Law&Crime Sidebar - Tupac Murder Trial Kicks Off with Damning Evidence On Day One

Episode Date: August 17, 2026

Nearly three decades after hip-hop legend Tupac Shakur was fatally shot in Las Vegas, Nevada, the trial for Duane "Keffe D" Davis—the only man criminally charged in connection with the killing—is officially underway. Prosecutors claim Davis orchestrated the drive-by shooting following a fight involving his nephew, while the defense argues the state's case relies entirely on unverified, recorded statements. Law&Crime's Jesse Weber recaps the critical highlights from day one, breaking down the opening statements and early eyewitness testimony from the stand. HOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokeVideo Editing - Michael Deininger, Christina O'Shea, & Jay CruzScript Writing & Producing - Savannah Williamson, Heather Berzak & Juliana BattagliaGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrimeTwitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeown with Tupac's sister, Sekyiwa Shakur, to reflect on her brother’s enduring legacy and her family's long road to justice.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

In this world, silence means survival. The one person who has a hard time being out is Dwayne Davis. Really at the end of the day, you have to ask yourself, if what they're saying is really truth, there are no facts to point to Keefei. Day one of the trial of D. Davis, the only man charged with the murder of Tupac Shakur is in the books. We're going to recap the biggest moments from opening statements,

statements which lay out what we can expect from each side to the start of witness testimony. This is a case almost 30 years in the making, and it is just begun. Welcome to Sidebar, presented by Law and Crime. I'm Jesse Weber. Here we are. After almost 30 years, day one of the murder trial for the only person ever criminally charged in connection with the killing of Tupac Shakur. Out in Las Vegas, Nevada, D. Davis, D. Davis is charged. with murder with a deadly weapon, with the intent to promote further or assist a criminal gang. And a jury will have to decide if he is guilty or not guilty.

16-person jury, 10 women, six men, four of them alternates. The hip-hop icon was gunned down on the streets of Las Vegas back on September 7, 1996, in a drive-by shooting. And prosecutors alleged that Davis orchestrated this killing. not that he actually pulled the trigger, but that he facilitated it, that he aided in the commission. So why does the prosecution believe Keefe D did this? What evidence do they claim they have against him? Well, let's go to the opening statements, okay, which from a legal point of view, I have always said, are some of the most important parts of a trial. They are technically not evidence.

It's a preview of what to expect in this case, both from the prosecution and the defense. But I will tell you, there are some statistics and studies out there that will show jurors. even though they aren't supposed to, will decide a case or lean a certain way after opening statements. So with that in mind, here is prosecutor Binu Palal laying out the scene,

the stage, the context, the case against Davis. On September 7th, 1996, Tupac Chippur came to Las Vegas to attend a Mike Tyson fight. After the fight, Tupac, along with Shook Knight, Trayvon Lane, and other people that were with that group, ran into a person

named Orlando Anderson. And Orlando Anderson is the defendant's nephew. And when they encountered Orlando Anderson sitting by himself, they attacked. That attack was captured on video. During those two and a half hours, you will learn that the defendant was escalating and planning the retribution for the beating of his beloved nephew. Now, let's be clear. Dwayne Davis did not hold the trigger.

But what he did do was plan the retaliation for the beating of his nephew. You will learn that Dwayne Davis got the gun. You will learn that he got into a white Cadillac. You will learn when the opportunity presented itself for retribution. Dwayne Davis made sure that the shooters were. armed and ready to execute their revenge. One of the connections that Dwayne Davis gets through his association with Zip Martin is with Sean Puffy Combs, who was then the CEO of Bad Boy Entertainment.

Sean Combs wanted some security when he came out to the West Coast. He was worried about Maupyru. He was worried about the members of Death Row Records. And so Dwayne, EPD Davis, agreed to be around to act as unofficial security for Sean Combs and his artist when they came out west, in order specifically to ensure there are no problems with Mob Pirou and Death Row Records. And this took a rivalry between Maup Pyro and Southside Compton Crips and escalated it. and that those tensions boiled over in the Lakewood Mall in the summer of 1996. Yeah, so you're looking at this surveillance footage of this purported beating of Orlando Anderson at the MGM grant, okay, this hotel in Las Vegas.

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Okay. So now we get into that alleged opportunity and what the prosecution claims Davis did. Dwayne Davis hears about this meeting. And what you will hear is that in his world, there is no question that a response is required. What we learn is that Dwayne Davis is upset about the beating of his nephew.

