Tupac Shakur declined to identify the gunmen who ambushed him, even as he lay critically wounded in an ambulance, a former police officer testified in court.
Retired Las Vegas police officer Garry Dale told jurors he tried to get the hip-hop legend to name his attackers while riding with him to the hospital in September 1996, moments after Shakur was struck in a drive-by shooting.
“He responded, ‘No, no, we’ll take care of it.’ Something like that,” Dale said Monday during testimony in the murder trial of Duane Davis, now 63.
Prosecutors allege Davis helped orchestrate the attack on Shakur as an act of “revenge.”
Shakur died in the hospital six days later from his injuries, leaving one of hip-hop’s most infamous killings officially unresolved for decades.
The trial of Davis moved into its second day Tuesday, with prosecutors presenting graphic autopsy photographs of the slain rapper.
A forensic expert was also called to explain the four gunshot wounds to Shakur’s chest that proved fatal.
Davis’ defense team has argued that the accusations linking him to the murder of the rap superstar are unfounded.
Davis, prosecutors allege, was full of “visceral anger,” which boiled over when Tupac and his crew allegedly beat up Davis’ nephew while he was in town for a Mike Tyson fight at the MGM Grand hotel.
It took authorities more than 25 years to formally charge Davis, who has acknowledged that his nephew, Orlando Anderson, fired the shots while he was in the car.
“Dwane Davis did not pull the trigger, but what he did do was plan the retaliation for the beating of his nephew,” a prosecutor told the jury during opening arguments on Monday.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
