A former gang member who says he worked “under the table” security for Suge Knight during Death Row Records’ heyday testified Tuesday he knew “everybody that was there” the night Tupac Shakur was fatally shot in Las Vegas — but he’s not naming names.
Taking the witness stand on the second day of Duane “Keffe D” Davis’ murder trial in Clark County, Nevada, James “Mob James” McDonald told jurors he was working at Knight’s Vegas nightclub, Club 662, when he learned Shakur and Knight had been wounded in a drive-by shooting on Sept. 7, 1996.
McDonald, a member of the Mob Piru Bloods, made it clear he was testifying against his will under a court order. He grew visibly exasperated when Davis’ defense lawyer, Michael Sanft, pressed him on cross-examination about what he heard in the aftermath of the shooting.
“Are you sure you want me to answer that?” McDonald replied, according to the trial livestream from CourtTV. “I don’t want to send him to prison, even though we don’t like each other,” he said, referring to Davis. “You’re asking me questions that can hurt him. … You’re asking something that’s gonna hurt this dude.”
McDonald said he was only willing to speak generally about how, after the shooting, a “gang war” erupted between the Mob Piru Bloods, affiliated with Knight, and the South Side Compton Crips, of which Davis was a high-ranking member.
