The Degasperis-Procesi equation (DP) is one of several equations known to model important nonlinear effects such as wave breaking and shock creation. It is, however, a special property of the DP equation that these two effects can be studied in an explicit manner with the help of the multi-peakon ansatz. In essence, this ansatz allows one to model wave breaking as a collision of hypothetical particles (peakons and antipeakons), called henceforth collectively multipeakons. It is shown that the system of ordinary differential equations describing DP multi-peakons has the Painlevé property which implies a universal wave breaking behaviour, that multipeakons can collide only in pairs, and that there are no multiple collisions other than, possibly simultaneous, collisions of peakon-antipeakon pairs at different locations. Moreover, it is demonstrated that each peakonantipeakon collision results in creation of a shock thus making possible a multi-shock phenomenon.