Rapper Busta Rhymes [ tickets ]--real name Trevor Smith--was arrested Saturday (8/19) and charged with assaulting a concertgoer earlier this month, according to published reports.

Smith, 34, was arrested following his performance at Saturday's AmsterJam Festival on New York's Randall's Island, an event that also featured LL Cool J, Foo Fighters, and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. Police took Smith into custody "as he and his entourage tried to flee the East River island" after "getting a top he was about to be arrested," according to the New York Daily News, which also reported that at least two members' of Rhymes' crew were also apprehended.

Police charged Smith in connection with an alleged Aug. 12 incident during which he is accused of kicking a man identified as Roberto Lebron in the head and body after Lebron accidentally spat on Rhymes' vehicle, police reportedly claim. Lebron, who reportedly was treated at a Bronx hospital, didn't report the incident to police until days later.

Smith's lawyer told the Daily News that police had arrested and detained Rhymes for the alleged assault as revenge for the rapper's failure to cooperate in the unsolved murder earlier this year of one of his bodyguards.

"This is payback by the NYPD," lawyer Scott Leemon was quoted as saying. "He should have received a desk appearance ticket."

Police told the paper that desk appearance tickets are not given for felony assault charges, which is what were originally leveled at Smith before prosecutors downgraded the charges to misdemeanor counts of third-degree assault and harassment.

In February, Israel Ramirez, 29, a bodyguard and longtime member of Smith's entourage, was shot and killed outside a Brooklyn warehouse as Rhymes and various guest stars were filming a music video inside. No one has been charged with the crime, even though about 500 people reportedly were at the warehouse for the video shoot. Rhymes has reportedly refused to offer police any information about the shooting.