The trial of a former gang leader accused of orchestrating the murder of rapper Tupac Shakur began on Monday, nearly 30 years after the hip-hop star was fatally shot in Las Vegas.
Duane “Keffe D” Davis (63) is accused of ordering the killing and providing the gun used in the 1996 drive-by shooting. He faces life imprisonment without parole if convicted.
Jury selection began on Monday and is expected to continue through the week, with the trial expected to last about a month.
Prosecutors are unlikely to establish who fired the shots that killed Shakur, but will seek to prove Davis organised the attack.
Shakur, also known as 2Pac, was shot on 7 September 1996 after attending a Mike Tyson boxing match in Las Vegas.
He died from his injuries six days later, aged 25.
Prosecutors say the shooting followed a confrontation at the MGM Grand casino, where Shakur and Death Row Records founder Marion “Suge” Knight attacked Davis’s nephew, Orlando “Baby Lane” Anderson, a member of the South Side Compton Crips.
Davis, a former leader of the gang, allegedly sought revenge.
Prosecutors say he was travelling in a white Cadillac with Anderson and others when the vehicle pulled alongside Shakur’s car and shots were fired.
The investigation remained unresolved for decades until Davis published a memoir in 2019. In it, he says he was sitting in the front of the Cadillac and handed a gun to people in the back seat, but did not identify the person who fired the shots.
Davis was arrested in September 2023. He has pleaded not guilty and has since denied involvement in the killing.
“I’m innocent. I ain’t killed nobody. Never did ever kill nobody,” Davis said in a 2025 interview from prison. He also claimed he was in Los Angeles when Shakur was killed.
Davis’ lawyers unsuccessfully sought to prevent prosecutors from using his memoir and statements he made to police in 2008 as evidence.
Shakur’s murder became one of the most prominent unresolved killings in music history. His death also came amid a high-profile rivalry between East Coast and West Coast hip-hop figures.
In May, Shakur’s stepbrother, Maurice Shakur, filed a wrongful-death lawsuit, arguing that others involved in the rapper’s killing had not been held accountable.
