TUPAC AMARU SHAKUR | Artist, Rapper, and Son of a Black Panther

“They got money for wars, but can’t feed the poor.”

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Words, research, and edits: Juno Rylee Schultz (she/her)

Research: Kylie Tuinier (she/her)

Edits: Bex Stump (she/her) and Nathan Thatcher-Miller (he/him)

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“I’m angry for my Mother because she gave up a lot of her life for this. I’m angry for Fred Hampton’s family because they lost a straight-up soulja. My mother knew that freedom wouldn’t come in her lifetime. Just like I know, that it won’t come in mines. But it’s a matter of either we stay like this, or somebody sacrifices. Somebody lay a track so we don’t stay in a 360-degree, deadly circle. So that’s how I gotta live, and that’s how I have to die. And that’s how my music has to be, and my acting, and my producing, and my interviews. Everything has to be for the love of Black people.”

 – Tupac Shakur, in a 1992 interview with Tanya Hart

“And when I say ‘Thug Life,’ I mean that shit. Cause these white people see us at thugs. I don’t care what ya’ll think. I don’t care if you think you a lawyer, if you a man, if you a African-American. We thugs and niggas to these motherfuckers. I walk around with Fred Hampton and Bobby Hutton in me. And when these motherfuckers press my button and I blow up, it ain’t me.” 

– Tupac Shakur, speaking at the 1993 Black Expo

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On June 16, 1971, Afeni gave birth to a baby boy who had spent time in prison before he’d left the womb, with Afeni saying “Tupac was always his name. Tupac Amaru Shakur. He was always in my mind a soldier in exile from the beginning. That’s how I saw it.”

It was at 5 a.m, with a shotgun pressed against her pregnant belly, and “Police! If you move, I’ll blow your fuckin’ brains open” being shouted, that Afeni Shakur was arrested by the New York Police Department, as part of a “mass arrest of the city’s Black Panthers” on April 2, 1969. 

Before all the accused had even seen a judge, Manhattan district attorney Frank Hogan was telling a group of gathered reporters the “186 counts of attempted arson, attempted murder, and conspiracy to bomb police stations, schools, and department stores.” 

District Attorney Hogan explained “Macy’s, Alexanders, Bloomingdale’s, Abercrombie & Fitch, and Korvette” were also targets, and that the following day was “the planned date” which framed the actions of law enforcement as being life-saving and immediately necessary.

The trial wouldn’t begin in full until September 1970, lasting eight months, “the longest and most expensive in New York state history.”

Afeni Shakur would spend fifteen months in the Women’s House of Detention before being released on bail. The Black Panthers and its supporters had raised the $100,000 necessary, and Afeni had convinced everyone that she would represent herself and the other Black Panthers. The hope among the defense team was that this strategy would help humanize the accused Panthers, in a case built tall from the State–and Federal–governments.

Author Dean Van Nguyen lays out the tapestry constructed by the government in his book, Words for My Comrades: A Political History of Tupac Shakur:

“The investigation into the New York Panthers was led by the Bureau of Special Services (BOSS), a localized department within the NYPD that tracked political and activist groups that it ostensibly believed to be a threat to the city. To what extent the indictment of the Panther 21 was a direct result of activities that fell under the umbrella of CONTELPRO is unclear. There is good reason to believe that, as with the killing of Fred Hampton in Chicago, the FBI was quietly guiding the NYPD in its attempts to disrupt and neutralize Panthers. The relationship certainly appeared cozy on August 29, 1968, when FBI special agent Henry Naehle reported on his meeting with a member of an NYPD special unit investigating the Panthers. Naehle acknowledged that the FBI’s New York Field Office ‘has been working closely in exchanging information of mutual interest and to our mutual advantage.”

According to lead defense attorney Gerald Lefcourt, the Media, Pennsylvania FBI headquarter leaks were of great aid to the Panther 21 defense:

“The Bureau of Special Services was an outfit that was designed to destroy things like the Panthers, and a lot of our arguments were about that–about the secret police and what they were trying to accomplish. We doubled down on the strategy about the secret police and their attempts to destroy this political movement.”

Much of the most damning of the prosecution’s testimony came from Ralph White, an undercover informant from the New York Police Department. He had falsely identified himself as Yedwa Sudan, and joined the Black Panthers. 

Afeni Shakur had grown suspicious of Sudan in the past, having told other Black Panthers she believed he was an undercover cop, due to his over-the-top behavior. Despite her warnings, nobody believed her.

Now two years later, Afeni Shakur was pregnant and facing up to 300 years in prison, and asking Ralph White if he remembered her working in schools, hospitals, and feeding hungry people–and to present proof and details of the bomb threats.

White claimed he couldn’t remember anything specific. Despite the robust effort of counterintelligence and double agents, it was clear the government had nothing of substance against Afeni Shakur and the Panther 21.

