Duane “Keffe D” Davis sentenced to 40 years to life in prison for murder of Tupac Shakur | Tupac Shakur

Duane “Keffe D” Davis, the former California gang leader convicted of murder for orchestrating the fatal shooting of rapper Tupac Shakur in 1996, has been sentenced to 40 years to life in prison.

“For three years, I’ve heard you say some variation of the same thing… ‘Yes, I was involved in all of this. But I’m different. I’ve moved on. I’ve moved away from Compton. I’m a grandfather now,'” Judge Carli Kierny said Tuesday as she handed down the sentence.

“You can’t take a man away from his family. You can’t take away his life, his whole future and just walk away from it,” Kierny continued.

On September 7, 1996, Shakur was shot and killed near the Las Vegas Strip shortly after a Mike Tyson boxing match. He died of his injuries a few days later.

For decades, his murder remained unsolved and remains one of hip-hop’s most enduring mysteries. Davis is the only person to be convicted of Shakur’s murder.

“It was hard to sit there, listen to someone over and over again describe, little by little, how they hunted down Tupac Amaru Shakur,” the rapper’s sister, Sekyiwa Shakur, said Tuesday, minutes before Davis’ sentencing.

She described her brother as a father figure. “He was the one God trusted to take care of me,” she told the court.

Grief over her brother’s murder led Sekyiwa Shakur to be hospitalized multiple times for depression, suicidal ideation and PTSD, she said.

She and the rapper’s half-brother, Maurice Shakur, called for Davis to receive the maximum sentence.

“It’s time to sit back and contemplate what you have done to the world, not just to me,” Sekyiwa Shakur said.

Davis watched him intently, but appeared stoic as the relatives spoke. He pledged earlier in the hearing to appeal the case.

A confluence of several factors hampered the investigation. The code of silence within street culture has made some witnesses reluctant to police cooperation. Las Vegas police were skeptical of the leads from their Compton counterparts, given that the head of security at Shakur’s label was a former Compton cop.

Orlando Anderson, a gangster and nephew of Davis, was on law enforcement’s radar as a potential shooter. The night Shakur was killed, the young rap star got into an altercation with Anderson. Las Vegas police questioned Anderson, but he was never arrested. Anderson later died in 1998.

But then, in 2023, Davis was arrested for murder.

It was Davis’ own media tour, touting his status as one of the last surviving eyewitnesses, and a “tell-all” 2019 memoir that led to the breakthrough.

Davis had felt emboldened by a backdoor deal in 2008 that he negotiated with police. He spoke candidly to investigators about the Shakur shooting, who were actually seeking information about the death of Christopher Wallace, known as Biggie Smalls or The Notorious B.I.G. Under a tender agreement, Davis was not to face charges for the offenses he shared.

In his memoir, Compton Street Legend, Davis wrote that he and a group of other men targeted Shakur and his entourage, seeking revenge for the fight with his nephew.

The briefs and interview have become essential to the prosecutors’ case. They argued that the details constituted an admission and that his public remarks voided the proposal agreement.

During Davis’ murder trial, his defense team argued that these details had been embellished. They also argued during the trial that there was no physical evidence, such as a murder weapon, linking Davis to the Las Vegas murder.

Ultimately, jurors sided with the state.