And frankly, no, that's not an unusual response. What's unusual is the next steps Dwayne Davis takes. Unusual for the normal person, maybe not unusual for an Indian culture. Dwayne Davis decides he is going

to organize a retaliation that this beating cannot go unanswered. Then he runs him into a person, named Zip Martin. Remember the Zip Martin that was a connection with Bad Boy Entertainment from New York. And Zip Martin tells him that he has a gun and that he can come help him out. As you just heard, and if you've been following our preview coverage

of this trial, this case is largely, if not almost entirely based on D. DeWan Keefe DeV Davis's statements. Okay? And it's not just what Witness A claims Davis said, No, these are recorded statements and also potentially, allegedly, a book that he wrote. These are statements that Davis has made over time where he, as the prosecution will argue, allegedly confessed to his participation in Tupac's murder. For example, this is when he reportedly sat down in 2008 to speak to a task force that was

investigating the death of notorious B.I.G. And while he allegedly made statements as early as 1998 about Tupac's killing, it was in 2008 when he does this secret interview. So they were investigating the death of notorious B.I.G. Christopher Wallace killed six months after Tupac. And according to the prosecution, the feds approached Davis because he was apparently leaving the same party in L.A., the one that Wallace had left right before he was killed. According to the prosecution, they picked Davis up on this narcotics trafficking beat. case against him. He claims, look, I don't know anything about Notorious BiG's killing, but I do have information on Tupac's killing. Hey, where's your going to? What do you tell us it right now? He tells that they were going to

go handle this. Whatever? Yeah. I have a long. You know what I mean? It was a lot of six to two. Who's that? Everybody in that graph. Yeah, people. And do you want to ask her? How do you know that this is going to? And in case that prosecution explaining more alleged details about what Davis is accused of doing here.

So later, Dwayne Davis organized it's. So later, Dwayne Davis organizes two. vehicles to go over to the 6-6-2 club. Before that, he gets the gun from Zipmark. And in that white Cadillac, before the shooting, before the shooting occurs, Dwayne Davis explains that the driver is Terrence T. Brown. In the rear driver's side is D'Andre Dre or Big Dre Smith. In the rear passenger side is Orlando Beatty Lane Anderson. And then Dwayne Davis himself, GPD. is in the front passenger side.

And this is how Dwayne Davis explains the murder of Tupak Shakor. And this is Keefei D, Mr. Davis seemingly explaining himself how this all went down. Yeah. He's a little bit of a stroke right here. You came up armed. That's the long way in the little war.

Here you come that DMW. We'll get any courts. And brother, Tupac, Tupac. I was like, there you go. He had a huge time of rebuttal. Maybe just wanted you there. It was a little man. We just pulled up on the side,

and check every car to see what they would. So what direction of your attention to him is some girls shouting at Tupac? Tupac. He gave his other way. Other one, they would have got away. He all had that point me on you. I think of my bitch.

There was gone. You had you turned and then you pulled alongside with it. You got to do it a part. But you already hand some of the gun on the fire. That's what you had to hand him. I thought he had to pull on my side. No, I don't know if you got on, no. He pulled it on the east side.

So you were going to, you were in a glass if you had to or you were... Yeah, you'd be on the side of a little bit. Okay. So you hand the gun into the backseat. Yeah. You can hear right. And Dray, three,

one, no, no, and I'm like two off. So what you hear

Dwayne Davis say, admit that as they see Tupac Shakur and Shib Knight driving to Club 662,

Dwayne Davis, Dwayne Davis, along with Karen Brown, D'Andre Smith, Orlando Iverson, decide to make a U-turn.

Confront Tupacacacacacour and Shub Knight. Dwayne Davis has the firearm. It's a firearm he got from Eric Vonsett Martin, and then he passes it to the back. Dwayne Davis says that if they were on his side of Tupac Chippur and that were on his side of the vehicle,

he would have shot them himself. But because they were on the other side, he handed it to D'Andre Smith. DeAndre Smith, according to Dwayne Davis, did not want to shoot at that time. So Orlando Anderson shot. Can see that thought. Dwayne Davis,

explains this over and over again. Okay, Glenn starts blasting. He says it should look over receive you. Yeah. You look right at you. Okay. Are you, okay? Nobody gets me saying that you know.

He looks over at you and then when you Fox is he gets to get shot. Evident story is you thought is trying to get out. Like a bad sheet or something. Yeah, what do you see happening inside there? I see the movie going to shoot again. I thought he was dead. I don't get it.

