A former Southern California road gang chief pleaded not responsible Thursday to homicide within the 1996 killing of rap music icon Tupac Shakur in Las Vegas — a cost prompted by his personal descriptions in recent times about orchestrating the lethal drive-by capturing.

Duane Keith “Keffe D” Davis is the one individual nonetheless alive who was within the automobile from which photographs have been fired and the one individual ever charged with against the law within the case. In courtroom on Thursday, Davis stood in shackles as he awaited proceedings and waved to his spouse, son and daughter within the packed spectator gallery.

“Not responsible,” Davis mentioned when Clark County District Court docket Decide Tierra Jones requested for his plea.

The decide advised Davis that prosecutors are usually not in search of the loss of life penalty within the case, which may put Davis in jail for the remainder of his life if he’s convicted. Jones additionally named county particular public defenders Robert Arroyo and Charles Cano to signify Davis at taxpayer expense, after Davis misplaced his bid to rent personal protection lawyer Ross Goodman.

Goodman two weeks in the past mentioned prosecutors lack witnesses and key proof, together with a gun or automobile, for the killing dedicated 27 years in the past. Outdoors the courtroom on Thursday, Goodman mentioned Davis was nonetheless attempting to rent him. Davis’ relations declined to remark.

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Clark County District Lawyer Steve Wolfson advised reporters that he and a panel of prosecutors determined the case towards Davis was “not the form of case that ought to proceed with the asking of the loss of life penalty.” He didn’t specify causes for that call.

Wolfson additionally declined to reply to Goodman’s criticism of the proof, saying {that a} jury will weigh the outcomes of the police investigation.

In courtroom, Davis wore dark-blue jail garb and answered a number of questions, telling the decide that he attended “a 12 months in school,” wasn’t below the affect of medicine, remedy or alcohol, and he understood he’s charged with homicide. The decide set his subsequent courtroom date for Tuesday to schedule the trial.

Davis, 60, is initially from Compton, California. He was arrested Sept. 29 outdoors a house in suburban Henderson the place Las Vegas police served a search warrant July 17, drawing renewed consideration to one in every of hip-hop music’s most enduring mysteries. Davis stays jailed with out bail, didn’t testify earlier than the grand jury that indicted him, and declined from jail to talk with The Related Press.

The indictment alleges Davis obtained and supplied a gun to somebody within the again seat of a Cadillac earlier than the car-to-car gunfire that mortally wounded Shakur and wounded rap music mogul Marion “Suge” Knight at an intersection simply off the Las Vegas Strip. Shakur died per week later. He was 25.

Knight, now 58, is in jail in California, serving a 28-year sentence for the loss of life of a Compton businessman in 2015. He has not responded to messages by means of his attorneys in search of remark about Davis’ arrest.

Prosecutors allege that Shakur’s killing in Las Vegas got here out of competitors between East Coast members of a Bloods gang sect and West Coast teams of a Crips sect, together with Davis, for dominance in a musical style dubbed “gangsta rap.”

The grand jury was advised the Sept. 7, 1996 capturing in Las Vegas was retaliation for a brawl hours earlier at a Las Vegas Strip on line casino involving Shakur and Davis’ nephew, Orlando “Child Lane” Anderson.

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Tupac Shakur’s household has waited 27 years ‘for justice’ in lethal drive-by capturing: Las Vegas sheriff

Prosecutors advised a grand jury that Davis implicated himself within the killing in a number of interviews and a 2019 tell-all memoir that described his life main a Crips sect in Compton. Davis has mentioned he obtained a .40-caliber handgun and handed it to Anderson, a member of Davis’ gang, within the again seat of a Cadillac, although he didn’t determine Anderson because the shooter.

Anderson, then 22, denied involvement in Shakur’s killing and died two years later in a capturing in his hometown of Compton. The opposite again seat passenger and the driving force of the Cadillac are additionally lifeless.

In his e-book, Davis wrote that he advised authorities in 2010 what he knew of the killings of Shakur and gang rival Infamous B.I.G, whose authorized identify is Christopher Wallace, to guard himself and 48 of his Southside Compton Crips gang associates from prosecution and the potential for life sentences in jail.

Wallace, also referred to as Biggie Smalls, was shot and killed in Los Angeles in March 1997, six months after Shakur’s loss of life.

Shakur is essentially thought of one of the crucial influential and versatile rappers of all time. He had 5 No. 1 albums, was nominated for six Grammy Awards, was inducted into the Rock & Roll Corridor of Fame in 2017, and acquired a posthumous star this 12 months on the Hollywood Stroll of Fame.

Related Press author Rio Yamat in Las Vegas contributed to this report.

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