Hours earlier, at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Tupac, Suge Knight, and their entourage beat up Orlando “Baby Lane” Anderson—Davis’s nephew—in an altercation captured on camera.
Davis, leader of the South Side Compton Crips, became enraged; he obtained a gun (a .40-caliber Glock) and gathered a group (including his nephew) in a white Cadillac.
According to the charges and his own accounts in interviews and his book Compton Street Legend (2019), Davis rode in the front passenger seat, handed the weapon to the occupants in the back, and the group pursued the black BMW carrying Tupac and Suge Knight.
Shots were fired from the Cadillac. Tupac was struck four times and died six days later.
The prosecution made this clear at the trial:
“Duane Davis did not pull the trigger. But he did plan the shooting in retaliation for the beating of his nephew.”
The fatal shot is generally attributed to his nephew, Orlando Anderson (who died in a 1998 shootout).
The other two occupants of the Cadillac have also passed away.
The case was reopened primarily because Davis talked too much:
He spoke to the police about it in 2008–2009, repeated the story in interviews, and wrote about it in his book.
Those statements served as key evidence at the trial.
The defense argued that it was all bravado or fiction intended to sell books, but the jury did not believe it.
Summary:
Hours earlier, at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Tupac, Suge Knight, and their entourage beat up Orlando “Baby Lane” Anderson—Davis’s nephew—in an altercation captured on camera.
Davis, leader of the South Side Compton Crips, became enraged; he obtained a gun (a .40-caliber Glock) and gathered a group (including his nephew) in a white Cadillac.
According to the charges and his own accounts in interviews and his book Compton Street Legend (2019), Davis rode in the front passenger seat, handed the weapon to the occupants in the back, and the group pursued the black BMW carrying Tupac and Suge Knight.
Shots were fired from the Cadillac. Tupac was struck four times and died six days later.
The prosecution made this clear at the trial:
“Duane Davis did not pull the trigger. But he did plan the shooting in retaliation for the beating of his nephew.”
The fatal shot is generally attributed to his nephew, Orlando Anderson (who died in a 1998 shootout).
The other two occupants of the Cadillac have also passed away.
The case was reopened primarily because Davis talked too much:
He spoke to the police about it in 2008–2009, repeated the story in interviews, and wrote about it in his book.
Those statements served as key evidence at the trial.
The defense argued that it was all bravado or fiction intended to sell books, but the jury did not believe it.
Everybody in Compton knew this when it happened. He got convicted because he talked too much. The killer has been dead.
As much as I love the music Tupac produced, he was involved in a life he didn't understand.