Former gang leader charged in killing of Tupac Shakur is allowed $750G bail and house arrest

A judge set bail Tuesday at $750,000 for a former Los Angeles-area gang leader charged with orchestrating the killing of hip-hop legend Tupac Shakur in 1996 and said he can serve house arrest with electronic monitoring ahead of his trial in June.

Court-appointed attorneys for Duane “Keffe D” Davis told The Associated Press after the hearing that they believe he can post bail. They had asked for bail of not more than $100,000.

The lawyers argued in a court filing a day before that their client — not witnesses, as prosecutors had said — faced danger. And they say that their 60-year-old client is in poor health after battling cancer, which is in remission, and that he won’t flee to avoid trial.

“We believe he can” post bail, public defender Robert Arroyo said after Tuesday’s hearing.

The lawyers accused prosecutors of misinterpreting a jail telephone recording and a list of names provided to Davis’ family members, and of misreporting to the judge that Davis poses a threat to the public if he were released.

Davis “never threatened anyone during the phone calls,” said Arroyo and Charles Cano, deputy special public defenders, in their seven-page filing Monday. “Furthermore, [prosecutors’] interpretation of the use of ‘green light’ is flat-out wrong.”

The “green light” reference is from a recording of an October jail call that prosecutors Marc DiGiacomo and Binu Palal provided last month to Clark County District Judge Carli Kierny, who presided over the bail hearing.