‘Truth or fiction’: US trial of Tupac Shakur’s accused killer begins

Rapper Tupac Shakur was killed in an act of revenge ordered by a gang leader, a prosecutor has told jurors, as one of the United States’ most anticipated trials gets under way in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Prosecutor Binu Palal told jurors that former street gang leader “Keefe D” masterminded the 1996 drive-by shooting of famed hip-hop star Tupac Shakur in retribution for the beating of his nephew during opening statements in the long-unsolved murder trial.

Duane Davis, 63, is facing charges for allegedly coordinating the drive-by shooting that killed Shakur, known by the stage name 2Pac, near the Las Vegas Strip area in Paradise, Nevada, some three decades ago. Prosecutors allege Davis was the “on-the-ground, on-site commander of the effort to kill Tupac”.

The 25-year-old California-based rapper quickly became an icon of the hip-hop genre during a short but glittering career in the 1990s, releasing several Billboard-topping albums during his lifetime and posthumously.

Davis was charged in Nevada’s Clark County on Monday with a single count of murder using a deadly weapon and with the intent to promote, further or assist a criminal gang. He has pleaded not guilty.

The trial before Judge Carli Kierny is expected to last up to six weeks. The jury was selected last week. The trial may feature testimony from Death Row Records co-founder Marion “Suge” Knight, a former rap mogul who was with Shakur the night he was slain and is now serving a 28-year prison sentence on an unrelated voluntary manslaughter conviction.

“You will learn that when the opportunity presented itself for retribution, Duane Davis made sure that the shooters were armed and ready to execute their plan. And remarkably, you will learn that from Duane Davis himself,” prosecutor Palal told the jurors in a downtown Las Vegas courthouse, referring to recent public statements by Davis that revived the long-stalled inquiry.

US prosecutors are aiming to prove it was Davis who orchestrated Tupac’s killing by supplying the gun, but they are not alleging he pulled the trigger.