Duane “Keffe D” Davis Found Guilty in Tupac Shakur’s 1996 Murder Case

The verdict was delivered by a Las Vegas jury following a weeks-long trial and roughly three hours of deliberations.

Trial Proceedings and Closing Arguments

During closing arguments, prosecutor Binu Palal told the jury that the case was “drenched in circumstantial evidence” and backed by corroborating witnesses, as well as years of statements made by Davis himself in media interviews and his memoir, according to the sources. “For nearly 18 years, Duane Davis has told the police, television, books, YouTube interviewers — anybody that will listen, he has told — he is responsible for the murder of Tupac Shakur,” Palal said, according to the sources. “Tell him you hear him — find him guilty.”

Defense attorney Michael Sanft countered that the primary proof presented against his client relied on Davis’s own past confessions, arguing that those statements did not constitute real evidence. “We have to ask ourselves the question really at this particular point: Why are we here 30 years later if Duane Davis had actually confessed — truly confessed?” Sanft argued, according to the sources.

The 1996 Shooting and Prosecution Case

On the night of September 7, 1996, Tupac Shakur was shot four times with a Glock .22 pistol while his vehicle was stopped at a red light in Paradise, Nevada, according to the sources. The shots came from a white Cadillac that pulled up alongside Shakur’s car, which was being driven by label boss Marion “Suge Knight,” the sources reported. Shakur was struck in the chest, arm, and thigh, while Knight sustained a graze wound to the head. Shakur succumbed to his injuries six days later at age 25.

Prosecutors and police asserted that Davis orchestrated the drive-by shooting and handed the murder weapon to someone in the backseat of the white Cadillac, pointing to either Orlando “Baby Lane” Anderson—Davis’s nephew—or another occupant as the actual shooter, according to the sources. The case was brought by prosecutors in September 2023, based on the theory that Davis organized the shooting to retaliate against Shakur and Knight after Shakur’s entourage attacked Anderson earlier that night, the sources noted.

Public Confessions and Memoir

Over the years, Davis frequently discussed his involvement in the homicide in public forums. In 2018, he appeared in the BET docuseries “Death Row Chronicles,” where he stated that the murder weapon came from the backseat of the white Cadillac, remarking, “Going to keep it for the code of the streets,” according to the sources. In 2019, Davis published his memoir, “Compton Street Legend,” the introduction of which stated, “I’m one of the only living eyewitnesses to Tupac’s killing,” before detailing the events of that night, the sources reported.

Photo: variety.com

Sentencing and Next Steps

Davis, 63, faces a maximum sentence of life in prison, according to the sources. He is being held without bail and is scheduled to be sentenced on October 13, at which point he plans to appeal the decision, the sources reported.