After appearing in court this Tuesday for the murder trial of Tupac Shakur, Duane ‘Keefe D’ Davis has received a confirmed trial start date of June 3rd, 2023.
After being arrested in September for the murder of Tupac, Keefe D and his public defenders, Charles Cano and Robert Arroyo, entered his plea of not guilty to the court last week. The trial will take place in Las Vegas, Nevada, which is notably a capital punishment state. However, prosecutors announced that they are not seeking the death penalty in the case of a conviction.
Prosecutors claim that Keefe D was the driving force behind the death of Tupac Shakur, as he was the one calling the shots and handing out guns to the other gang members in the car. As far as is known, on the fateful night of September 13th, 1996 Tupac was involved in an altercation with Davis’s nephew, Orlando Anderson. Multiple accounts of the night have ID’d Anderson as the gunman that shot Tupac in the drive-by, however Anderson was never arrested or put on trial before his own gang-related death in 1998.
Despite his not guilty plea, there is definitely some damning evidence against Davis, some including his own words. In 2019, he released his book ‘Compton Street Legend’ in which detailed the ’96 incident, claiming to be the mastermind behind the drive-by-shooting that killed Tupac Shakur.
The trial may prove to be more difficult than simply showing Davis’s own written words, as many potential witnesses are refusing to testify. Hopefully with a start date of June 3rd, the prosecution has enough time to find a few willing witnesses to change the game.
For now, 60-year-old Davis, who was allegedly diagnosed with cancer, will stay in jail until the trial begins next summer, but his attorneys have stated that they are seeking bail ahead of the trial.