Orlando Anderson

Did You Know?

• Anderson was raised primarily by his grandparents after his parents separated.
• He attended Taft High School and later graduated from Manuel Dominguez High School.
• Anderson was struck in the chest during a shootout at a car wash in Compton following a dispute with rival gang members Michael and Jerry Stone.

Murder of Tupac Shakur

Orlando Anderson first came to public attention in July 1996 after an incident at Lakewood Mall. He and several others were accused of assaulting Trevon Lane, a Death Row Records employee, and trying to steal his Death Row medallion. The attack was fueled by a known rivalry between the South Side Compton Crips and Death Row associates, who were mostly connected to the Mob Piru gang. On September 7, 1996, after a boxing match at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Lane spotted Anderson in the hotel lobby and told Tupac Shakur.

Security footage showed Shakur and his group attacking Anderson. About three hours later, Shakur was shot. In the days after, Las Vegas police detective Lt. Larry Spinosa told the press that Anderson was not a suspect. But later, Compton police named him as a primary suspect in court affidavits.

Anderson denied any role in the shooting, telling Vibe magazine and the Los Angeles Times in 1997 that he was actually a fan of Shakur. That same year, Shakur’s mother, Afeni Shakur, filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Anderson. The case was reportedly settled shortly before Anderson died in 1998. Decades later, on September 29, 2023, Anderson’s uncle, Duane “Keffe D” Davis, was arrested and charged with Shakur’s murder.

Prosecutors claimed Davis supplied the gun used in the shooting and that Anderson was in the backseat on the right side of the car from which the shots were fired. Davis’s trial started in Las Vegas on August 10, 2026. On August 31, he was found guilty of murder, with sentencing set for October 13.