Former gang leader’s bail hearing postponed in Tupac Shakur murder case
LAS VEGAS (AP) — A bail hearing for a former Los Angeles-area gang leader, Duane “Keffe D” Davis, charged with orchestrating the killing of hip-hop music legend Tupac Shakur in 1996, was postponed on Tuesday in Las Vegas. This delay allows defense attorneys time to respond to prosecutors’ allegations that witnesses in the case may be at risk.
Court-appointed attorneys for Davis sought the delay to respond to prosecutors’ allegations, filed last week, which claim that jail telephone recordings and a list of names provided to Davis’ family members show that Davis poses a threat to the public if he is released. No court hearing was held on Tuesday, but one of Davis’ attorneys, Robert Arroyo, informed The Associated Press that the defense wants to respond in court in writing.
Davis is the only person ever charged with a crime in the drive-by shooting that also wounded rap music mogul Marion “Suge” Knight, who is now serving 28 years in a California prison for an unrelated fatal shooting in the Los Angeles area in 2015. Davis has pleaded not guilty and is due for trial in June on a murder charge. He has remained jailed without bail since his arrest on September 29 outside his Henderson home, where Las Vegas police served a search warrant in mid-July.
Originally from Compton, California, Davis is now housed at the Clark County Detention Center in Las Vegas, where detainees’ phone calls are routinely recorded. If convicted at trial, he could spend the rest of his life in prison. Prosecutors point to Davis’ own words since 2008 — in police interviews, in his 2019 tell-all memoir, and in the media — that they say provide strong evidence that he orchestrated the September 1996 shooting. Davis’ attorneys argue that his descriptions of Shakur’s killing were “done for entertainment purposes and to make money.”
Arroyo and co-counsel Charles Cano have argued their 60-year-old client is in poor health after a battle with cancer that is in remission, poses no danger to the community, and won’t flee to avoid trial. They want bail to be set at not more than $100,000. Davis maintains that he was given immunity from prosecution in 2008 by FBI agents and Los Angeles police who were investigating the killings of Shakur and rival rapper Christopher Wallace, known as The Notorious B.I.G. or Biggie Smalls, six months later in Los Angeles.
The bail hearing is now scheduled for January 9th.