Thirty years after the killing of American hip-hop icon Tupac Shakur, the long-awaited murder trial of a former gang leader accused of orchestrating the rapper’s death has begun in Las Vegas.
Jury selection commenced on Monday in the trial of 63-year-old Duane “Keffe D” Davis, a former leader of the South Side Compton Crips. He is accused of supplying the weapon and ordering the attack that left Shakur fatally wounded in a drive-by shooting on September 7, 1996.
Prosecutors allege that Davis sought revenge after Shakur and Death Row Records boss Marion “Suge” Knight were involved in a confrontation with Davis’s nephew, Orlando “Baby Lane” Anderson, at the MGM Grand casino following a Mike Tyson boxing match.
Later that night, a white Cadillac allegedly pulled alongside the vehicle carrying Shakur and Knight before gunmen opened fire. Shakur, who was 25 at the time, sustained multiple gunshot wounds and died days later.
Davis has pleaded not guilty and denies involvement in the killing. He has previously claimed that he was in Los Angeles on the night of the shooting and argued that statements attributed to him in his 2019 memoir were exaggerated by his co-author.
The investigation remained unresolved for decades until renewed attention followed the publication of Davis’s memoir, in which he acknowledged being in the Cadillac and said he had handed a firearm to people in the back seat. He did not identify the person who fired the fatal shots.
Davis was arrested in September 2023 and now faces life imprisonment without parole if convicted.
The trial is expected to last about a month, although prosecutors acknowledge that it may not ultimately establish who pulled the trigger.
The case has remained one of the most prominent unsolved murders in American music history, particularly because of the intense East Coast-West Coast hip-hop rivalry of the 1990s.
Shakur’s death has continued to generate speculation among fans and investigators, while the March 1997 murder of fellow rap star Christopher “The Notorious B.I.G.” Wallace further intensified the mystery surrounding the era.
The latest proceedings could provide the most significant judicial examination yet of the circumstances surrounding Shakur’s death.
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