Standing before the jury, exhausted and ready to go back to jail, or be set free, Afeni Shakur gave her closing remarks:

“I don’t know what I’m supposed to say. I don’t know how I’m supposed to justify the charges brought before the court against me. But I do know that none of these charges has been proven and I’m not talking about proven beyond a reasonable doubt. I’m saying that none of the charges have been proven, period. That nothing has been proven in this courtroom, that I or any of the defendants did any of these things. So, why are we here? Why are any of us here? I don’t know. But I would appreciate it if you end this nightmare, because I’m tired of it and I can’t justify it in my mind. There’s no logical reason for us to have gone through the last two years as we have, to be threatened with imprisonment because somebody somewhere is watching and waiting to justify being a spy. So do what you have to do. But please don’t forget what you saw and heard in this courtroom. Let history record you as a jury that would not kneel to the outrageous bidding of the state. Show us that we were not wrong in assuming that you would judge us fairly.”

According to Words for My Comrades, Lead Defense Attorney Gerald Lecourt remembered the scene as “Afeni Shakur … obviously on the verge of giving birth and arguing ‘Enough is enough. I’m tired. Let me have my baby. Let me go home.’

In 1998, shortly before he died, Eldridge Cleaver, an early leader of the Black Panther party, described Tupac as “the symbolic child of Huey Newton and Malcom X,” adding that “the thing about Tupac was his spirit and his rebellion against oppression. This comes from the way that he was raised and the values that were transmitted to him.”

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Tupac Shakur had a tumultuous childhood, as Afeni continued her activities with the Panthers, in addition to self-medicating the traumas and pains she had with crack cocaine. Tupac found unsupervised time in his childhood to explore the streets, smoking weed and rapping with friends, while living in New York to Baltimore. This also included searching for meaning in theatre and art programs in school.

When Tupac was 17, he and his mother moved to Marin City, California. Shakur wouldn’t graduate, but he would leave an indelible impression through his participation in an interview series with the school’s students that sought to document the different experiences students had in that urban area. 

“We’re not being taught to deal with the world as it is. We’re being taught to deal with this fairy tale land, which we’re not even living in anymore. That’s why my Momma taught me to analyze society and not be quiet. If there’s something on my mind, to speak it.”

– Tupac Shakur, speaking on-camera at Tamalpais High School about his experiences, 1988

When Tamalpais High School teacher Barbara Owens announced her retirement in 2019, she highlighted Tupac Shakur’s reading of Shakespeare among her favorite memories:

“I asked him to take the part of Othello. All of the students read the play aloud and he took that part. It was absolutely, hands down, one of the most stellar performances of Shakespeare, let alone Othello, that I have ever heard. When he got to the scene where Othello is having a critical argument with himself about whether or not he’s going to snuff out Desdemona, he read it brilliantly. I stopped the class and said, ‘I want you all to remember this moment. You will never ever, in your lifetime, hear Othello as well as you just heard it now.’”

In 1989, Leila Steinberg was introduced to Tupac Shakur by mutual friends, and it quickly became clear the two needed to work together. Steinberg worked for “a nonprofit multicultural arts-based organization that brought musical artists into schools.” 

As Jeff Pearlman states in Only God Can Judge Me: Leila Steinberg was hosting weekly workshops in the community, and working on “finding creative ways to involve young, musical talent” to “talk to young people about life skills and racial identity.”

Leila had just been complaining to those around her about how she was seeking the “unattainable” which was a “social justice voice for high school students.”

When they were introduced shortly thereafter, Tupac performed “Panther Power” for Steinberg; its stirring questioning of reality and the American Dream across Tupac’s poetic lyricism immediately showcased the disparity and possibilities he saw in the world. 

“As real as it seems the American Dream

Ain’t nothing but another calculated schemes

To get us locked up shot up back in chains

To deny us of the future rob our names

Kept my history of mystery but now I see

The American Dream wasn’t meant for me

Cause lady liberty is a hypocrite she lied to me

Promised me freedom, education, equality

Never gave me nothing but slavery

And now look at how dangerous you made me

Calling me a mad man cause I’m strong and bold

With this dump full of knowledge of the lies you told

Promised me emancipation in this new nation

All you ever gave my people was starvation

Fathers of our country never cared for me

They kept my ancestors shackled up in slavery

And Uncle Sam never did a damn thing for me

Except lie about the facts in my history

So now I’m sitting hear mad cause I’m unemployed

But the government’s glad cause they enjoyed

When my people are down so they can screw us around

Time to change the government now panther power” 

– Panther Power, Tupac Shakur

Leila found Tupac to be “unlike anything she’d ever heard.” She recalled that “it had fire to it, and it had a message. It wasn’t just words. It was passion.”

Leila invited Tupac to poetry gatherings at her home, and the two spent lots of time together. It was beneficial for Tupac as he and his Mother weren’t in a good place at this time. Leila and Tupac had a good friendship, but as his new manager and platonic female friend, she did serve somewhat of a maternal role. 

“We were all fucked up and dealing with abandonment issues. We had the struggle of parents who brought us up in times of activism, but also substance abuse. I’d never met a person like Tupac. He was so unique and outside the box. He was comfortable with his femininity. But he was also hard and tough. He was an addict’s son. He felt the heartache of abandonment and poverty. He wore that like a jacket. Like a jacket you can’t take off no matter how hard you try.”

Within a year, Tupac had dropped out of high school, deciding to focus on rapping and his music career fully. Leila totally understood his dedication and matched him, working to build his audience. 

