Sept. 1, 2026
Tupac Murder Trial: GUILTY Verdict For Former Gang Leader Duane Davis
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RSS Feed One week shy of the 30th anniversary of the shooting death of Tupac Shakur, 63-year-old Duane Davis was found guilty of murdering the rap icon on the Vegas Strip. It only took the jury three hours to convict Davis, after two weeks of testimony and nearly 30 witnesses. The prosecution effectively used Davis’ own words, both written and spoken to convince the jury of 12 that he was the mastermind behind the killing. We have reaction from the courtroom and hear what Davis told the judge after he learned his fate.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
00:00:02
Speaker 1: Hey there, folks. It is Tuesday, September 1st. Took them 30 years to bring somebody to justice for the Tupac Shakur killing, but it didn't take them very long to bring back a verdict. And with that, welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ recording this as the Lindsay Clancy jury continues to tick-tock, tick-tock on the deliberation clock. This jury wasn't messing around, Robeson.
00:00:28
Speaker 2: They weren't.
00:00:28
Speaker 3: Less than three hours, I believe, is the official time it took a jury of 12 to convict Dwayne Davis of first-degree murder with a deadly weapon.
00:00:40
Speaker 2: And it was interesting, the only kind of little bit of a.
00:00:43
Speaker 3: I had to kind of look into it was the added with intent to promote further or assist a criminal gang. When he was read that guilty verdict, the judge said, Hey jury, you're still going to have to go back and deliberate on the gang enhancement addition to the murder conviction. But the prosecution came back later and said, we're fine. We're going to dismiss the gang enhancement because of witness availability and There's even mystery shrouded in all of that.
00:01:13
Speaker 1: This is, Robes, I'm kind of as I'm talking now. This is a moment in hip hop history. Robes, these two are the, they have to be two of the biggest hip hop rap icons ever. And that battle between the two was legendary and it produced legendary music. And these two guys were killed months apart in their 20s. Never solved. And it just became a part of hip-hop rap lore. Just the unsolved murders of these guys. Robes, for the first time, someone has been convicted and held accountable for one of the killings. Robes, this is kind of a really, really big deal, given what these two men have meant to music and what this story has meant to fans. This is a big deal.
00:02:07
Speaker 2: It is.
00:02:07
Speaker 3: And you know how I always think that timing isn't coincidence.
00:02:12
Speaker 2: How about this?
00:02:13
Speaker 3: The verdict came down exactly to the day, one week shy from the 30th anniversary of that murder.
00:02:21
Speaker 2: So the verdict came down August 31st.
00:02:23
Speaker 1: 30 years.
00:02:24
Speaker 2: A week later, it's September 7th, right?
00:02:27
Speaker 1: 30 years.
00:02:28
Speaker 3: September 7th, 1996. That is when Tupac Shakur and Suge Knight Were shot at. Tupac later died there on the Vegas trip.
00:02:37
Speaker 2: I mean, that's kind of remarkable. Almost exactly to the day.
00:02:42
Speaker 3: 30 years. And what?
00:02:43
Speaker 1: The only reason we have this is not because of fantastic detective work that solved it. Don't get me wrong. A lot of work put in. But I'm saying this guy opened his mouth and has been doing podcasts and writing books and doing interviews. And that is the thing that did him in. This might have gone unsolved if he just shut up. You know what?
00:03:04
Speaker 3: When you said that, and yes, that is absolutely true. It was his own loose lips that got him behind bars. But just hearing you say it that way, the anger that I felt for the Tupac Shakur family, that they have just had to sit there and know that this man was responsible, hear him talk about it, see him profit from it, writing a memoir about it, and then finding out in court that police have known about it all these years, that had to be a hell of a moment.
00:03:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's been two decades.
