Tupac Shakur murder trial opens with revenge claim in Las Vegas

The man accused of ordering the killing of Tupac Shakur acted out of revenge, a Las Vegas jury heard Monday, as one of the most anticipated murder trials in American music history finally got underway — 28 years after the rapper was gunned down on the Las Vegas Strip.

Duane ‘Keffe D’ Davis, 60, sat in the courtroom as prosecutors laid out their case, alleging he orchestrated the September 1996 drive-by shooting that killed the 25-year-old rap icon. Shakur was struck by four bullets while riding in a BMW sedan driven by Death Row Records founder Suge Knight. He died six days later in a Las Vegas hospital.

Prosecution paints picture of premeditated attack

Clark County prosecutors told jurors that the shooting wasn’t random. It was calculated. The alleged motive, they argued, stems from an earlier altercation that same night at the MGM Grand, where members of Davis’s South Side Compton Crips got into a fight with Shakur and his entourage following a Mike Tyson boxing match.

But it didn’t stop there. Prosecutors alleged Davis rode in the white Cadillac that pulled alongside Shakur’s vehicle on Flamingo Road and that someone in that car opened fire with a .40-caliber Glock. Shakur had no idea what was coming.

“This was revenge, plain and simple,” a prosecutor told the jury during opening statements. “The defendant wanted payback, and Tupac Shakur paid with his life.”

Defense pushes back hard

Davis’s defense team wasted no time countering. His attorneys argued their client has been railroaded by investigators desperate to close a cold case that had embarrassed law enforcement for decades. They pointed out that Davis was not charged until 2023 — nearly 27 years after the murder — and suggested the case relies heavily on statements Davis himself made in a 2019 memoir and in media interviews.

That’s a shaky foundation for a murder conviction, they insisted.

Still, the prosecution’s case includes testimony from multiple witnesses and what they describe as corroborating physical and circumstantial evidence gathered over years of investigation by the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department.

A cultural moment decades in the making

Shakur remains one of the best-selling music artists of all time, with more than 75 million records sold worldwide. His death — and the unsolved mystery surrounding it — shaped hip-hop culture for a generation. Fans lined up outside the Clark County courthouse before dawn Monday, some holding signs bearing his image.

The trial is expected to last several weeks.

For many who grew up listening to albums like All Eyez on Me and Me Against the World, the proceedings feel long overdue. Decades of rumors, documentaries, and conspiracy theories have kept the case alive in the public imagination. Now, for the first time, it’s in front of a jury.

What comes next

Witness testimony is scheduled to begin Tuesday. If convicted of first-degree murder with the use of a deadly weapon, Davis faces life in prison. He has pleaded not guilty.