Tupac Shakur slaying: Las Vegas police arrest suspect 27 years later

More than two decades after his death, a suspect has been arrested in connection with the murder of Tupac Shakur.

The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department (LVMPD) arrested Duane “Keffe D” Davis on Friday as part of its long-running investigation into Shakur’s unsolved 1996 slaying, officials announced. The Associated Press was first to report news of the arrest.

“For 27 years, the family of Tupac Shakur has been waiting for justice,” Clark County Sheriff Kevin McMahill said at a Friday news conference.

“I know there’s been many people who did not believe that the murder of Tupac Shakur was important to this police department. I’m here to tell you, that was simply not the case. It was not the case back then. And it is not the case today,” McMahill said.

Investigators had several leads early on, LVMPD Lt. Jason Johansson said, but “never had the necessary evidence to bring this case forward and present it for criminal charges.”

The case was “reinvigorated” by Davis’s “own admission” in 2018 in interviews he did with media outlets, Johansson told reporters.

The arrest comes roughly two months after the LVMPD confirmed in July it executed a search warrant related to the Las Vegas drive-by shooting that killed the 25-year-old “Changes” rapper. 

Johansson said police “followed a systematic investigative plan” since Davis’s 2018 comments and “conducted countless interviews and corroborated numerous facts that were not only consistent with the crime scene on the night of the incident, but also corroborated and were consistent with the sequence of events that night.”

“We need to make this be a reminder that the charge of murder does not have a statute of limitations,” Johansson said.

“Tupac Shakur is a music legend, and for a long time, this community and worldwide have been wanting justice for Tupac. Today we are taking that first step,” Clark County District Attorney Steve Wolfson said.

Wolfson said Davis is expected to appear in court in the next few days.

“Today justice will be served in the murder of Tupac Shakur,” Wolfson said.