00:03:40
Speaker 3: And look, his sister, Sakiwa Shaker, She cried in court, just some color from the courtroom from folks who were there. And they said the other gathering of Tupac family and friends, they were embracing, holding hands, passing around tissues. It was definitely an emotional moment. And then on the other side, Dwayne Davis's son was in the courtroom as well. He was described as covering his face with one hand. But like, look, obviously Tupac. it's hard enough knowing your father is going to prison for the rest of his life. But to know that the reason why he's going to prison for the rest of his life is because he told everybody he did it. That's, that's, that's rubbing salt in the wound.
00:04:21
Speaker 1: Everybody who would listen. And I guess Rogues, he was out there. He thought he was invincible. I guess for whatever reason, he didn't consult with a lawyer to realize if you go out and start popping off at the mouth about this, the deal is going to be off.
00:04:34
Speaker 2: They call that hubris.
00:04:35
Speaker 1: Yeah. Bro, he looked it. He looked it during the trial at times. Bro, this is, I just always remember that. I remember hearing, I know I was when Tupac got shot next to Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville. I was a freshman in college, starting my sophomore year in college. Like, I remember that stuff. Bro, this has been a part of any hip-hop fan's life your whole life. And now they finally got a guy who's decided to go pop off at the mouth. Robes, so many people got exposed to a lot of gang culture and an understanding of it.
00:05:11
Speaker 2: Um, throughout this trial. Absolutely. And look, it's pretty remarkable.
00:05:16
Speaker 1: Yes.
00:05:16
Speaker 3: His family and friends, Tupac Shakur's had to wait almost 30 years, but this thing happened pretty quickly. Nine days of testimony, 27 witnesses, 24.
00:05:26
Speaker 2: For the prosecution, three for the defense. They thought this was going to take a lot longer.
00:05:31
Speaker 3: Uh, the prosecution was originally, they had a list of up to 45 witnesses. Turns out they didn't need them. I mean, that literally is what it amounted to. Um, Davis, one of four people in that white Cadillac. The other three are dead. The white Cadillac that pulled up to Tupac and Suge Knight. And look, there's no way they could have convicted him if they didn't have his own voice behind it.
00:05:56
Speaker 2: Like there's no one there to rat him out.
00:05:59
Speaker 1: Robes, you remember at the beginning of this trial, the talk was that the prosecution pretty much only had his own words to use against him. His own words that he had in the book. so much was focused on in the podcast and all this stuff. Robes, I thought it was pretty effective by this prosecutor to get up there during his closing and start with, forget his words. Like, don't even take into account anything he said and let me lay out the evidence we have as to why he was responsible. So he went through that way and then... Added the guy's own words. I thought that was a good way to go.
00:06:36
Speaker 3: It was really good. And look, I thought it was also effective in his closing. The prosecution said that even with the changing details, yes, there was a slightly different varying account from a podcast interview to the police recordings. to his memoir. Sometimes he denied knowing who fired the gun. But the prosecution said this, even with all of those changing details, one fact remained the same. Dwayne Davis put himself in each and every one of those accounts in the Cadillac where the shots were fired from.
00:07:13
Speaker 2: The core fact remained.
00:07:16
Speaker 1: What a... Rose, when he said it in those ways, he's like, this guy at every point had an opportunity to take himself out of the car. Everybody else is dead who was in the car. He said every opportunity he had, he said, but it depends on whose story. He was changing his story based on what his needs were. So little details he would change here or there, but he kept that point consistent. guilty, guilty, guilty. Exactly.
00:07:44
Speaker 3: I mean, and look, we were laughing from the beginning with the defense's defense.
00:07:50
Speaker 2: Our client lies.
00:07:52
Speaker 3: And look, they did try to go with, there's, this was, I actually kind of laughed in their closing, but the defense was really pushing the fact that there was no physical evidence, no murder weapon. They never found the Cadillac that they wrote in that night. The bullet casings never matched a weapon on file. So they had all of this to say. They actually said they have nothing in this case that says that man was here in Las Vegas on September 7th, 1996.
00:08:16
Speaker 1: Let the hilarity ensue.