As Jeff Pearlman writes in Only God Can Judge Me, these “weren’t A-list ties but she knew people who knew people, as well as regional promoters who were on the lookout for young acts capable of filling an auditorium.”

During this time Tupac was pressing Leila incessantly about his desire for a record deal, and wanting a bigger platform–and faster. 

“He wanted success as badly as anyone I’ve ever known. He always said to me, ‘You know people. I need a record deal.’”

– Leila recalling managing Tupac 

By late 1989, Leila reached out to Atron Gregory, someone she knew through music promotion channels, saying “Atron, you said you’d help me if I had someone worthwhile. Well, I have a kid. Can you help?”

Leila drove Tupac to Starlight Sound to meet Shock G and Digital Underground, a hip-hop group and collective, focused on production, beats, and rapping.

Tupac “entered the studio’s piano room, put down a backpack, removed his jacket, lit up a Newport, and asked, ‘You ready? You want me to do it right now?’”

“He had that whole Scarface, ‘Is we doing this drug deal or not, nigga?’ It had that urgency to it.”

– Shock G recalling Tupac’s first audition 

After Tupac’s second audition outside Shock G’s apartment a week later, Atron Gregory told Leila “We want him.”

According to Jeff Pearlman, “Tupac formally joined Digital Underground on March 17, 1990” and the group’s U.S. tour started on April 6, curing Tupac’s restlessness as Atron Gregory sent his demo tape to record labels that weren’t calling back.

Tupac was technically just a roadie and crew member, since Digital Underground already had so many people in the group and onstage, but he was happy to be moving in the right direction while he was as patient as possible with his own career. 

As Pearlman writes: “the members of Digital Underground could tell when Tupac had been drinking, and they dreaded the experience. Weed, on the other hand, soothed Tupac, so the marijuana was plentifully supplied. Tupac smoked all hours of the day and night. Though not yet Digital Underground’s best rapper, he was–without question–the group’s biggest bud fiend.”

Tupac made his debut on national TV on May 3, 1990 when Digital Underground appeared on The Arsenio Hall Show to perform ‘The Humpty Dance.’

On August 13, 1991, Tupac signed a record deal with Interscope Records, with part of the contract requiring his debut album being ready for holiday release. 

According to Jeff Pearlman, “Tupac’s idea for 2Pacalypse Now was to get away from the upbeat silliness of Digital Underground and offer a manifesto on what it was to be young, Black, and hunted in modern America. His inspirations weren’t LL Cool J or even Chuck D, but Malcom X and Bobby Seale and the up-and-down saga of his mother.”

“Rebel songs. Just like, you know, back in the sixties you had folk songs. That’s what this is. This is soul music. It’s like, music for us to carry on with. For us to move on. It’s battle songs. It’s songs talking about strong Black men fighting back.”

– Tupac Shakur describing his vision for 2Pacalypse Now

Tupac worked relentlessly in the studio, following his vision while being extremely conscious of how limited he considered time to be.

“He always felt like he was running out of time, and he was trying to cram his whole life into as many days as he could.”

– Lisa Smith-Putnam, TNT Records/Interscope

“Tupac could spit out a thought and father the next thought all in one motion. His brain worked uncommonly fast.”

– Ramon Gooden, producer on 2Pacalypse

Tupac reportedly had the album’s thirteen tracks ready and got to work immediately, “finishing one or two songs every night … no nonsense. Just hard work” according to recording engineer Marc Senasac. 

On September 25, 1991, Interscope teased the upcoming release of 2Pacalypse Now with the album’s first single, ‘Trapped.’

The song’s lyrics detail the cycle of police violence Black men find themselves perpetually trapped in existing in American society:

“They got me trapped, can barely walk the city streets

Without a cop harasskin’ me, searching me, then askin’ my identity

Hands up, throw me up against the wall, didn’t do a thing at all

I’m telling you one day these suckers gotta fall

Cuffed up, throw me on the concrete”

At the time of release, Tupac had not yet been physically brutalized by police officers, but this would change on October 17th, when Shakur would be forced to endure the stories that he told.

A few weeks after the release of ‘Trapped’, Tupac was crossing the intersection of Seventeenth and Oakland to use an ATM, when two police officers stopped Shakur for jaywalking. 

The police mocked his name after demanding to see his ID, told him the same rules still apply to him as everybody else, and began beating Shakur on the concrete, just as Tupac had rapped about on ‘Trapped.’

Atron Gregory contacted civil rights attorney John Burris to arrange a meeting for Tupac’s case against the Oakland police department. Burris photographed Tupac’s bruised right cheek, the bruises across his chest and back, as well as the “bloody slit” above his right eye.

“Tupac was very excitable when he told me the story. He had an edge about him. He kept referring to himself as a young black man, and he had some historical reference to it. He knew the story of police and young black men. He wasn’t afraid to address it. Hell, he wanted to address it.”

– John Burris, Oakland Civil Rights Attorney 

On November 12, 1991, Burris set up a press conference for Tupac at his office, “announcing a ten-million-dollar lawsuit” against the police officers who assaulted him.

