Tupac Shakur murder trial opens in Las Vegas

Las Vegas, United States. Prosecutors have told jurors that former street gang leader Duane “Keffe D” Davis organised the 1996 drive-by shooting of hip-hop star Tupac Shakur in retaliation for the beating of his nephew.

Davis, 63, has pleaded not guilty to one count of murder using a deadly weapon in Nevada’s Clark County. He is accused of leading a group of men who killed Shakur, 25, near the Las Vegas Strip.

Opening statements

Prosecutor Binu Palal told jurors in a downtown Las Vegas courthouse that Davis ensured the shooters were armed when an opportunity for retaliation arose.

“You will learn that when the opportunity presented itself for retribution, Duane Davis made sure that the shooters were armed and ready to execute their plan,” Palal said, adding that Davis had made public statements implicating himself in the case.

Defence lawyer Michael Sandt said investigators still had little evidence to support the charges nearly 30 years after the killing.

“At the end of the day you have to ask yourself, is what they are saying truth or fiction?” Sandt told the jury.

Long-unsolved killing

Shakur was one of rap’s most commercially successful and influential artists. His killing became a seminal moment in rap history and heightened perceptions of violence in hip-hop culture during the golden age of “gangsta” rap, amid the East Coast-West Coast rap feud.

Police said following Davis’ 2023 arrest that he had long been considered a suspect, but investigators had lacked sufficient admissible evidence to bring charges until he began making public statements about the killing.

The trial, before Judge Carli Kierny, is expected to last up to six weeks. The jury was selected last week.

Events before the shooting

Authorities have described Davis as the “shot caller” in a plot to avenge the beating of his nephew by Shakur and members of the rapper’s entourage inside the MGM Grand casino on September 7, 1996.

The confrontation allegedly arose from hostility between two Los Angeles-area street gangs: the South Side Compton Crips, whose self-described leader was Davis, and Mob Piru, which police said was associated with Death Row Records co-founder Marion “Suge” Knight.

Knight was with Shakur on the night of the shooting and is serving a 28-year prison sentence on an unrelated voluntary manslaughter conviction. He may testify during the trial.

Shakur, Knight and others had been in Las Vegas to attend the world heavyweight title boxing match between Mike Tyson and Bruce Seldon.