Slain Rapper 'Proof' Sparked Eminem's Career

April 12, 2006 — -- Eminem's music is known for its brutally vivid lyrics, but even at his most volatile, nothing he's written could be as personally devastating as what he's experienced in the past week.

Just days after he filed to end the three-month remarriage to his wife, Kim, his best friend and D-12 partner Proof was shot dead at a nightclub along Detroit's Eight Mile.

Proof, whose real name was Deshaun Holton, was a teenager when he befriended the rap star -- then known as Marshall Mathers -- and played an incalculable role in his career.

"Proof was really the guy who got Eminem to be a rapper," Anthony Bozza, who wrote "Whatever You Say I Am," the Eminem biography, told ABC News Radio

Mathers became serious about music when he was 14 but was rejected by most fellow rappers because of his race. His friendship with Proof was one of the turning points in his career, and it was Proof's idea to form D12 -- the rap group to which they both belong. They remained close friends, with Proof serving as best man at Eminem's wedding three months ago.

"He really keeps only a few close people around him, so losing one of them is going to be completely devastating to him," Bozza said.

It was only last Wednesday that Eminem's volatile relationship with wife Kim came to an end, yet again.

"There has been a breakdown in the marriage relationship to the extent that the objects of matrimony have been destroyed, and there remains no reasonable likelihood that the marriage can be preserved," according to divorce papers the rapper filed.

It's unclear what Proof was doing at the bar. Police say an argument broke out and the 32 -year-old rapper fired first, striking Keith Bender, 35, in the head, and critically injuring him.

Investigators have not yet ascertained who fired the bullet that killed Proof, according to Detroit police spokesman Sgt. Omar Feliciano.

The club, which was operating after licensed hours, was empty when police arrived. Officers responding to a 911 call say the victims had been taken by private vehicles to St. John Conner Creek, an outpatient treatment facility, where Bender was treated and Proof was pronounced dead.

In the hours after the shooting, a spot of blood was on the street in front of the tavern, and police had marked shell casings in a parking lot across the street. Later, fans created a makeshift memorial, setting stuffed animals near a telephone pole where an oversize memorial card was filled with condolences.