A prosecutor has told a jury that the 1996 killing of Tupac Shakur was an ‘act of revenge’ planned by Duane ‘Keffe D’ Davis, who is currently on trial for the murder. According to Chief Deputy District Attorney Binu Palal, Davis did not pull the trigger but planned the shooting in retaliation for the beating of his nephew, Orlando ‘Baby Lane’ Anderson, by Shakur’s entourage outside a boxing match at the MGM Grand hours before the shooting.
Davis, 63, is charged with murder with a deadly weapon and with intending to promote, further or assist a criminal gang in Shakur’s death. He has pleaded not guilty and faces life in prison if convicted. In his opening statement, Davis’s attorney dismissed the prosecution’s account as ‘fiction.’
Prosecutors showed jurors video of Shakur’s entourage attacking Davis’s nephew, as well as audio of Davis explaining the moment Shakur was shot. Members of Shakur’s family, including his stepbrother Maurice ‘Mopreme’ Shakur, were present in the courtroom and listened intently to the audio.
Palal told jurors that Davis held onto a visceral hatred for Shakur for decades, which drove him to speak about the killing to investigators in 2008. Davis had previously denied responsibility for the shooting, but in 2009, he admitted to his role in the killing in an interview with Las Vegas police.
The prosecution plans to call 35 to 45 witnesses, including retired Las Vegas police officer Garry Dale, who recounted how he and another officer stopped a car carrying Knight and Shakur because the vehicle didn’t have a license plate. They let the pair go with a warning, but about 10 minutes later, they responded to a call about a shooting and found Shakur being pulled from the car by EMTs.
Another witness, Ingrid Stokes, testified that she and her friends were heading home from Las Vegas when they encountered Shakur and Knight, who was friends with a woman in Stokes’ group. Stokes said they feared more gunfire and drove away, almost hitting a white four-door vehicle in the process.
The defense attorney, Michael Sanft, argued that the prosecution’s account is ‘fiction’ and that Davis wasn’t previously charged for the 1996 killing because law enforcement knew that he was ‘full of crap.’ Sanft pointed to missing documents in the original investigation and distrust between Los Angeles and Las Vegas police departments.
