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Tupac murder trial week 1: jurors hear Davis name nephew as shooter
Developing
What we know
A Las Vegas jury has finished the first week of the murder trial of Duane “Keffe D” Davis, the only person charged in the 1996 killing of rapper Tupac Shakur. Prosecutors lean on Davis’s own recorded statements and a 2019 memoir; the defense says those accounts are fiction designed for leniency, money, or notoriety.
Jurors this week heard a 2008 Los Angeles police interview in which Davis said he passed a gun that his nephew Orlando “Baby Lane” Anderson used to fire on Shakur’s car after a casino brawl hours earlier. Davis, 63, has pleaded not guilty to murder with a deadly weapon; the trial is expected to last about a month.
What's confirmed
- CNN’s Aug. 22 week-one wrap and AP/CBS/BBC–Reuters court coverage: opening statements, retired investigators, and gang-era witnesses framed a case built on Davis’s admissions versus defense claims of invented stories.
- Thursday audio (CBS/AP/BBC): Davis told LAPD detectives in 2008 that Anderson fired the shots; Davis said he handed the weapon into the back seat of the Cadillac.
- Prosecutors allege Davis planned the Sept. 7, 1996 drive-by to avenge the MGM Grand fight involving Anderson; they say he did not personally pull the trigger.
- Defense attorney Michael Sanft told jurors Davis’s interviews and memoir are unreliable “fiction” that police never adequately corroborated.
What's still developing
- Remaining witness testimony and how jurors weigh decades-old recordings against faded memories and dead key figures.
- Any further rulings on what portions of Davis’s podcasts, documentaries, or memoir the jury may consider.
- Whether additional corroborating physical evidence beyond Davis’s statements is presented before closing arguments.