00:08:18
Speaker 2: That did not land. It did not land.
00:08:22
Speaker 1: Because the prosecutor had all of this, of him on audio. asking them to find the video of him in Vegas. So his own words were confirming that he was there. Didn't y'all see me? I was at the watch recall. He just assumed these cops that were investigating knew he was there because he knew he was on video.
00:08:45
Speaker 3: Yeah.
00:08:46
Speaker 1: It's silly.
00:08:47
Speaker 2: It was ridiculous.
00:08:48
Speaker 3: And the other thing the defense tried to hammer home with the jury was that the prosecutors obviously didn't consider his account credible or they would have charged him back then. That was his defense. And it just, it was flimsy. And it was not shocking. I think we even said it yesterday. Yes, Lindsay Clancy, we're waiting that jury.
00:09:12
Speaker 2: It could be all week. It could be days.
00:09:14
Speaker 3: But we were pretty sure in the Dwayne Davis courtroom that jury was going to be back pretty quickly.
00:09:20
Speaker 1: What are we considering here? Robes, his words over the years, telling this story, to hear his voice and how he was telling it and how consistent he was in telling it. Robes, there are many details that would have never gotten out about this crime had he not been the one to tell them. Robes, and that, oh my goodness, what was the other evidence? The Sebring. You remember that? The whole issue, there was a, I didn't know about this. But after they did the shooting and they had shot Tupac and they were getting away in their vehicle, there was a car that he thought was chasing them.
00:09:53
Speaker 3: Yes.
00:09:53
Speaker 1: A Sebring.
00:09:54
Speaker 2: Yes.
00:09:55
Speaker 3: Right?
00:09:55
Speaker 1: And he said, I think they actually shot at that car because they thought that car was chasing them. He gave that detail years and years and years ago. The woman in the Sebring testified in this trial. Nobody ever knew about that. The only way he could know that Sebring was there and that somebody was back there, he had to have known.
00:10:20
Speaker 3: Yes.
00:10:20
Speaker 1: The one in the car. Yes. That was further evidence. I had no idea. They thought they were being chased and shot at a woman in a car.
00:10:28
Speaker 3: Right.
00:10:29
Speaker 2: And they were just trying to get away from the scene.
00:10:30
Speaker 1: That was it. Yes.
00:10:31
Speaker 2: And that's what she testified to.
00:10:33
Speaker 3: But yes, every single part of his account like actually sealed his fate. Over and over and over again. It wasn't like there was just one confession to one detective. It was comical how loudly, how often, in different forms, he told the same story. And in each and every time, he's the guy.
00:10:58
Speaker 1: It was a pretty highly produced closings. They used a lot of clips. Some of them used clips from the trial itself. And say, remember this part? And roll the clip. It was well produced.
00:11:10
Speaker 2: It was highly produced.
00:11:11
Speaker 1: Like television, like roll cue. There's your soundbite. And they come back and he continues. But the funniest one was him playing sound, playing a part of a video of Dwayne Davis sitting, doing an interview, holding up the book. Get my book. This is the real story right here. Okay.
00:11:30
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think, and he even brought up the prosecutor to correct the O.J. Simpson, if I did it. He was like, O.J.
00:11:36
Speaker 3: Simpson wrote a book, if I did it. Dwayne Davis wrote a book, I did it. That worked for me.
00:11:43
Speaker 1: That's plain Johnny Cochran speak. Yes, yes.
00:11:46
Speaker 3: We get that.
00:11:49
Speaker 2: To just how quickly this jury came to a verdict.
00:11:52
Speaker 3: But when we come back, save this for the end because it was probably my favorite part of yesterday. Dwayne Davis's reaction after the judge tells the bailiffs to remand him back into custody and that he was going to be held without bond. Wait until you hear what Dwayne Davis had to say to the judge. Welcome back, everyone, to Amy and TJ. It was a swift day in court yesterday in Las Vegas. Dwayne Davis, the only person now held accountable officially in the shooting death of Tupac Shakur 30 years ago.
