Man arrested in connection with murder of Tupac Shakur in 1996
The murder of the hip hop legend has gone unsolved for nearly three decades
A man has been arrested in connection with the murder of Tupac Shakur in 1996, reports AP.
Las Vegas police made the arrest on Friday morning, 27 years after the acclaimed hip hop legend was shot four times in a drive-by shooting in the Nevada city.
The man is named as Duane “Keffe D” Davis, although the exact charge or charges are not currently known publicly, with an indictment expected later today.
Davis has been a long person of interest to investigators. In his 2019 memoir Compton Street Legend he described being in the Cadillac where the shots fired at Tupac came from.
In a 2018 interview he implicated his nephew, Orlando “Baby Lane” Anderson, saying he was one of two people in the back seat where the shots were fired from. Anderson denied any involvement, and has since died in a shooting in 2020.
Previously speaking to AP, Greg Kading, a retired Los Angeles police detective who was involved in the murder investigation for years, said Davis being arrested would not be surprising.
“It’s so long overdue,” he said. “People have been yearning for him to be arrested for a long time. It’s never been unsolved in our minds. It’s been unprosecuted.”
The investigation into the murder has been ongoing for nearly three decades.
Earlier this year in July it was reported that Las Vegas police had searched a house in the Nevada city of Henderson - Davis's wife's home - which is located under 20 miles away from the Las Vegas strip where Shakur was shot.
“It has been a while,” Las Vegas Police Lt Jason Johansson told the Las Vegas Review Journal.
He added: “It’s a case that’s gone unsolved and hopefully one day we can change that.”
Shakur was shot on September 7, 1996, in a drive-by shooting after attending the Mike Tyson and Bruce Seldon fight at the MGM Grand.
He was in a black car with the head of Death Row Records Marion ‘Suge’ Knight, who survived the incident.
The rapper had been shot four times and died in hospital a week later on September 13, aged 25.
Shakur - also known as 2Pac - was a six-time Grammy Award-nominated rapper and had five No. 1 albums.
According to The Guardian, Las Vegas police claim that the investigation has previously been stalled due to witnesses' refusal to cooperate.
Patrick Hinton is Mixmag's Editor & Digital Director, follow him on Twitter