“They said that even though I was a member of a rap group that I still have to ‘know my place in Oakland’ … that I wasn’t above the law. Finally, I told them to give me a ticket. I uttered profanity and told them that I wasn’t a slave and they weren’t my master. One said, ‘Hey, I like the sound of that … master.’”

– Tupac speaking at the press conference announcing the ten-million-dollar lawsuit  

Tupac ended the press conference after taking questions, and reiterating that his debut album about the struggles of the Black experience was now available to buy.

In April 1992, while Tupac was working on his second album, a police officer would be killed by a gang member delivering cocaine, and Shakur’s first album would be found inside the cassette tape of the driver’s vehicle. 

President George H. W. Bush and Vice President Dan Quayle both condemned Tupac Shakur and the rapper’s music, demanding Interscope, and its parent company Time Warner, to remove 2Pacalypse Now from stores.

“There is absolutely no reason for a record like this to be published.”

– Vice President Dan Quayle speaking on TV about Tupac Shakur’s debut album

“There isn’t a doubt in my mind that my husband would still be alive if Tupac hadn’t written those violent, anti-police songs.”

– Linda Davidson, widow of Bill Davidson, speaking to the press

Meanwhile, Tupac was losing his hair and shaving his head, suffering from the effects of alopecia from the police beating him, while the country all learned his name from a misunderstanding of his album’s lyrics and themes. 

Tupac’s second album, then titled Troublesome 21, was largely inspired by the Rodney King riots. The title was a reference to his age and reputation, but also the Panther 21. 

Many of the tracks were filled with righteous anger, but there were also songs with inspiration and hope, such as ‘Keep Ya Head Up.’

Tupac submitted the completed demos to Interscope and it immediately became clear that the album would not be released in its current form. 

President George H. W. Bush was calling for a boycott of Time Warner, which owned Warner Bros. and Interscope, over the lyrics of Ice-T’s ‘Cop Killer.’ 

This led the head of Warner Bros. to declare an end to “the distribution of albums that glorified violence against police” and for artists needing to have lyrics approved before products could be sent to stores.

When Tupac learned that Troublesome 21 wasn’t going to be released because of white men and racist politics, he pulled the entire album himself, turning it into Strictly 4 My N.I.G.G.A.Z. and keeping only two songs from the previous selection: ‘Keep Ya Head Up’ and ‘I Get Around.’

Strictly 4 My N.I.G.G.A.Z. was released on February 16, 1993, with Interscope choosing ‘Holler If Ya Hear Me’ as the first single. This must have felt ironic on some level for Tupac, but his message and rebel songs of how it felt to be a Black man in America was still reaching people.

“Oh no, I won’t turn the other cheek

In case ya can’t see us while we burn the other week

…

I guess cause I’m black born

I’m supposed to say peace, sing songs, and get capped on

…

So we live like caged beasts

Waitin for the day to let the rage free

Still me, till they kill me

I love it when they fear me”

Holler If Ya Hear Me, Tupac Shakur  

‘Keep Ya Head Up’ stands out as a track that offers hope without as much anger, but the message of judgment on who Tupac believes is ultimately responsible for the violence causing all our problems is still very much clear.

“It seems the rain’ll never let up

I try to keep my head up, and still keep from gettin’ wet up

You know, it’s funny when it rains it pours

They got money for wars, but can’t feed the poor

Said it ain’t no hope for the youth and the truth is

It ain’t no hope for the future

And then they wonder why we crazy”

Keep Ya Head Up, Tupac Shakur 

“I’m tryin’ to make a dollar out of fifteen cents

It’s hard to be legit and still pay your rent

And in the end it seems I’m headin’ for the pen

I try and find my friends, but they’re blowin’ in the wind

Last night my buddy lost his whole family

We ain’t meant to survive, ’cause it’s a setup

And even though you’re fed up

Huh, ya got to keep your head up

And it’s crazy, it seems it’ll never let up, but

Please, you got to keep your head up”

Keep Ya Head Up, Tupac Shakur 

According to Dean Van Nguyen’s Words for My Comrades, the original album was so different that “Strictly‘s flagship single ‘Holler If Ya Hear Me’ was unrecognizable from the never-to-be-released version of the song that 2Pac recorded for Troublesome 21. His original vision is a lightning shock of threats to kill crooked cops, warnings to outgoing Los Angeles police chief Daryl Gates to move to another state, and a direct reference to Malcom X’s speech ‘The Ballot or the Bullet.’”

Still, the references to the Black Panthers and other revolutionaries are still there; Tupac was just learning when and where he needed to pack his messaging to be more effective. The instructions to prepare yourself with knowledge, arm yourself when necessary, and pump your fists LIKE THIS–PUMP PUMP if you’re pissed–would reach the masses once ‘I Get Around’ and ‘Keep Ya Head Up’ both became platinum singles.

It would be appropriate for these two songs to be Tupac Shakur’s first big singles as well, as they appropriately reflected the views of the artist and the revolutionary. Tupac believed in the struggle, but like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. looking cool on the pool table, Shakur’s music video for ‘I Get Around’ was a reminder that the struggle had to come with living and fun, or you might forget to smile while you’re fighting the power. 

