News of November 10, 1996
Yaki Kadafi Shot Dead in New Jersey
He was in the car behind Tupac and the only witness who might have identified the shooter: on November 10, 1996, Yafeu Fula died at age 19.
At 3:48 a.m. on Sunday, November 10, 1996, police in Orange, New Jersey, found Yafeu Fula on the third floor of a housing project, struck by a bullet to the head. The 19-year-old, a member of Tupac’s group The Outlawz as Yaki Kadafi, died that afternoon at the University Hospital of Newark. Two months earlier in Las Vegas, he had been sitting in the car behind Tupac.
A Witness Who Could No Longer Testify
For investigators in Las Vegas, it was another setback. Fula had been the only person from the entourage who said he might be able to identify the shooter, Lieutenant Larry Spinosa said. However, he reportedly never reached out again after that; contact had been handled through Death Row attorney David Kenner.
In the days that followed, two juveniles aged 16 and 17 were charged with murder. According to Orange police, nothing pointed to a connection to the Tupac case.