00:12:40
Speaker 2: Back in 1996. Yes, he was convicted of first-degree murder.
00:12:43
Speaker 3: The jury came back in less than three hours, and he is now facing life in prison without the possibility of parole, all because he couldn't keep his mouth And that continued even after the verdict was read.
00:12:59
Speaker 1: He's been a character, though.
00:13:00
Speaker 2: Davis had some things to say to the judge.
00:13:02
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, he's been a character throughout this trial. You know, remember he was yelling at the prosecutor? Yep. At one point. He's spoken a couple times. That he wasn't supposed to.
00:13:12
Speaker 3: He's a man who's used to doing what he wants, when he wants, to whomever he wants.
00:13:16
Speaker 2: And so, yes, he had that attitude.
00:13:18
Speaker 3: And look, his face was described as stone cold, like zero reaction.
00:13:24
Speaker 1: All I've ever seen of his face.
00:13:25
Speaker 3: I've never.
00:13:26
Speaker 2: Does he smile?
00:13:27
Speaker 1: I've never seen a reaction. Even in the photo, nothing. He has the same scowl.
00:13:33
Speaker 2: Yeah, a scowl. That's what it is. But after.
00:13:35
Speaker 3: The judge ordered him held without bail.
00:13:38
Speaker 2: Davis said, excuse me, I want to have my stuff back.
00:13:42
Speaker 3: Apparently he wanted his jewelry and some phones back as if that were going to happen.
00:13:48
Speaker 1: That was going to happen. They're going to take that.
00:13:50
Speaker 3: Right?
00:13:50
Speaker 2: Like, is he delusional? Excuse me, I want to have my stuff back.
00:13:54
Speaker 3: He yells this at the judge and then says, and I would like to appeal this matter.
00:13:59
Speaker 1: Okay.
00:14:00
Speaker 3: It's not really how things are done. The judge actually did respond to him and said, okay. Of course there will be an appeal, but that happens after sentencing.
00:14:07
Speaker 1: After we tell you you're going to prison for the rest of your life. Then you can yell that out.
00:14:16
Speaker 3: Then you can appeal, but probably best done through your attorney. But yes, his sentencing date is coming up October 13th. Again, facing life in prison without the possibility of parole. Can't imagine, what is he, 63 now? I mean, he's going to prison for the rest of his life, without a doubt. How is that going to be like for him in jail?
00:14:35
Speaker 1: Who knows? Where is he going to be in prison? He's going to be in prison in Vegas. Not in California, not in Southern California. I don't know how that's going to go for him. But man, this is, what a chapter. In hip-hop history that was just closed to a certain degree. We now know. This is the best story we've gotten. We now know what happened to Tupac, what happened that night.
00:14:54
Speaker 2: Do you have an emotional reaction?
00:14:56
Speaker 3: I know you had a connection, obviously, to Tupac and your time in life and what you thought about his music and him. Any actual emotional, personal reaction to the conviction?
00:15:07
Speaker 1: You know what? I kind of sank a little bit doing this, remembering just how young he was. Damn, man, 25. He did that much at 25. He had three or something movies he had starred in. He was making some of the music of your youth. Whatever you're listening to when you're junior high, high school, certainly first couple years of college, that music is going to stay with you the rest of your life. Tupac is that. He is just a poet. He just was. The dude was brilliant. Brilliant, brilliant. And I don't know just how young he was and how just unnecessary all this was.
00:15:45
Speaker 3: Right.
00:15:45
Speaker 1: So do a Drake and Kendrick. Right. No bullet to fly. Got nasty. But this thing was a different time. Well, just a shame.
00:15:54
Speaker 2: It is a shame. That's a good way to put it. Just a total shame.
