Duane “Keffe D” Davis, a former Los Angeles gang leader, was found guilty on Monday by a Las Vegas court of the 1996 murder of chart-topping rapper Tupac Shakur.
Nearly 30 years after Shakur’s death, the jury found Davis, 63, guilty of murder following just a few hours of deliberation.
“Count one, murder with use of a deadly weapon, guilty of first-degree murder with use of a deadly weapon,” the jury foreperson announced in court.
Davis, who faces a possible sentence of life in prison without parole, told Judge Carli Kierny after the verdict that he intends to appeal.
The former leader of the South Side Compton Crips was accused of orchestrating the September 7, 1996, killing after his nephew was beaten by members of Shakur’s entourage at a Las Vegas casino.
“Duane Davis, in the culture of gangs, could not let that stand,” prosecutor Binu Palal said during closing arguments. “So what did he do? He acquired a firearm, got his group together, and went hunting for Mr Shakur.”
Shakur was in Las Vegas to attend a heavyweight boxing bout involving Mike Tyson when he was shot about two hours after the casino confrontation.
A white Cadillac pulled alongside the BMW carrying Shakur at a red light. The rapper was sitting in the front passenger seat when a gunman opened fire.
Prosecutors alleged that Davis handed a firearm to someone in the back seat of the Cadillac and directed that person to shoot Shakur, who died six days later at the age of 25.
Davis is the only known occupant of the Cadillac that night who is still alive.
Marion “Suge” Knight, co-founder of Death Row Records and the driver of the BMW, was also wounded in the shooting.
Shakur, widely known as 2Pac, became one of the most influential figures in hip-hop before his death. His killing remained one of the United States’ most high-profile unsolved cases for decades, fueling years of speculation among fans over who was responsible and why.
Davis, whose Crips gang was among several rival groups that controlled parts of Los Angeles in the 1990s, is the only person to have been charged in connection with Shakur’s killing.
Davis is scheduled to be sentenced on October 13.
Confession
The investigation into Shakur’s murder stalled for decades amid a lack of evidence, but the case was revived after Davis published his memoir, Compton Street Legend, in 2019.
In the book, Davis wrote that he was sitting in the front seat of the Cadillac and handed a pistol to people in the back seat. He did not identify who fired the shots at Shakur.
Davis had repeatedly claimed over the years that he was involved in the rapper’s killing, making statements in interviews with law enforcement and the media before recounting his involvement in his autobiography.
He later withdrew those claims and pleaded not guilty to the murder charge.
During closing arguments, prosecutor Palal played clips of Davis’s various alleged confessions for the jury.
Davis’s defence attorney, Michael Sanft, argued that his client’s statements were fabricated, in part to generate publicity for his book.
“You’re reading a book that is fiction and not fact,” Sanft told jurors. “But the state wants you to believe that this is somehow a confession, that he was there and present at the time of the shooting.”
Sanft maintained that there was no evidence linking Davis to Shakur’s murder apart from Davis’s own statements.
Before the trial, Davis’s lawyers unsuccessfully sought to prevent prosecutors from introducing his memoir as evidence, as well as comments he made during a 2008 police interview.
Shakur was a central figure in the bitter East Coast-West Coast rivalry that dominated American hip-hop in the 1990s.
Known for hits including “California Love” and “All Eyez on Me,” he was the son of a Black Panther and spent parts of his childhood in Harlem and Baltimore. After signing with Los Angeles-based Death Row Records, however, he became one of the defining figures of West Coast hip-hop.
AFP