You see the first straight or something, or something. You see the last one in his neck right here. So you have to turn it to the room, yeah, yeah. Okay. So, I'm sorry, you guys. Now, you know, the boat, a car, and they're going to write.

Everybody's trying to jump in the back of the back seat. What's your dog? Stupid. And I'm a stupid. They want to run and they stop. But two-by's trying to jump with a back seat. What's here? You can't really know.

I'm going to be too big. Now, this case is not just based on one recorded 2008 interview. It is based on multiple alleged statements, and it is that frequency and the circumstances surrounding those alleged admissions that could prove problematic for Keefei D. In 2009, Davis is being so helpful to federal authorities that he actually flies out to New York to try and get Zip Martin to implicate himself in the Tupac report. Martin at that time was dying of cancer, was out of the game, and really did not engage with Dwayne Davis.

In 2009 though, Dwayne Davis gives an interview to Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department Detectors Dan Long. Now, Dwayne Davis is more guarded in that interview. It is a different setting than the interview of 2008. It's not a secret proffer agreement. Dwayne Davis does admit a number of him, that he was in Las Vegas, that he was mad about Orlando Anderson, that he was the boss, that he was in the white Cadillac, that he procured the firearm that ultimately killed two Bosch.

So in 2017, Dwayne Davis decides to go public. He's approached by the producers of a show called Death Row Chronicles that appears on BET. And this is a, just a small portion of what he says is his motivation for appearing. Only one of the TVD days, I was probably keeping in food dinner. I'm not people alive that really continue to destroy about the two bucks in. People have been pursuing me for 20 years. In the favor of me, I see. I'm going out and down and that's great because I got cancer.

I got none else to lose all I'm here right now is true. Remarkably, in 2019, Dwayne Davis then decides he's going to publish his own book. And with regards to the book, it is certainly a lot of self-aggrandizement. But again, the core remains. He was mad about Orlando Anderson beating, about the beating of Orlando Anderson's nephew. He was in Las Vegas. He got the gun. He was in the white catalan.

And he had the gun to get him. So you ended up getting in the car with Baby Lane in them? I got in the car with the home shed. And we ran into them. We went up to the light on sunset and a bingo. And a dude, we acted like he was in a parade or something. And that BMW hanging out the window. Hey, this two bog.

He's a two box. And then he was holling for him. And we had to go that. And it came up on the sun. Now, there's something key here that the prosecution hits upon. One emotion that allegedly surfaces from Keefe D, which the prosecutor claims shows that he participated in this killing of Tupac Shakur. And that emotion is anger. And again, what remains, even as late as 2020, 2021, 22 is Dwayne Davis's visceral anger at Tupac Choucault.

You know, that's what you're wrong. Yeah, too. You know what? You know what? You know what I'm in? You know what I? You know what I? They were wrong.

My nephew never jumped up, man. They just joked on my name. My nephew, you didn't talk about you. Wrong. Just up. Jesus. 28 years later, that is the visceral anger that Dwayne Davis had. or Tupac.

It did it. In two and a half hours, he took care of what he thought was the proper response. And 28 years later, he still is angry about what Tupac did. On September 7, 1996, Tupac Choucault publicly on camera, participated in a humiliating beating of Dwayne Davis' nephew, Orlando Anderson. Dwayne Davis knew that in his world, that required a relationship. response. And over the years in private interviews and public statements and even in private calls, Dwayne Davis has repeatedly told us over and over again about the anger he felt and his own role

in the revenge drive-by shooting of Tupac Chiquot. And now, nearly 30 years later, we're going to ask you to finally hold Dwayne Davis accountable. Thank you. So those are the key moments from the prosecution's opening statement. Remember, they have the burden of proof. They have to prove this case beyond the reasonable doubt. And as you notice, they spent almost all the time on the alleged statements and alleged confessions of Dwayne Keefe D. Davis. And that is exactly what Keefe D's defense attorney Michael Samf focused on in his opening statement. At the end of the day, you have to ask yourself if what they're saying is really truth or fiction. Fact or fiction? There are no facts to point to Keefei. Not one. Three themes here from the

defense as far as I could see. Okay. One, there's no other evidence tying Kee-D to Tupac's killing. For example, the prosecution doesn't seem to have the murder weapon in this case. Two, sloppy investigation, not complete. And three, you can't trust what Kee-D said that he may made it all up. LAPD reached out to him, called them up and said, Detective Long, we have the gun. And we tested it and it matches back to what you're looking for in terms of the weapon that killed Tupac Shakur. Detective Wong goes to LAPD, gets the gun, transports it back, gets tested, and it comes out as not a match. LAPD tells him after we gave you a big gun to test you out.