00:15:57
Speaker 3: But there is some justice, some closure, at least for the Shakur family. And they certainly seem grateful for yesterday's verdict. And with that, everyone, we always appreciate you listening to us. And again, we're on Verdict Watch with Lindsay Clancy. So please, please, please pay attention to the feed. We will be on it as soon as we get any word from that jury in Massachusetts. But in the meantime, thank you for listening. I'm Amy Robach alongside TJ Holmes. We'll talk to you soon.
Speaker 1: Hey there, folks. It is Tuesday, September 1st. Took them 30 years to bring somebody to justice for the Tupac Shakur killing, but it didn't take them very long to bring back a verdict. And with that, welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ recording this as the Lindsay Clancy jury continues to tick-tock, tick-tock on the deliberation clock. This jury wasn't messing around, Robeson.
00:00:28
Speaker 2: They weren't.
00:00:28
Speaker 3: Less than three hours, I believe, is the official time it took a jury of 12 to convict Dwayne Davis of first-degree murder with a deadly weapon.
00:00:40
Speaker 2: And it was interesting, the only kind of little bit of a.
00:00:43
Speaker 3: I had to kind of look into it was the added with intent to promote further or assist a criminal gang. When he was read that guilty verdict, the judge said, Hey jury, you're still going to have to go back and deliberate on the gang enhancement addition to the murder conviction. But the prosecution came back later and said, we're fine. We're going to dismiss the gang enhancement because of witness availability and There's even mystery shrouded in all of that.
00:01:13
Speaker 1: This is, Robes, I'm kind of as I'm talking now. This is a moment in hip hop history. Robes, these two are the, they have to be two of the biggest hip hop rap icons ever. And that battle between the two was legendary and it produced legendary music. And these two guys were killed months apart in their 20s. Never solved. And it just became a part of hip-hop rap lore. Just the unsolved murders of these guys. Robes, for the first time, someone has been convicted and held accountable for one of the killings. Robes, this is kind of a really, really big deal, given what these two men have meant to music and what this story has meant to fans. This is a big deal.
00:02:07
Speaker 2: It is.
00:02:07
Speaker 3: And you know how I always think that timing isn't coincidence.
00:02:12
Speaker 2: How about this?
00:02:13
Speaker 3: The verdict came down exactly to the day, one week shy from the 30th anniversary of that murder.
00:02:21
Speaker 2: So the verdict came down August 31st.
00:02:23
Speaker 1: 30 years.
00:02:24
Speaker 2: A week later, it's September 7th, right?
00:02:27
Speaker 1: 30 years.
00:02:28
Speaker 3: September 7th, 1996. That is when Tupac Shakur and Suge Knight Were shot at. Tupac later died there on the Vegas trip.
00:02:37
Speaker 2: I mean, that's kind of remarkable. Almost exactly to the day.
00:02:42
Speaker 3: 30 years. And what?
00:02:43
Speaker 1: The only reason we have this is not because of fantastic detective work that solved it. Don't get me wrong. A lot of work put in. But I'm saying this guy opened his mouth and has been doing podcasts and writing books and doing interviews. And that is the thing that did him in. This might have gone unsolved if he just shut up. You know what?
00:03:04
Speaker 3: When you said that, and yes, that is absolutely true. It was his own loose lips that got him behind bars. But just hearing you say it that way, the anger that I felt for the Tupac Shakur family, that they have just had to sit there and know that this man was responsible, hear him talk about it, see him profit from it, writing a memoir about it, and then finding out in court that police have known about it all these years, that had to be a hell of a moment.
00:03:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's been two decades.
00:03:40
Speaker 3: And look, his sister, Sakiwa Shaker, She cried in court, just some color from the courtroom from folks who were there. And they said the other gathering of Tupac family and friends, they were embracing, holding hands, passing around tissues. It was definitely an emotional moment. And then on the other side, Dwayne Davis's son was in the courtroom as well. He was described as covering his face with one hand. But like, look, obviously Tupac. it's hard enough knowing your father is going to prison for the rest of his life. But to know that the reason why he's going to prison for the rest of his life is because he told everybody he did it. That's, that's, that's rubbing salt in the wound.
