Latest / INSIGHT TODAY / Why Tupac Shakur's murder trial is happening 30 years after he was killed
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: How did an ex gang member's book learns him on
- 0:03Speaker 1: trial for Tupac's murder. Yeah, you heard that right. But
- 0:07Speaker 1: let's just pull up for a moment, because we are
- 0:09Speaker 1: talking about one of the most prominent artists of the nineties.
- 0:13Speaker 2: He's icon that's gone.
- 0:15Speaker 3: You know, he's there forever missed in the industry. He
- 0:18Speaker 3: stood for a lot in his music and how he
- 0:22Speaker 3: brought his storytelling into life in the community, inspiration for
- 0:27Speaker 3: me growing up.
- 0:29Speaker 1: More than seventy five million records sold to his name.
- 0:33Speaker 1: Lots of his music spoke about racial injustices and police violence,
- 0:37Speaker 1: but also street and gang life. All of that came
- 0:41Speaker 1: to a halt thirty years ago, aged twenty five. It
- 0:45Speaker 1: was nineteen ninety six. He was riding in the passenger
- 0:48Speaker 1: seat of this black BMW. Shag Knight was the driver
- 0:53Speaker 1: founder of Death Row Records on America's West Coast, which
- 0:56Speaker 1: Tupac was signed to. At the same time, there was
- 1:00Speaker 1: a huge rivalry with Bad Boy Records, founded by Sean
- 1:04Speaker 1: Combs Diddy out of the East Coast. It played into
- 1:08Speaker 1: the nineties gang landscape in Los Angeles. There was a
- 1:12Speaker 1: tough walk between the bloods, often represented by the color
- 1:15Speaker 1: of red and Cripps, who often wore blue. The shooting
- 1:18Speaker 1: in ninety six happened after Tupac had been to a
- 1:21Speaker 1: Mike Tyson fight in Vegas. This security footage shows him
- 1:26Speaker 1: and some of his group, who are thought to be
- 1:28Speaker 1: associated with the Bloods, attacking a man called Orlando Anderson,
- 1:33Speaker 1: who it's claimed is linked to the Crips. Hours later,
- 1:37Speaker 1: Tupac and shag Knight left, a white Cadillac pulled up
- 1:41Speaker 1: next to their car. That's when the shots were fired.
- 1:45Speaker 1: Shag Knight is thought to be one of the only
- 1:47Speaker 1: people left alive who saw Tupac's death. His killing has
- 1:51Speaker 1: been one of America's highest profile unsolved cases for thirty years.
- 1:57Speaker 1: Only now is a trial being prepared for, in large
- 2:01Speaker 1: parts thanks to a book co written by the very
- 2:04Speaker 1: man Standing Trial, introducing Dwayne Davis aka KEIFD. He was
- 2:11Speaker 1: only officially arrested and charged with murder in twenty twenty three,
- 2:16Speaker 1: but it's not claimed he pulled the trigger himself. It
- 2:19Speaker 1: came after years of countless theories about the case, potential
- 2:23Speaker 1: suspects dying or being killed, and witnesses disappearing. There's also
- 2:29Speaker 1: the no Snitch Street Code law. Enforcement say witnesses refused
- 2:33Speaker 1: to talk to them. It left Keefd someone alleged to
- 2:37Speaker 1: be associated with a crips gang, same as his nephew
- 2:41Speaker 1: Orlando Anderson, attacked by Tupax group before the shooting. It's
- 2:45Speaker 1: not that police didn't know about Keefd. He is the
- 2:49Speaker 1: last surviving person who was in the Whites Cadillac from
- 2:52Speaker 1: which the shots came.
- 2:54Speaker 3: So what changed Dwayne Keefd.
