Keefe D Found Guilty of Orchestrating Tupac Shakur Murder

A Las Vegas jury has convicted Duane “Keefe D” Davis of first-degree murder in the death of rap legend Tupac Shakur.

The jury returned its verdict Monday evening, Aug. 31, after less than three hours of deliberations.

The defense had called for a not guilty verdict. But in video streamed live from the courtroom, jurors said “yes” when asked individually if they had voted to convict the former gang shot caller of orchestrating the 1996 killing.

The late rapper’s family members were in the courtroom when the verdict was read. They held hands and became emotional as they listened to the jurors being polled.

Related: Keefe D Goes Off on Prosecutors for ‘Endangering’ His Family

Davis, 63, stood silently as the verdict was read. He was the first and only person arrested in connection with the fatal shooting on the Las Vegas Strip nearly 30 years ago.

According to the Associated Press, prosecutors withdrew a gang enhancement from the charge Monday evening because of “witness logistics.”

Davis was arrested on Sept. 29, 2023. Prosecutors said he planned the shooting, was inside the car when it happened, and provided the gun used to take Shakur’s life.

Investigators said the murder stemmed from a long-running feud between Davis’ South Side Compton Crips and the Mob Piru Bloods, a gang affiliated with Shakur and Death Row Records co-founder Marion “Suge” Knight.

On the night of the shooting, Shakur was riding in a BMW driven by Knight. A white Cadillac pulled up beside them at a red light and someone inside opened fire.

Shakur was shot multiple times and died six days later. Knight was injured but survived.

Jurors heard audio from a 2008 interview Davis gave to investigators, in which he claimed his nephew, Orlando “Baby Lane” Anderson, fired the shots that killed Shakur.

Davis and the other Compton, California gang members were in Nevada for a boxing match. Davis said he would have pulled the trigger himself, but he was sitting on the opposite side of the car.

“If we would have been on my side, I would have blasted,” Davis bragged in the recording.

Davis made the statements after receiving a proffer agreement, which offered him limited immunity for information he provided to law enforcement.

Prosecutors argued that legal protection did not extend to the public statements Davis later made over and over about the killing — in interviews and in his 2019 memoir, Compton Street Legend.

While promoting the book on the VladTV YouTube channel, Davis said Shakur was to blame for his own death after he attacked Anderson inside the MGM Grand shortly before the shooting.

“He put himself in that position, he did that,” Davis said.

He also gave lengthy interviews to The Art of Dialogue YouTube channel and appeared in the BET docuseries Death Row Chronicles. The interviews became a key part of the prosecution’s case.

Davis’ attorney, maintained that the stories in the book and the interviews were fictionalized to make money. The jury disagreed.

Davis is scheduled to be sentenced on Oct. 13. He faces 20 years to life in prison, according to the Associated Press.