00:04:21
Speaker 1: Everybody who would listen. And I guess Rogues, he was out there. He thought he was invincible. I guess for whatever reason, he didn't consult with a lawyer to realize if you go out and start popping off at the mouth about this, the deal is going to be off.
00:04:34
Speaker 2: They call that hubris.
00:04:35
Speaker 1: Yeah. Bro, he looked it. He looked it during the trial at times. Bro, this is, I just always remember that. I remember hearing, I know I was when Tupac got shot next to Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville. I was a freshman in college, starting my sophomore year in college. Like, I remember that stuff. Bro, this has been a part of any hip-hop fan's life your whole life. And now they finally got a guy who's decided to go pop off at the mouth. Robes, so many people got exposed to a lot of gang culture and an understanding of it.
00:05:11
Speaker 2: Um, throughout this trial. Absolutely. And look, it's pretty remarkable.
00:05:16
Speaker 1: Yes.
00:05:16
Speaker 3: His family and friends, Tupac Shakur's had to wait almost 30 years, but this thing happened pretty quickly. Nine days of testimony, 27 witnesses, 24.
00:05:26
Speaker 2: For the prosecution, three for the defense. They thought this was going to take a lot longer.
00:05:31
Speaker 3: Uh, the prosecution was originally, they had a list of up to 45 witnesses. Turns out they didn't need them. I mean, that literally is what it amounted to. Um, Davis, one of four people in that white Cadillac. The other three are dead. The white Cadillac that pulled up to Tupac and Suge Knight. And look, there's no way they could have convicted him if they didn't have his own voice behind it.
00:05:56
Speaker 2: Like there's no one there to rat him out.
00:05:59
Speaker 1: Robes, you remember at the beginning of this trial, the talk was that the prosecution pretty much only had his own words to use against him. His own words that he had in the book. so much was focused on in the podcast and all this stuff. Robes, I thought it was pretty effective by this prosecutor to get up there during his closing and start with, forget his words. Like, don't even take into account anything he said and let me lay out the evidence we have as to why he was responsible. So he went through that way and then... Added the guy's own words. I thought that was a good way to go.
00:06:36
Speaker 3: It was really good. And look, I thought it was also effective in his closing. The prosecution said that even with the changing details, yes, there was a slightly different varying account from a podcast interview to the police recordings. to his memoir. Sometimes he denied knowing who fired the gun. But the prosecution said this, even with all of those changing details, one fact remained the same. Dwayne Davis put himself in each and every one of those accounts in the Cadillac where the shots were fired from.
00:07:13
Speaker 2: The core fact remained.
00:07:16
Speaker 1: What a... Rose, when he said it in those ways, he's like, this guy at every point had an opportunity to take himself out of the car. Everybody else is dead who was in the car. He said every opportunity he had, he said, but it depends on whose story. He was changing his story based on what his needs were. So little details he would change here or there, but he kept that point consistent. guilty, guilty, guilty. Exactly.
00:07:44
Speaker 3: I mean, and look, we were laughing from the beginning with the defense's defense.
00:07:50
Speaker 2: Our client lies.
00:07:52
Speaker 3: And look, they did try to go with, there's, this was, I actually kind of laughed in their closing, but the defense was really pushing the fact that there was no physical evidence, no murder weapon. They never found the Cadillac that they wrote in that night. The bullet casings never matched a weapon on file. So they had all of this to say. They actually said they have nothing in this case that says that man was here in Las Vegas on September 7th, 1996.
00:08:16
Speaker 1: Let the hilarity ensue.
00:08:18
Speaker 2: That did not land. It did not land.
00:08:22
Speaker 1: Because the prosecutor had all of this, of him on audio. asking them to find the video of him in Vegas. So his own words were confirming that he was there. Didn't y'all see me? I was at the watch recall. He just assumed these cops that were investigating knew he was there because he knew he was on video.
