Duane 'Keffe D' Davis, the former leader of the South Side Compton Crips, is on trial in Las Vegas, Nevada, for orchestrating the murder of Tupac Shakur.
Tupac Shakur was shot on the night of September 7, 1996, near the Las Vegas Strip, while riding in a vehicle driven by Death Row Records co-founder Marion 'Suge' Knight. He died six days later at the age of 25.
Prosecutors allege Davis helped plan the attack and provided the gun used in the shooting, though they do not accuse him of firing the shots. Tupac Shakur was riding in a black BMW driven by Marion 'Suge' Knight; the fatal shots were fired from a white Cadillac.
The prosecution says the killing was retaliation for an earlier assault on Orlando 'Baby Lane' Anderson, a nephew of Davis and member of the South Side Compton Crips. Anderson was suspected by authorities as the gunman, but grand jury testimony later pointed to Deandrae Smith.
Davis, 63, pleaded not guilty. His 2019 memoir, 'Compton Street Legend,' and a 2008 police interview have been ruled admissible as evidence by a Nevada judge. In the memoir, Davis claimed he was in the front seat of the white Cadillac and passed a gun to the back seat.
Je suis innocent. Je n'ai jamais tué personne.
Davis has also asserted he was in Los Angeles on the night of the shooting, and that his memoir was fictionalized by his co-author for commercial reasons. His attorneys have called the case 'essentially the entertainment world’s JFK assassination — endlessly dissected, mythologized, monetized.'
Authorities have reported that the murder weapon and the white Cadillac used in the shooting have not been recovered. Police reported that Orlando Anderson was killed in a gang-related shootout in Compton in 1998. According to California corrections records, Marion 'Suge' Knight is currently serving a 28-year prison sentence in California for a separate fatal hit-and-run case.
Reportedly sold worldwide during Tupac Shakur's career
Davis was arrested in September 2023 after police searched his wife’s home in Henderson, Nevada. The trial is scheduled to begin on Monday, August 10, and is expected to last approximately four weeks.
Davis faces the possibility of life imprisonment without parole. In a separate development, according to court records, Tupac Shakur’s half-brother filed a civil lawsuit in May, stating that those involved in the murder have not been held accountable for 30 years.
In the documentary series 'Sean Combs: L'heure des comptes', Davis allegedly stated in a police interrogation that Sean 'P. Diddy' Combs offered him one million dollars to assassinate Tupac Shakur.