When Shakur was pressed about his lyrics and “gangster” content in interviews, he gave an insightful response, highlighting racist double-standards. 

“When did I ever say I was a gangsta rapper? Is Frank Sinatra a gangsta singer? What is that? That’s such a limited term. Marlon Brando is not a gangsta actor, he’s an actor. Axl Rose and them are not gangsta rock and rollers, they’re rock and rollers. So I’m a rapper, this is what I do. I’m an artist. And I rap about the oppressed taking back their place. I rap about fighting back. To me, my lyrics and my verses are about struggling and overcoming, you know? I make it uncomfortable by putting details to it. It might not have been politically correct but I’ve reached somebody; they’re relating to me. They relate to the brutal honesty in the rap. And why shouldn’t they be angry? And why shouldn’t my raps that I’m rapping to my community be filled with rage? They should be filled with the same atrocities they gave to me.”

–Tupac Shakur, speaking to the press about his lyrics in 1993

By September 1993, ‘I Get Around’ and ‘Keep Ya Head Up’ were multi-platinum singles, and Tupac used some of his money to purchase a home near Atlanta, Georgia. Shakur had also housed much of his family, and they were living near him, and his mother. This gave Shakur reprieve from the stresses of his career, until law enforcement caused more problems for him. Again. 

On October 31, 1993, in the early morning hours, Tupac was traveling back to his hotel after performing at Clark Atlanta University. This is when he saw two white men beating an unarmed black man. Everything inside of him had raised him to respond in moments like this. Tupac Shakur could never conceive of walking away when witnessing someone being attacked, especially an unarmed Black man. 

Tupac stopped his car and shouted at the attackers to stop. The men yelled slurs back and “directed a firearm toward Tupac” before using their guns to break windows on Tupac’s car. 

As they ran away, Tupac reached for his gun–after asking for it and no one with him listening–and went down on one knee in the street. Tupac fired three shots at the two white men fleeing the scene, hitting one man in the abdomen, and the other man in the buttocks. 

Hours later, while Tupac is showing his family and friends his latest demo tape, a song he’s extremely excited about called ‘Dear Mama’, the police knock on his door and arrest him. 

Tupac’s plea of self-defense would have been valid in other circumstances, but these were two off-duty police officers. A detail Tupac and most of the public didn’t even know.

Headlines read “Rapper Tupac Shot at Two Police Officers” removing the nuance of the altercation across the media. 

The charges were however quickly dropped against Tupac Shakur, once the police learned internally that the guns the police officers had were stolen from the police station evidence locker.

Controversy continued to follow Tupac Shakur while he was filming ‘Above the Rim’ in New York City. This was Shakur’s fourth and final appearance in a film while he was alive, and it would have tragic consequences for his life. 

Tupac was staying at the Le Parker Méridien during the six weeks of filming, and it was while enjoying the night life of New York City that Shakur met Jacques Agnant. 

Better known as “Haitian Jack,” a gangster that Mike Tyson and The Notorious B.I.G. warned Tupac to be cautious and weary of. Tupac was drawn to Haitian Jack, wanting to adopt his gangster mannerisms, and the respect he was able to command, inside of his film role in ‘Above the Rim.’ 

According to Pearlman, “word on the street was that Agnant was also a government snitch.”

Agnant reportedly took Tupac “on shopping sprees, steering him away from hoodies and baggy jeans and introducing him to Prada and Rolex.”

Jacques Agnant would also introduce Tupac Shakur to Ayanna Jackson, a girl Tupac would leave his phone number with, after a night of dancing. Tupac was especially interested in how she didn’t seem overly interested in his music or rising celebrity status, allowing for normal human connection.

Four days later, Tupac is in the lobby of the hotel he wasstaying in, guns pointed at him, after Jackson had screamed and accused Shakur, Agnant, and a friend of Agnant of raping her. 

Charles “Man Man” Fuller, Tupac’s “literal shadow” at this time, was in the room and maintains Shakur didn’t rape Jackson. Man Man also noted how police officers were waiting for Tupac downstairs the moment he and Tupac went downstairs to the hotel lobby.

Tupac was released on $250,000 bail. 

On November 7, 1994, Tupac was in the New York State Supreme Court to begin his trial for the alleged rape of Ayanna Jackson.

One of his attorneys, Iris Crews, is quoted as saying that Tupac “was nothing like the press depicted. He was so intelligent. He would come to court with two or three newspapers, and read them cover to cover. For God’s sake, he was quoting Mark Twain.”

When the court was dismissed, the closing remarks from the prosecution reiterated their belief that Tupac had orchestrated a gang rape.

The jury had until the following day to deliver their verdict with all the presented evidence. That evening Tupac was on his way to Quad Recording Studios to deliver a verse to another rapper, in a deal that had been set up in the final days of the trial. The amount of money was low–only $7,500–but Shakur was running low on money from his lawyers, court fees, and from not having time to focus on his career because of the trial.

When he arrived, Tupac was ambushed by a group of men who shot him several times before robbing him. He had “forty thousand dollars’ worth of jewelry stolen.” 

