50 Cent defends drug dealing past

50 Cent doesn't regret being a pre-teen crack dealer.

The 'Candy Shop' rapper started selling drugs in Queens, New York, after his mother – also a dealer – was murdered.

He was just 12 years old, and would tell his grandmother he was at an after-school club while he roamed the streets pushing narcotics.

The musician – real name Curtis Jackson – explained: "If there was another option that made sense to me at that time period, I would have taken it. But I made my choices at an age where there was an innocence involved.

"I identify with it being the wrong choice now, but you can't regret that you made it."

50 quit drug dealing in 2000, but an old "crack feud" came back to haunt him a few months later when he was shot nine times at close range.

He sustained injuries to his hand, arm, hip, chest, legs and cheek, but eventually fully recovered.

The hip-hop star now sees the shooting as a "transformational moment" that made him into the strong person he is today.

He explained: "When you get hurt as bad as I was hurt when I was shot, either fear consumes you, or you become insensitive.

"Things that happened to me after that started to matter a lot less. Whatever else happens is just not a big deal."