A Nevada judge has denied Duane “Keefe D” Davis’ motion to suppress evidence in the long-running Tupac Shakur murder case, clearing the way for prosecutors to use items seized from his home at trial.
The ruling is a major setback for Davis, who stands accused of orchestrating the 1996 killing of Tupac Shakur in Las Vegas. In December, his legal team asked the court to throw out evidence collected during a nighttime raid on his Henderson, Nevada home in July 2023. That search happened just months before his arrest.
According to Rolling Stone, in the motion, Davis’ attorneys argued the warrant was flawed and based on what they called a distorted image of their client. “When officers obtain nighttime authorization through bad faith, courts agree suppression is appropriate,” the motion stated.
“Bad faith is evident from the face of the affidavit supporting the search warrant. […] First, the court unwittingly relied on a misleading portrait of Davis as a dangerous drug dealer. When in fact, his drug convictions were [25] years old. He was a [60]-year-old retired cancer survivor that had lived quietly in the same Henderson home for nearly a decade.”
The filing continued, “Second, the court overlooked the case-specific urgency or safety concerns Nevada law requires to justify nighttime searches. [It accepted] instead generic safety theories that would apply to virtually any search of any home.”
Despite those arguments, the judge sided with prosecutors.
Davis remains in custody at the Clark County Detention Center after pleading not guilty in 2023. His trial is currently scheduled to begin in August, following earlier delays tied to the volume of evidence under review.
The Tupac Shakur murder case now moves one step closer to a courtroom showdown nearly three decades in the making.
