Trial proceedings in Las Vegas
The second day of the Tupac Shakur murder trial in Las Vegas has begun, with Duane "Keefe D" Davis, 63, a former South Side Compton Crips gang leader, facing one count of murder with a deadly weapon in connection with the 1996 shooting. Prosecutors allege that Davis helped orchestrate the shooting, though he is not accused of being the gunman. Davis has pleaded not guilty.
During testimony, photographs of Shakur's body were shown, and most family members left the courtroom, according to Vanessa Murphy, an investigative reporter for 8News Now in Las Vegas, who is reporting live from the Nevada courtroom. The photographs, which were described in court but not shown on the trial live stream, showed evidence of the medical attempts to save his life after he was shot, Dr. Lisa Gavin confirmed.
Shakur was shot on 7 September 1996 and died in a Las Vegas hospital on 13 September 1996.
Dr. Lisa Gavin, a forensic pathologist in Clark County, Nevada, testified as an expert analyst, reviewing the report and photos of Shakur's body from his autopsy. Highlighting the challenges of holding a murder trial 30 years after a death, the medical examiner who conducted the original autopsy has since died. Gavin noted that she was in medical school in 1996 but has years of experience in interpreting evidence.
The second day began with more audio from a years-old interview between Davis and Fred Miller, a former Los Angeles police detective.
Claims of a bribe offer
Suge Knight, the Death Row founder, made a claim on "TMZ Live" from prison that Davis's lawyers offered him up to $1 million to say Keefe wasn't in the car that allegedly shot Tupac. Knight said he refused the alleged offer, insisting his loyalty to Tupac "can't be compromised."
Knight also pushed back on The Game's claim that Keefe D is being used as a scapegoat, accusing people of using Pac's death for attention. According to Knight, Tupac's life "wasn't no motherf*ing circus," and he says too many people are talking just to get attention.
Knight stopped short of saying Keefe is guilty or innocent but repeated his claim that there was "definitely more than one person involved" in Tupac's killing. He also accused "crooked cops" and off-duty officers of being mixed up in the larger picture surrounding Pac's death.
Gene Deal's allegations
Gene Deal, the former bodyguard of Sean "Diddy" Combs, claimed in an interview with The Art Of Dialogue that he is facing pressure to testify in the Keefe D trial and speak on Diddy's alleged involvement in Tupac's murder. Deal alleged prosecutors want him to take the stand and speak on Eric "Von Zip" Martin being the alleged middleman between Keefe and Sean Combs.
"They want to put an association with Keefe D and Diddy," he alleged. "What they wanted Diddy at that time for is, Diddy would be the scapegoat of why there was such a thing called the East Coast and West Coast war. If he had Tupac killed, if he put up the money for Tupac to be killed, then it's easier for them to say the gangbangers and somebody associated with Death Row killed Biggie. So now, we got to keep this going. We got to use Keefe D and his association with Diddy."
Deal also referenced a $400 million lawsuit by Biggie Smalls' mother against the LAPD, suggesting prosecutors wanted to implicate Diddy to avoid that lawsuit. He stated that Keefe D was not a Crip after age 17. Deal has criticized Diddy's misconduct before but suggested he doesn't think Combs had anything to do with Tupac's murder.