00:08:45
Speaker 3: Yeah.
00:08:46
Speaker 1: It's silly.
00:08:47
Speaker 2: It was ridiculous.
00:08:48
Speaker 3: And the other thing the defense tried to hammer home with the jury was that the prosecutors obviously didn't consider his account credible or they would have charged him back then. That was his defense. And it just, it was flimsy. And it was not shocking. I think we even said it yesterday. Yes, Lindsay Clancy, we're waiting that jury.
00:09:12
Speaker 2: It could be all week. It could be days.
00:09:14
Speaker 3: But we were pretty sure in the Dwayne Davis courtroom that jury was going to be back pretty quickly.
00:09:20
Speaker 1: What are we considering here? Robes, his words over the years, telling this story, to hear his voice and how he was telling it and how consistent he was in telling it. Robes, there are many details that would have never gotten out about this crime had he not been the one to tell them. Robes, and that, oh my goodness, what was the other evidence? The Sebring. You remember that? The whole issue, there was a, I didn't know about this. But after they did the shooting and they had shot Tupac and they were getting away in their vehicle, there was a car that he thought was chasing them.
00:09:53
Speaker 3: Yes.
00:09:53
Speaker 1: A Sebring.
00:09:54
Speaker 2: Yes.
00:09:55
Speaker 3: Right?
00:09:55
Speaker 1: And he said, I think they actually shot at that car because they thought that car was chasing them. He gave that detail years and years and years ago. The woman in the Sebring testified in this trial. Nobody ever knew about that. The only way he could know that Sebring was there and that somebody was back there, he had to have known.
00:10:20
Speaker 3: Yes.
00:10:20
Speaker 1: The one in the car. Yes. That was further evidence. I had no idea. They thought they were being chased and shot at a woman in a car.
00:10:28
Speaker 3: Right.
00:10:29
Speaker 2: And they were just trying to get away from the scene.
00:10:30
Speaker 1: That was it. Yes.
00:10:31
Speaker 2: And that's what she testified to.
00:10:33
Speaker 3: But yes, every single part of his account like actually sealed his fate. Over and over and over again. It wasn't like there was just one confession to one detective. It was comical how loudly, how often, in different forms, he told the same story. And in each and every time, he's the guy.
00:10:58
Speaker 1: It was a pretty highly produced closings. They used a lot of clips. Some of them used clips from the trial itself. And say, remember this part? And roll the clip. It was well produced.
00:11:10
Speaker 2: It was highly produced.
00:11:11
Speaker 1: Like television, like roll cue. There's your soundbite. And they come back and he continues. But the funniest one was him playing sound, playing a part of a video of Dwayne Davis sitting, doing an interview, holding up the book. Get my book. This is the real story right here. Okay.
00:11:30
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think, and he even brought up the prosecutor to correct the O.J. Simpson, if I did it. He was like, O.J.
00:11:36
Speaker 3: Simpson wrote a book, if I did it. Dwayne Davis wrote a book, I did it. That worked for me.
00:11:43
Speaker 1: That's plain Johnny Cochran speak. Yes, yes.
00:11:46
Speaker 3: We get that.
00:11:49
Speaker 2: To just how quickly this jury came to a verdict.
00:11:52
Speaker 3: But when we come back, save this for the end because it was probably my favorite part of yesterday. Dwayne Davis's reaction after the judge tells the bailiffs to remand him back into custody and that he was going to be held without bond. Wait until you hear what Dwayne Davis had to say to the judge. Welcome back, everyone, to Amy and TJ. It was a swift day in court yesterday in Las Vegas. Dwayne Davis, the only person now held accountable officially in the shooting death of Tupac Shakur 30 years ago.
00:12:40
Speaker 2: Back in 1996. Yes, he was convicted of first-degree murder.
00:12:43
Speaker 3: The jury came back in less than three hours, and he is now facing life in prison without the possibility of parole, all because he couldn't keep his mouth And that continued even after the verdict was read.
