THE LAS VEGAS SHOOTING

Two years after the murder of rapper Tupac 
Shakur in Las Vegas-- a case in which no arrests 
have yet been made -- MTV News has obtained a 
29-page document prepared by police in Compton, 
California, which reveals that only a few days 
after Shakur's murder last September 7th, 
Compton police had already learned the name 
of the man some local gang members believed to 
be responsible for the crime. This document, it 
must be emphasized, is based largely on the words 
of Compton police informants. It does not legally 
prove who killed Tupac, nor does it legally prove 
that his death was a gang murder. Proof is the 
job of the courts. However, the Compton police 
document does contain a startling account of 
the events that led up to Shakur's murder and a 
shot-by-shot account of the five day blood bath 
his killing seems to have set off in Compton. 
A gang-war that apparently left three men dead 
and ten wounded. It also deals with a host of 
questions as to the identity of the man who 
allegedly shot Tupac Shakur.


This 29-page statement of probable cause 
offers some intriguing answers. It was written 
up by Compton police last September and was 
attached to a motion filed in February by Suge 
Knight's defense team as part of their 
attempt to overturn Knight's probation 
violation. Based largely on information 
provided to the Compton police by their 
gang-informants, the statement (or affidavit) 
gives an unverified but considerably detailed 
account of gang-related activity in Compton 
before and after the shooting of Tupac Shakur 
in Las Vegas on the night of Saturday, 
September 7th.

According to the statement of probable cause, 
five days after Shakur was shot, an informant 
with special knowledge of the activities of the 
Bloods -- a man identified in the statement as 
CRI or "confidential reliable informant" 
#3 --provided police with a sequence of events 
which suggested that the shooting in Vegas might 
have been the culmination of a beef that began 
at the Lakewood Mall in Compton. The informant told 
Compton police that a man named Travon Lane -- 
a Death Row affiliate also known as "Tray" -- was 
at the mall's Foot Locker in July or August 
of last year when he was confronted by several 
members of the Southside Crips. There was a scuffle 
during which Lane's Death Row medallion was taken 
from him.


Fast forward to September 7th in Las Vegas -- 
the night of the Tyson/Seldon fight at the 
MGM Grand. According to the affidavit, CRI #3 
told the Compton cops that moments after the 
bout, Travon Lane was walking through the 
hotel as part of Death Row's entourage when he 
spotted a man later identified as Orlando 
Anderson. The same man, Lane thought who'd 
taken his medallion at the Lakewood mall two 
months ago. Lane pointed the man out to Shakur. 
Shakur confronted Anderson with the 
question "You from the South?" -- an apparent 
reference to the Southside Crips. A melee 
ensued -- captured on tape by MGM Grand 
surveillance cameras.

Little more than an hour later, as a line of 
Death Row cars snaked its way to a party at 
Knight's Club 662, a white Cadillac with California 
license plates -- according to one report -- pulled 
up to the right of Shakur and Knight's vehicle. 
According to the affidavit, a passenger 
opened fire with a Glock .40 caliber handgun, 
grazing Knight and critically wounding Shakur -- 
as members of the Death Row entourage watched 
from the cars behind Knight's.


In the affidavit, the informant is also said 
to have told Compton police he heard Travon 
Lane at Club 662 declaring that the shooter 
was the same man who'd been in the melee at 
the MGM Grand and that the shooter was 
"Keefee D's nephew." According to police, 
Orlando Anderson is the nephew of the man known 
by Compton police to be Keefee D. Both are 
reputed to be Southside Crips.

Back in Compton on September 9th, the day 
according to the affidavit that another 
informant noticed a late-model white Cadillac 
being driven into a local auto shop by Orlando 
Anderson's cousin-- three separate Blood sects 
convened at Lueders Park. The topic of discussion, 
according to the affidavit? The need to retaliate 
against the Southside Crips for the attack on 
Tupac Shakur. Compton police were told by their 
informant that five sites for drive-by shootings 
were chosen. Three potential targets were singled 
out.


At 2:58 that afternoon at a location on East 
Alondra, one such man -- whose name was mentioned 
to Las Vegas police as someone who might have 
been riding in the white Cadillac -- was shot 
in the back. The war was on.

Two days later at 9:05 on the morning of 
September 11th, Southside Crip Bobby Finch was 
gunned down on South Mayo. The next day, Vegas 
police told Compton cops that they'd received 
calls that Finch had been riding in the white 
Cadillac. By early morning on the 14th, five more 
people had been shot in what Compton police regarded 
as related assaults. Meanwhile, three Bloods were 
fired on and wounded in two separate shootings. 
On September 13th, the day Tupac Shakur died, 
two more Bloods were shot and killed by an 
assailant who fled on foot.


As the gang war raged, police in Compton and 
Las Vegas continued to receive unsubstantiated 
tips that "Keefee D's nephew" or " Baby Lane" -- 
aliases for Orlando Anderson -- had shot 
Tupac Shakur. On the 13th, the affidavit says, 
one reputed member of the Bloods identified the man 
who'd shot him in Compton two days earlier as 
Orlando Anderson. On the 20th, an eyewitness 
fingered Anderson as the triggerman in an April 1996 
homicide. Around that same time, the affidavit 
states, an informant told one police officer that 
Anderson had been spotted with a .40 caliber 
Glock handgun -- a potentially significant tip, 
since it hadn't yet been revealed publicly that 
a .40 caliber Glock had been used in the attack 
on Shakur.


On October 2nd, as part of a gang sweep, Compton 
police arrested Anderson in connection with that 
April 1996 homicide, but the District 
Attorney's office declined to press charges and 
asked police to gather more evidence. Compton 
police told MTV News that Anderson remains the 
prime suspect in the April 1996 homicide, and 
charges are expected to be formally filed imminently. 
As for Anderson's attorney, he declined to 
comment on this or any other allegations contained 
in the affidavit. And says that he has not been 
informed that his client remains the prime 
suspect in that April 1996 homicide. He has 
previously denied that Anderson was in any way 
involved with the killing of Shakur.

While testifying under oath in Suge Knight's 
probation hearing,Orlando Anderson invoked the 
Fifth Amendment when asked if he was a member of 
the Crips and denied that Knight had assaulted 
him. Vegas police questioned Anderson briefly in 
October after which one Vegas cop was 
quoted as saying that Anderson was not a 
suspect in Shakur's murder. Four months later, 
Vegas Sgt. Kevin Manning told the Los Angeles Times 
that Anderson was indeed a suspect in Shakur's 
killing, but that the department lacks hard evidence 
against him. Vegas police say that since the night 
of the shooting they have not been able to speak 
to Travon Lane -- who the affidavit asserts 
was involved with the scuffle with Anderson at 
the Lakewood Mall, who pointed Anderson out 
to Shakur at the MGM Grand and was heard at Club 
662 hours after the shooting IDing Anderson 
as the shooter. Efforts by MTV News to talk 
with Travon Lane were unsuccessful. 

On May 29, 1998 Orlando Anderson the main suspect 
in the 2pac slaying was himself gunned down at a 
Los Angeles car wash.