-case fatal shooting of one John Henkel on Oct. 19, 1993. It was the same address, and G. Dep — born Trevell Coleman — would have been 18 at the time.

Neither side voiced a doubt that Henkel was the victim in question.

Fast forward to plea negotiations last year.

G. Dep was willing to plead guilty to shooting Henkel, a random stranger, during a botched robbery. But prosecutors insisted G. Dep plead to murder, which carries a mandatory minimum of 15 years.

Given the choice between a certain 15 years prison and a roll of the dice at trial, G. Dep is now hoping a jury will find reasonable doubt that he is guilty of Henkel’s murder.

After all, there are some inconsistencies between G. Dep’s confession and the facts of the murder. G. Dep had confessed to shooting a clean-shaven blonde man in a green plaid jacket, for instance. Henkel had brown hair and a beard and was wearing a tan leather jacket.

“He’s not even sure if the per on he said he shot actually got shot,” the lawyer told jurors.

“All of you have to decide if the descriptions match up,” he said.

Prosecutors, meanwhile, insist that Henkel is the only victim who fits G. Dep’s confession.

“There are no other homicides even close to fitting the description,” prosecutor David Drucker told jurors.

Testimony is set to begin this afternoon and run two days, with Coleman’s confession tape going into evidence tomorrow.

G. Dep still faces a possible mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years. But despite the risk, he still wants to take responsibility, just not with this vicim, Ricco told jurors.

“He, Trevell Coleman, is seeking his redemption,” the lawyer said.

G. Dep, whose hits include “Special Delivery,” had signed with Sean Combs’ Bad Boy label in 1999, and was dropped a few years later.

His videos are credited with helping popularize a dance called the Harlem Shake in the early 2000s.