00:12:59
Speaker 1: He's been a character, though.
00:13:00
Speaker 2: Davis had some things to say to the judge.
00:13:02
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, he's been a character throughout this trial. You know, remember he was yelling at the prosecutor? Yep. At one point. He's spoken a couple times. That he wasn't supposed to.
00:13:12
Speaker 3: He's a man who's used to doing what he wants, when he wants, to whomever he wants.
00:13:16
Speaker 2: And so, yes, he had that attitude.
00:13:18
Speaker 3: And look, his face was described as stone cold, like zero reaction.
00:13:24
Speaker 1: All I've ever seen of his face.
00:13:25
Speaker 3: I've never.
00:13:26
Speaker 2: Does he smile?
00:13:27
Speaker 1: I've never seen a reaction. Even in the photo, nothing. He has the same scowl.
00:13:33
Speaker 2: Yeah, a scowl. That's what it is. But after.
00:13:35
Speaker 3: The judge ordered him held without bail.
00:13:38
Speaker 2: Davis said, excuse me, I want to have my stuff back.
00:13:42
Speaker 3: Apparently he wanted his jewelry and some phones back as if that were going to happen.
00:13:48
Speaker 1: That was going to happen. They're going to take that.
00:13:50
Speaker 3: Right?
00:13:50
Speaker 2: Like, is he delusional? Excuse me, I want to have my stuff back.
00:13:54
Speaker 3: He yells this at the judge and then says, and I would like to appeal this matter.
00:13:59
Speaker 1: Okay.
00:14:00
Speaker 3: It's not really how things are done. The judge actually did respond to him and said, okay. Of course there will be an appeal, but that happens after sentencing.
00:14:07
Speaker 1: After we tell you you're going to prison for the rest of your life. Then you can yell that out.
00:14:16
Speaker 3: Then you can appeal, but probably best done through your attorney. But yes, his sentencing date is coming up October 13th. Again, facing life in prison without the possibility of parole. Can't imagine, what is he, 63 now? I mean, he's going to prison for the rest of his life, without a doubt. How is that going to be like for him in jail?
00:14:35
Speaker 1: Who knows? Where is he going to be in prison? He's going to be in prison in Vegas. Not in California, not in Southern California. I don't know how that's going to go for him. But man, this is, what a chapter. In hip-hop history that was just closed to a certain degree. We now know. This is the best story we've gotten. We now know what happened to Tupac, what happened that night.
00:14:54
Speaker 2: Do you have an emotional reaction?
00:14:56
Speaker 3: I know you had a connection, obviously, to Tupac and your time in life and what you thought about his music and him. Any actual emotional, personal reaction to the conviction?
00:15:07
Speaker 1: You know what? I kind of sank a little bit doing this, remembering just how young he was. Damn, man, 25. He did that much at 25. He had three or something movies he had starred in. He was making some of the music of your youth. Whatever you're listening to when you're junior high, high school, certainly first couple years of college, that music is going to stay with you the rest of your life. Tupac is that. He is just a poet. He just was. The dude was brilliant. Brilliant, brilliant. And I don't know just how young he was and how just unnecessary all this was.
00:15:45
Speaker 3: Right.
00:15:45
Speaker 1: So do a Drake and Kendrick. Right. No bullet to fly. Got nasty. But this thing was a different time. Well, just a shame.
00:15:54
Speaker 2: It is a shame. That's a good way to put it. Just a total shame.
00:15:57
Speaker 3: But there is some justice, some closure, at least for the Shakur family. And they certainly seem grateful for yesterday's verdict. And with that, everyone, we always appreciate you listening to us. And again, we're on Verdict Watch with Lindsay Clancy. So please, please, please pay attention to the feed. We will be on it as soon as we get any word from that jury in Massachusetts. But in the meantime, thank you for listening. I'm Amy Robach alongside TJ Holmes. We'll talk to you soon.