What you will also learn is out of all those people in that room, not one person verifies what TPV tells them. That the FBI, the gold standard of investigation in our country, did not go out and follow up on what was said. Now, one of the things the state showed you was a picture of a car and indicated there was four individuals in that car. And he tells you that at some point, three of those individuals are dead, and Kee-Pee is the only one that's remaining. But at the time that he gives his statement to the task force in 2008, there's another individual that's still alive.

They never interviewed that individual to verify if that information was true. Why not? Because the FI just fall asleep, that the LEPD just didn't care. Kee was never charged for any of what he said during that time period. And it's because they knew he was full of crap. Otherwise, he would have. Why wouldn't they? When Detective Long comes back to Las Vegas, he goes and he talks it over with the Clark County District Attorney's Office.

You know what happened then? They didn't charge the case either. in 2009. Ask yourself the reason why that is, is because they just didn't care about Tupac Shakur or his life, or it's because they looked into it and realized we can't verify this information. We don't believe this to speak true. And you'll notice, if you watch this entire defense opening or even during the course of this case, the defense spent a lot of time criticizing the work of retired Las Vegas police detective, Clifford And Mr. Mogg goes to the grand jury. And in the grand jury, it's a secret proceeding.

We're not there. But the defense, you know, isn't sitting like we are here. It's just the prosecutors. There's a panel of people called the grand jurors. And you have people come up and they testify in her oath. And there's really no way for the defense to challenge any of it because it's done in secret. We don't really know about it. But in this particular case, Mr. Mogg is sworn to testify to truth.

And you know what Mr. Mobb does, he just reads pages of the book into the record. He doesn't do any more in terms of an investigation than read pages of a book into the record. He never documents in any of his efforts, any verification of the book before he reads it into the record. He walks up, gets on the stand, and reads the book as if it's the gospel truth. What you're going to find out about Mr. Mogg is that he never wrote a report. So when he took over the case in 2017, all the way up until when he retired in 2023 and was in front of the grand jury, he never wrote a report. Not one time. Not like Detective Becker and not like Detective Becker and not like Detective Long.

And not like any other police officer who does their job. This man never writes a report. And one of the other things that the defense did in their opening statement is they could, called out the prosecution's witnesses, like Reggie Wright Jr., who, by the way, I've interviewed before. This is somebody who worked as security for death row records. Attorney Safft claimed he's a felon who wasn't around when the shooting occurred, that he allegedly ordered people to lie during the investigation. The defense also mentioned Devonta Dirk Rock Lee, who Samp claimed is a paid informant who will say whatever he needs to. Defense attorney Sapt also mentioned

retired LAPD detective Greg Cating, that he allegedly stole the Tupac and Biggie case file for personal gain. Now, before we get into the testimony, just here is how the defense, defense attorney Sam, wrap things up in his opening statement. What you're going to hear from witnesses that will testify to this is that KTP was known to do this. Otherwise, it's just that.

And at the end of all the time you spend together, what you're going to find is that the state can not prove to you beyond a reason without the claim that he wasn't had anything to do with a first degree murder with use of that you said that you love there's no facts to that matter okay so two different perspectives two different opening statements let me go to witness testimony i actually want to start with the second witness of the day we'll get to the first but the second witness called by the prosecution was ingrid stokes she claims she was on the las vegas strip that night that she was in a car on the same street as Shug Knight and Tupac that they were in their own car. And she was right there as the shooting happened.

So this is what she said when being questioned by the prosecution. We were driving, you know, hanging out and convertible. And my girlfriend, Lauren, at the time, she knew Shug. And she told us, hey, there's Shug. Pull up next to him. I'm going to ask them what they're doing. And so Shalane was a driver. And she slowed up close to them.

And so you said Shalane was the driver. Yes. Where were you seated? I was a passenger in front. In the front passenger? So Shalane's driving, you're on the front passenger, and the other two women are in the backseat. Yeah, Tanisha's behind me,

and then Lauren is behind the driver. After all these years, you still know that, huh? Well, yeah. Some things you don't forget. That one is sure. And so then when you start driving, when you see Shug and your friend starts talking to Shug, what happens?