Tupac pretended he was dead until the attackers left, hoping the two gun shots he had in his head would be convincing enough. He then crawled to the elevator and called for help. The Notorious B.I.G. and his friends were upstairs and waited with Tupac until medical help came. 

When paramedics arrived shortly afterward, one of the primary arresting police officers from the night of alleged rape gave Tupac a ‘thumbs up’ while asking Tupac “how’s it hanging.”

Tupac was beginning to feel extremely paranoid, after already feeling like the alleged rape with Ayanna Jackson was from “someone that wanted Tupac to be arrested.”

Afeni warned Tupac of how much the coincidences and circumstances felt eerily similar to how COINTELPRO targeted the Black Panthers. 

The day after the shooting, Tupac was charged in court, with the judge not allowing Tupac, the defense, or anyone to tell the jury that he had been shot and spent time in the hospital last night. 

Shakur and codefendant Fuller were found guilty of sexual abuse, but acquitted the two men on the other charges. The jury hadn’t been convinced of the other charges. 

Tupac was released on bail and allowed to finish healing in the hospital. His paranoia led himself to flee the hospital to nurse his wounds privately at a friend’s apartment. He would later return for sentencing, with a bleeding leg wound that was still wrapped and healing.

On February 7, 1995, Tupac Shakur would learn how long he would be going to jail for crimes he hadn’t even committed. 

During the final sentencing, when Tupac was asked if he had any closing remarks, Shakur had the following to say to Ayanna Jackson, and then the judge and the court room:

“I’m not apologizing for a crime. I hope in time you’ll come forth and tell the truth–I am innocent.”

“You know, Your Honor, throughout this entire court case, you haven’t looked me or my attorney in the eye once. It’s obvious that you’re not here in the search for justice, so therefore, there’s no point in me asking for a lighter sentence. I don’t care what you do, ’cause you’re not respecting us, this is not a court of law; as far as I’m concerned, no justice is being served here, and you still can’t look me in the eye. So I say, do what you want to do, give me whatever time you want, because I’m not in your hands, I’m in God’s hands.” 

Tupac Shakur was sentenced to 18 months to four and a half years at Clinton Correctional Facility. Jacques Agnant’s indictment was dismissed, and “he pleaded guilty to two misdemeanors.”

Tupac spent 8 months in prison, and it was a traumatizing experience, with stabbings happening daily. Correctional officers were especially harsh to him, because of Tupac’s ties to the Black Panthers and his radical beliefs, and the other inmates were rough since he was a celebrity. 

Tupac’s ‘Me Against the World’ was recorded the year before he was incarcerated however, and he helped finish the mixing of it over the prison phones. 

According to Jon Pearlman, Carsten “Soulshock” Schack, who co-produced the ‘Me Against the World’ track ‘Old School’, “Tupac felt all that stuff his Mom felt from back in the day when she was Black Panther. He was almost vibrating as he rapped.”

From Dean Van Guyen’s Words For My Comrades: 

“This album was made before I went to jail, before I got shot, and all I’m talking about is going to jail and getting shot, so it was a prophecy. So when the album comes out and then you hear about what’s really going on in my real life, I mean, I don’t have to say I’m keeping it real, you could listen to the music and go, Whoa, he said that …”

– Tupac Shakur 

Shakur was the first artist to have an album debut at #1 on the Billboard 200 while in jail, a feat that has only been repeated twice since, with Lil Wayne’s ‘I Am Not a Human Being’ and NBA YoungBoy’s ‘Sincerely Kentrell.’

Shakur was ultimately protected on the inside because of his Black Panther ties. Tupac would have been protected by the Panthers, regardless, but Shakur was also working on big community action plans once he was out, meeting with individuals such as Al Sharpton while at Clinton Correctional Facility.

These plans were interrupted after Suge Knight sent Tupac Shakur a gift of $15,000, which prompted Tupac to ask the Death Row Records CEO to come meet and discuss a future together.

Watani and the rest of Tupac’s family and management were also all working on securing a release for the rapper, through his current record label, Interscope.

From Pearlman’s Only God Can Judge Me:

“Well, here’s the thing. We were working on a bail package, and we finally had it in place. Warner Bros. which owned Interscope was part of it, but we also had other people who put money in. It’s up to them if they want to say who they are. But it was in place. Now did Tupac know all of this? I would think so, because Watani Tyehimba [Tupac’s manager at the time] and I were always pretty clear giving him information. But did he want to hear it? Did he believe it? I honestly don’t know. But anyone who says we weren’t working on it has absolutely no idea what they’re talking about. I’d been with Tupac for a long time. I loved him. The narrative that we ignored him is nonsense.”

– Atron Gregory

From Dean Van Nguyen highlights in Words For My Comrades:

“Tupac needed a way out, and the possibility presented itself when the court decided he could be freed pending his appeal, with bail set at $1.4 million. Where was he going to get that kind of cash? Tupac might have had a hit album, but legal fees had drained his resources. 

Interscope was open to the idea of putting up the money to get its star out of jail, but parent company Time Warner, unwilling to be seen as having anything to do with springing a convicted felon, blocked the move. 

