ASSASSINS

UPDATE: On August 31st 2026, Duane ‘Keffe D’ Davis was found guilty of orchestrating the murder of rapper Tupac Shakur. Prosecutors argued that Davis supplied the weapon, and ordered the shooting – but did not pull the trigger himself. Davis maintains his innocence and says he will appeal the conviction.

Cabramatta was the epicentre of Australia's worst heroin epidemic. It was also the electorate of John Newman, the state MP gunned down outside his own home in 1994. 
This week we look beyond the assassination and into the epidemic itself, with Don Weatherburn, a professor at the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre at UNSW.

John Newman, the Australian politician, was shot dead in his driveway while he was still in office.
The gunman has never been found.
Newman was the State MP for the south-western Sydney electorate of Cabramatta.
At the time of his death, the suburb was in the throes of a massive heroin epidemic.
Host: Aslan Pahari
Producer: Hannah Jose
Audio Engineer: Tegan Nicholls, Emrys Cronin
Video Producers: Tejas Bhat, Dylan Behan
Special thanks: Michael Osmond for archives research
Supervising Producer: Kyla Slaven
Executive Producers: Joel Werner, Eric George, Jessica Radburn
To binge even more great episodes of ASSASSINS with Aslan Pahari go to the ABC listen app (Australia) or wherever you get your podcasts. There you'll find more stories of the world's most shocking assassinations — from the lone wolf hitman to the professional assassin, you'll hear how famous figures like Abraham Lincoln, Benazir Bhutto, Ramses III, Tupac and Gandhi met their end.

When Anwar al-Awlaki joined Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, he knew he could be jailed or killed by the US government.
What he didn’t know was that his death would come at the hands of a person he trusted with his life.

It was the first killing of an American citizen by his own government, without a trial, on foreign soil. 
And it was President Barack Obama who approved the order.