Nearly 30 years after Tupac Shakur was fatally shot in Las Vegas, testimony is underway in the murder trial of Duane “Keffe D” Davis.
Davis has pleaded not guilty to murder with a deadly weapon. Prosecutors do not allege that Davis personally fired the shots that killed Tupac. Instead, they say he orchestrated the attack and provided the weapon as retaliation after Tupac and members of his entourage attacked Davis’ nephew, Orlando “Baby Lane” Anderson, at the MGM Grand.
Retired Las Vegas police officer Garry Dale was among the first witnesses to testify. Dale told jurors that he rode in the ambulance with Tupac after the September 7, 1996 shooting and asked the injured rapper who shot him.
According to Dale, Tupac did not identify anyone and instead responded with words to the effect of, “No, we’ll take care of it.”
Tupac was riding in a BMW driven by Death Row Records co-founder Suge Knight when a white Cadillac pulled alongside them and gunfire erupted. Tupac died six days later at age 25.
Prosecutors plan to rely heavily on Davis’ past interviews and his 2019 memoir, while his defense argues those statements are unreliable and that prosecutors have not proven he ordered the killing.