Suge Knight was willing to broker a deal. All Tupac had to do was sign a makeshift handwritten contract Knight put in front of him during a visit. The prisoner agreed, and the wheels to release him were put into motion. 

Knight being the face of the deal was enough to calm the higher-ups who actually wrote the check.”

As David Cohen, Interscope’s Head of Business Affairs at the time, recalled in Dean Van Nguyen’s Words for My Comrades: 

“I imagine Tupac himself thought Suge bailed him out, but the truth is we and Time Warner put up the money. I mean, look, I was definitely part of bailing out Tupac.”

The conversation between Tupac Shakur, Suge Knight, and a signed napkin happened on September 16, 1995, literally minutes before Watani and others from Tupac’s family were about to “explain that his release was imminent … that he would be free within a few weeks.”

Tupac Shakur was released on October 12, 1995. Watani would stop managing Tupac after this, firmly disagreeing with the decision to sign with Death Row Records. 

According to Pearlman: “it wasn’t the greatest deal for Tupac, since it was essentially, for Interscope … shuffling paperwork [and turning] Tupac over to Death Row, thereby still making money off his music, without having his conduct drag down the Interscope name and image. And while Knight took all the credit for Tupac’s liberation, it was largely bluster. The $1.4 million bond required for bail was put up by Interscope and Time Warner–not Knight and not Death Row. In fact, the $1.4 million wasn’t, as Tupac believed, a gift of generosity and kindness. The dough was an advance on future album royalties. Tupac was paying his own bail money with money had yet to earn.”

In addition to being a bad business deal for Shakur, It also feels suspiciously close to the disruption put on the Black Panthers from COINTELPRO, with how many of Tupac’s plans were interrupted once he was on his way to California and Death Row Records. 

“He was happy, excited. He had money, and he was free. But sometimes the progression is a digression, because the environment was bad for him.”

– Snoop Dogg, recalling Tupac Shakur joining Death Row Records, 2023

Tupac Shakur got to work immediately at Death Row Records, quickly assembling the first double-album in rap music history: ‘All Eyez On Me.’

According to family and friends around Tupac, the album was very intentionally made to be what Death Row wanted from Tupac, and its artists at the time. The songs still carry Tupac’s concerns and political overtones, but there’s definitely a difference with this and other work made for Death Row Records. 

“Death Row wanted Pac to fucking be greedy and grimy, so that album was him being a boss baller. Diamonds, girls, nice clothes, Mercedes-Benz, fucking. He’d never been that. Not deep down. But he knew what Suge expected. So, as strange as it sounds, he set aside his integrity to make a great album.”

– Kendrick Wells, Tupac’s longtime friend and assistant at the time 

“When ‘Hit ‘Em Up’ [one of the songs from ‘All Eyez on Me] came out, I was like ‘Eh, I don’t really know about this record. Seems vindictive and that’s all it is. It doesn’t sound like you.’ And he was like ‘Fuck that record. I’ve already recorded seven more albums.’ He’s like ‘I’mma get back to it. And I just need to get this out the way, take care of my obligation.”

– Money B from Digital Underground, recalling the release of ‘All Eyez On Me’, 2023

According to those present at the time, Death Row Records was “a record label, and also the mafia” as Darryl “Big D” Harper explained, a producer at Death Row. 

When speaking to Pearlman, Roy Tesfan, Suge Knight’s former assistant, said that at the end of his job interview, “when he was escorted toward a large window and offered the position with a warning, [with Suge Knight saying] ‘We don’t fire niggas here, we throw niggas out windows.’

From Jeff Pearlman’s Only God Can Judge Me:

“I always felt it was a role [Suge Knight] played. He had the money to live out the fantasy. Where others earn street reps, Suge bought his.”

– Darryl “Big D” Harper

“People got pissed on, they got their ass whupped, they did all kinds of shit. At Death Row, you were there to humiliate people. It’s my job to show you that you don’t mean shit.”

– Daz Dillinger, Death Row producer and member of Tha Dogg Pound

According to those who were around Tupac Shakur in the studio, they described him as “a typhoon of marijuana and Newport smoke and spittle” who “could not stand still.”

“You felt like crying. It wasn’t music. It was pain. Snoop and Dre went from being the main men at Death Row to almost feeling invisible. Pac came with an energy nobody could match.”

– Darryl “Big D” Harper

By June 1995, Tupac was living one of his biggest dreams: living at a big, giant family compound for him and his family.

Everyone was close, and the possibilities for the future felt limitless.

It was at this time when Tupac was sleeping two or three hours most nights, asking family members to wake him early in the morning. He was working on music incessantly, constantly feeling like he was running out of time. 

Tupac was covering the cost of bills and living for over forty people around this time, family and friends, with nothing being spared. This is something that was important to him. It was also part of why he had plans for his own music and film company–Euphanasia Studio Company–to continue producing music and movies, but with him possessing ownership of it all. 

Suge Knight worked hard to talk Tupac out of it, hoping to have him run an East Coast off-shoot of Death Row Records, called Death Row East. 

Suge Knight persuaded and guilted Tupac into going to Las Vegas to see the Mike Tyson fight, reminding him that Mike needed Tupac’s support. According to Tupac’s family, Knight continued to try to convince him to stay at Death Row Records all throughout the fateful trip.

