Report: Notorious B.I.G. supplied the gun that killed Tupac
An investigation by the Los Angeles Times has found that the likely killer of rapper Tupac Shakur was a gang member who received a gun and payment from rapper Notorious B.I.G.
An investigation by the Los Angeles Times has found that the likely killer of rapper Tupac Shakur was a gang member who received a gun and payment from rapper Notorious B.I.G.
The Times, in a one-year investigation, found that a Los Angeles gang member named Orlando Anderson likely killed Shakur.
According to the Times--which based much of its investigation on interviews it conducted with unidentified members of the Southside Crips gang in the Los Angeles area--Shakur and his entourage attacked Anderson in Las Vegas as retaliation for a prior incident during which Anderson beat one of Shakur’s bodyguards.
Later that night, according to the newspaper, Anderson gathered some Crips for a meeting, and the group decided to kill Shakur. The gang then met with Wallace, who was in Las Vegas at the time, and asked the rapper for $1 million in exchange for killing Shakur. Wallace agreed to pay the $1 million, on the condition that his own .40-caliber pistol be used in the killing, the Times said.
Shakur was shot on Las Vegas Boulevard on Sept. 7, 1996, just hours after Anderson was attacked. Shakur died several days later, and a week later Wallace reportedly paid the gang his first $50,000 installment of the $1 million bounty.
Anderson was questioned briefly by police soon after Shakur was shot, but wasn’t considered a serious suspect. The Compton, Calif., gang member was later shot and killed in an unrelated incident. Police have claimed that they were unable to solve the Shakur case because witnesses refused to cooperate with their investigation.
Wallace, during an interview that took place a few days before he was murdered on March 9, 1997, told the San Francisco Chronicle that he wasn’t involved in Shakur’s death.
At the time of Shakur’s shooting, Wallace and Shakur were in the midst of a yearlong feud during which they exchanged insults in their music, at concerts and at awards shows.
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