They were talking, and she was like, what's going on, what's happening? We look over and then we pull up to the car and we kind of nod or say hello, that kind of thing, but we were in our own little world. While she was talking to him, he said, hey, we're all going to the club. Won't you follow us? Get behind us. You can go with us. There was a car behind us and they kept going around us trying to get in front of us. We almost hit the car when we were trying to drop off. There was a car in that last lane that was the turning lane and it was a white foredoor. I don't tell you what I'm trying to know. It was like white-ish and we almost hit when we were trying to get away. Were you trying to pursue the white car? Hell no.

I just want to get away. The police officer made us sit on the ground, on the sidewalk, in front of everything. Like, cars are still, I think, may have been passing. So it was kind of an odd situation where they were, like, kind of rude to us. And then they're treating us like we're suspects. We really didn't know what happened, though. Now I want you to listen very carefully to what she says when questioned by the defense on cross-examination. When we pulled up on the side of him and she was talking to Shug, he was.

was relaxed like sitting in the chair, sitting in the pasture seat, and Shug was relaxed talking to Lauren, nothing, like there was no engagement. Okay, so as you're sitting there and you pull up, Tupac was not hanging out the window and doing something out of the window. Absolutely no, no. Okay. His torso was not sitting on top of the window yelling to his fans, Tupac Tupac Tupac. No, there was no fans around. They were just driving in the car listen to music like we were. took away from that? Does that account contradict what Keefe D. said in one of his interviews, where he seemingly claimed that people were yelling, Tupac, Tupac, and he was leaning out the window. She seems to disagree with that account, or her account's different. So I think the defense is trying

to mount the argument here. You can't believe what Keefe D said, that he's an unreliable narrator, something to think about. Now I want to go back to that first witness of this trial. Okay, Gary Dale, worked for the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department. He was working on a bike team the night that Tupac was killed, claimed that before the shooting, earlier in the night, he stops this black BMW that he claims had no license plates, and he says was occupied by Shug Knight and Tupac Shakur. But this is the key moment.

Listen to this account of what happened after the shooting, and I will tell you, it is chilling to hear and legally potentially important. for the prosecution. We'll fast forward about, I'll say, 10 minutes later, something unusual happened. What happened? We were continuing riding on the strip area. We were heading southbound on the boulevard, and we heard some calls come out about a vehicle. Can't remember exactly what was said, but heading up towards Harmon, we saw the vehicle

that had been described in the Median of the road. It looked like it had ran up on the Median and was stopped there in the middle of the boulevard. What do you do when you see that? We approached the vehicle. Is it you and Mr. Goldberg? Officer Goldberg. Mr. Goldguard, I. And do you see either of the two people that you saw earlier in the vehicle?

Yes. And who is that? Marion Knight was outside of the vehicle walking around, talking. and Tupac Shakur was being removed by EMS people. As Marian Knight is talking, do you recall anything he's saying? He was telling us to take care of Tupac Shakur. Are you able to have any sort of communication with Mr. Shakur? He was still talking, and I was trying to convince him to tell me the name of whoever his assailants were.

and did he ever respond? Yes, he responded, no, we'll take care of it. Something like that. No, we'll take care of it, something like that. Talk about that large gold chain we see in that photograph right there. The second time you came across Mr. Shakur, was he wearing that gold chain that's around his deck? No.

So the thing that came into my mind, did Tupac Shakur, seemingly know who did this to him. And if there's a continuation of events here, Orlando Anderson, and then this is retaliation, you can see why this might be pivotal for the prosecution. But there you have it. Okay. Some of the biggest moments from day one, we're planning on doing this every day. We want to make sure that you have a full recap of the most important moments from each day. We're going to analyze it for you as well, both from the prosecution and the defense. What is going on in this case? And by the way, you can stream this trial for yourself on the Long Crime Trials channel. Hopefully you can check it out.

Okay, before we wrap things up, I want to just tell everybody something. So on sidebar, you know, we break down major trials. We walk you through the key pieces of evidence. Sometimes we're kind of limited on how much we can show you. That is why, if you haven't heard yet, you can look at everything on case files on the Long Crime Plus app. We have it for Tupac Shakur, too. So we are opening up the evidence fault.

So you can inspect the raw body cam footage, the 911 calls, the crime sales. scene photos, the full trial tapes firsthand. Plus, you get ad-free streaming of all your favorite long crime and court TV shows. You can see the full picture for an entire month free. Head on over to longcrimeplus.com. Enter promo code Sidebar and start exploring today. And that's all we have for you right now here on Sidebar. Everybody, thank you so much for joining us.

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