“Let me say this: two weeks before we went to Vegas, Pac was on the phone, foaming out of his mouth, veins busting out his neck, his head–threatened to blow up Death Row Studio. And he was fussing about his music. He wanted his masters.”

– Jamala, Tupac’s cousin, recalling the final weeks of Tupac’s life (2023)

Tupac Shakur was wearing his bullet proof vest everywhere at this point, but Suge Knight told him “no, you don’t need all of that. Come on, we’re just gonna go to the fight” in Tupac’s hotel room.

It’s impossible to know, but easy to speculate on how Suge Knight would later think about this moment.

On September 7, 1996, after watching the Mike Tyson fight, Tupac Shakur would beat and stomp Orlando Anderson, a South Side Compton Crip; this was a rival gang, and someone who had tried to rob a Death Row Records associate earlier that summer. One of the people in Tupac and Suge’s entourage spotted Anderson, and Shakur immediately started the attack.

At around 11 p.m. Tupac Shakur would be killed in a drive-by shooting, while riding in the passenger’s seat of Suge Knight’s car. The two were on their way to Club 662, a club owned by Suge Knight, when a mystery assailant pulled up next to Shakur and Knight’s car.

In 2025, it became clear and known to the public that the shooter was Duane “Keefe D” Davis, acting in response to a $1 million hit that Sean “P. Diddy” Combs put out on Suge Knight and Tupac Shakur.

With a flat tire and gun shot wounds, Suge Knight would rush Tupac Shakur to the closest hospital, the University Medical Center of Southern Nevada.

Shakur would be placed onto life support, and put into a medically induced coma, while paramedics worked to save him. During the six days while Shakur fought for his life, the police harassed his family, denying the family space for grief and what they knew was coming. 

On September 13, 1996, Tupac stopped breathing, his struggles and time in this world finally ending, but his songs and messages playing on repeat for so many … until the end of time.

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“Wow. Tupac Shakur. We all miss Pac. Jesus Christ, I miss him. I’m so spoiled by Pac that I stopped making music. Who do you put beats under now? 

After Pac died, there was pain and sorrow, but there was also [exhales deeply] … there was a relief. There was an exhale that happened. And there was a calm that came. All of his pain, all the voices in his head, finally silenced. 

There was a small funeral that Afeni held at Malibu Beach. 30 to 50 friends and family. We brought drums and we had fires burning. But we threw all the gifts in the ocean. Chicken wings, Hennessy, and his favorite pictures. Jewelry. Books. The water was freezing. But Afeni walked in there, deep out there, to dump the urn. 

Afeni said it best: ‘don’t cry for my baby. He was a strong fighter. And he burned a white flag. It burned all night. And Pac lived an intense, potent, deadly twenty five years. When something burns really hot … it’s gone.’

Tupac died to get his message across. I believe that. He was a pre-thinker. He had a Plan E, much less a Plan B. He was always plotting. ‘If I die this way, put this out.’

 – Shock G, speaking about Tupac’s death, funeral, and life (2002)

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From Dean Van Guyen in his book Words for My Comrades:

“The text on his original birth certificate read: Lesane Parish Crooks. It was a name with no history, assembled from various sources, and bestowed on the son of Afeni Shakur to prevent the boy from being targeted by enemies of a Black Panther Party mother just weeks after she was acquitted of conspiracy to bomb a series of public buildings around New York City. This covert identity proved to be nothing more than a placeholder. When she felt it was safe to do so, Afeni amended the document to ensure history would recognize the chosen child by his true form, Tupac Amaru Shakur. 

It was a name selected to honor Túpac Amaru II, descendant of the last Incan ruler and Indigenous cacique. Amaru II was executed in 1781 after leading a large Andean rebellion against Spanish rule; he died a martyr and symbol of anti-colonial resistance. For Tupac Shakur, it proved to be a chilling prophecy that came to be. But, as Afeni explained, ‘I wanted him to have the name of revolutionary, Indigenous people in the world. I wanted him to know he was part of a world culture and not just from a neighborhood.’”

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In 2004, Jordan Fripp created an art piece titled ‘Martyrs’, which features outlines of the faces of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and Tupac Amaru Shakur; each revolutionary figure is drawn by a different color, representing Fripp’s feeling on what each man’s revolutionary and political beliefs for liberation center around. 

Dean Van Guyen writes in Words for My Comrades that King is “assigned green, the color money” as he “believed social injustices were rooted in economics”; “Malcom X is “assigned yellow” as he “believed the Black community needed to attain power to achieve upliftment”; and finally Tupac is “assigned red” as he “believed in the oppressed using force to overcome subjugation.”

Dean Van Guyen writes that “Martyrs’ was created just a few years after comedian Chris Rock poked fun at the idea of Tupac and Biggie as Black American icons comparable to Martin and Malcom” with Rock saying ‘I don’t think you’ll see their pictures hanging up in your grandmamma’s living room.”

Tupac Shakur was complicated, and contained both multitudes and contradictions, but he also contained the spirit of revolutionary, and carried Fred Hampton with him, in every step he took and every bar he rapped.