Duane “Keffe D” Davis, a former gang leader arrested and charged last year with the decades-old murder of hip-hop icon Tupac Shakur, is expected to ask a judge in Nevada on Tuesday to place him under house arrest until his June trial for the 1996 crime.
Key Facts
Davis, now 60, has been held at the Clark County Jail in Las Vegas since he was first arrested in September and charged with murder using a deadly weapon; he has pleaded not guilty to the charge.
According to multiple reports, he will ask the judge to be released to house arrest while the case continues through the court system, a request that follows weeks of his attorney claiming that Davis’s health has deteriorated in jail.
His lawyers said in a court filing last month that Davis, who is a married father of four, poses no danger to the public and will not flee to avoid trial, but prosecutors have argued that his release would pose a risk to witnesses in the case.
Main Background
Shakur, who was 25 years old, was one of the first artists inducted into the Hip-Hop Hall of Fame in 2002 and was riding in a BMW driven by Marion “Suge” Knight, founder of Death Row Records, when he was shot in a drive-by attack by unidentified assailants on September 7, 1996. He was shot four times and died six days later.
Orlando Anderson, Davis’s nephew, has long been considered the shooter in the incident, according to the Los Angeles Times. Anderson died nearly two years after Shakur’s death in another incident. Davis had identified Anderson as the shooter in a 2008 conversation with authorities during which he was granted immunity by the Los Angeles Police Department and the FBI, who promised not to use his statements against him. Greg Kading, a former detective with the LAPD, said that Davis admitted orchestrating the incident and that his nephew fired the fatal shot. He noted that while Davis is protected from prosecution for what he said in the 2008 interview, he is still being interviewed in matters not covered by immunity agreements and “has painted himself into a corner.” Authorities have indicated that Davis’s 2019 book “Compton Street Legend” reveals his confessions to hiding the car and gun used in the shooting, repairing, and repainting it. Police raided Davis’s home in Henderson, Nevada, last summer and seized materials they said were linked to the case, including .40 caliber gun casings, computers, and photographs. Under Nevada law, murder charges can be filed against defendants if it is found that they acted as accomplices, even if they did not commit the crime themselves.
Important Quote
“He was his own best witness,” Kading said of Davis. “Ego and greed got the better of him.”
The Big Number
3. This is the number of people killed in Compton, California, in the ten days following Shakur’s death. Ten others were injured in what the Los Angeles Times described as a “gang retaliation killing spree.” Davis is a former leader of the Southside Crips gang in Compton. Shakur was linked to the Mob Piru Bloods gang.
For more information, see:
- Duane Davis Can Be Convicted Of Tupac Shakur’s Murder Even If He Wasn’t The Triggerman-What To Know About The ‘Hardened Gangster’
- Tupac Shakur Killing: Duane Davis Pleads Not Guilty To Murder Charge
- Duane Davis Charged With Murder Of Tupac Shakur Following Decades Of Investigations
- Los Angeles Times Tupac Shakur’s killing brought ’10 days of hell’ to Compton. The bloodshed helped crack the case
Follow me on Twitter. Send me a secure tip.
Mary Whitfill Roeloffs
Editorial Standards
Reprints and Permissions
Leave a Reply