- 2:56Speaker 4: Davis was actually approached in the early two thousands about
- 3:00Speaker 4: another rapper's death, Biggie Small's death. They were trying to
- 3:02Speaker 4: investigate what happened to him, who was also shot, and
- 3:05Speaker 4: that's an unsolved case as well. And Dwayne Davis said,
- 3:08Speaker 4: I can't talk to you about what happened with Biggie
- 3:10Speaker 4: Small's but I can talk to you about what happened
- 3:12Speaker 4: that night in Las Vegas. And essentially he entered into
- 3:15Speaker 4: a profit agreement with law enforcement where they said, if
- 3:18Speaker 4: you tell us everything and we believe you're telling the truth,
- 3:20Speaker 4: we will not use what you say against you, will
- 3:23Speaker 4: not prosecute you.
- 3:24Speaker 1: Basically that deal stood for years, but then came the
- 3:28Speaker 1: book in twenty nineteen, a memoir titled Compton Street legend
- 3:34Speaker 1: co written by Dwayne Davis. In it, he never claimed
- 3:38Speaker 1: to be the shooter, but it says he was the
- 3:40Speaker 1: person who tossed the gun used to kill Tupac into
- 3:44Speaker 1: the backseat of the Cadillac. Prosecutors said all of that
- 3:48Speaker 1: meant the deal was no longer, and a judge agreed,
- 3:51Speaker 1: despite Dwayne Davis and his defense team having argued that
- 3:55Speaker 1: he wasn't the book's only author and that sections were
- 3:58Speaker 1: fictionalized to make profit.
- 4:00Speaker 2: The judge literally pointed to an interview when someone asked
- 4:04Speaker 2: him about this. This is hyperbole, This is exaggeration. It
- 4:07Speaker 2: is like na, son, gangang, this is the truth.
- 4:09Speaker 3: This is real.
- 4:10Speaker 2: Everything in this book, this is my real truth. I
- 4:13Speaker 2: have co signed on it.
- 4:14Speaker 3: The judge was saying, look, man, you said this is
- 4:17Speaker 3: the real truth, You've co signed on it, and then
- 4:20Speaker 3: you kept doing podcasts telling the world this is what happened.
- 4:24Speaker 3: So the judge says, no, man, it's all coming in
- 4:26Speaker 3: against you. Doesn't mean it's an admission. Everybody doesn't mean that.
- 4:30Speaker 3: It says you are guilty.
- 4:32Speaker 2: It said. The judge says, the jury can now hear it.
- 4:35Speaker 1: And so the book and everything that he said publicly
- 4:39Speaker 1: reignited the investigation into Tupac's murder. The door to Dwayne
- 4:43Speaker 1: Davis being arrested was opened. In the years that followed.
- 4:47Speaker 1: Please look to back up the claims that he'd made
- 4:50Speaker 1: about the shooting, seized the likes of computers from his
- 4:54Speaker 1: house and material relating to Tupac before then arresting him
- 4:58Speaker 1: in twenty twenty three. So, in many ways, Dwayne Davis's
- 5:02Speaker 1: own words have landed him on trial for Tupac's murder.
- 5:06Speaker 1: He said he may well take the stands, in which
- 5:09Speaker 1: case he can get up there and argue that the
- 5:11Speaker 1: book is fiction, as his team previously have done, say
- 5:14Speaker 1: that none of it actually happened. Remember, it is not
- 5:17Speaker 1: claimed that he pulled the trigger and fired the shots
- 5:21Speaker 1: that killed Tupac. But this is a murder trial.
- 5:24Speaker 2: The theory is the hand of one is the hand
- 5:27Speaker 2: of all. The same theory is all of you were
- 5:30Speaker 2: in the car together. You may not have fired the shot,
- 5:34Speaker 2: however you gave the gun, You were in the car,
- 5:36Speaker 2: you were all working together, So every single one of
- 5:40Speaker 2: you is liable for that murder.
- 5:43Speaker 1: Dwayne Davis is charged with murder with a deadly weapon
- 5:46Speaker 1: with the intent to promote further or assist a criminal gang.
- 5:50Speaker 1: The trial is likely to expose more about the deadly
- 5:53Speaker 1: East Coast West Coast rivalries. Dwayne Davis has pleaded not guilty,
- 5:59Speaker 1: but if he is convicted, he faces life in prison.