But let me first admit: I’m a nonbeliever. While I seriously respect Tupac’s music (and especially his poetic lyricism), I’ve always been baffled by the hysterical admiration of him. I may be a proud California girl, but I generally prefer the more hard-hitting sound of East Coast hip-hop to the West Coast scene, so Tupac never became a favorite of mine.

With that said, I can see how the lore surrounding his image — and especially his death — has led to an almost religious fervor for the artist. The cover of his first album released posthumously and the last one he recorded alive, “The Don Killuminati: The 7 Day Theory” (sometimes called “Makaveli”), depicts Shakur on the cross in an attempt to convey his crucifixion by the media, implying to many of his fans a literal resurrection after his death.

Released so soon after he passed away, the strange title of the album gave conspiracy theorists and fanatics something to pore over — a reference to Italian philosopher Niccolo Machiavelli, who wrote about faking one’s own death in the book “The Art Of War.” Apparently, Tupac read Machiavelli’s work extensively while in jail in 1995, leading many to believe the reference is a sign that Tupac has, indeed, faked his own death and will one day return. In other words, he will eventually be resurrected, like Jesus.

In all likelihood, the reference to Machiavelli simply appealed to the constant threat of death Tupac experienced in the gangsta lifestyle and is not the key to Tupac’s secret hideout in Cuba or to a religious zeitgeist in which the rapper must await the rapture. But what is resurrection if not the ability to live on after death? Within the hip-hop community, Tupac is immortalized years after his murder, just as Jesus was immortalized by humanity after his crucifixion. Isn’t that enough?

Not exactly. Even though I’m not the biggest Tupac fan, I am a fan of justice. I want peace of mind for Tupac’s mama. I want answers. I want to find the killer.

Now, I don’t usually believe in conspiracy theories, but there is one I hold to be true: Diddy is behind Tupac’s death. I can feel it. Duane “Keffe D” Keith Davis, a shot caller for the Southside Crips, told the Los Angeles Police Department that Sean “Diddy” Combs — then known as Puff Daddy, cross-country rival of Tupac’s label Death Row Records — commissioned Shakur’s legendary murder in Vegas in September 1996. Davis himself claims he was offered $1 million to kill Tupac and Suge Knight, Death Row’s former CEO (who survived the ultimate shooting by Keffe D’s nephew Orlando Anderson).

But despite this obvious evidence against him, you still might wonder if Diddy is really capable of murder in the first place. And I’ll admit, he probably isn’t. But he probably is capable of being a murder conspirator. I think of Combs like the mob boss of the hip-hop game: a cold businessman calling all the shots (literally) and not taking any himself. Don’t let his newfangled innocence sway you — he built the crucifix for a hip-hop Jesus.