LOS ANGELES, DEC. 7 -- A judge ordered the arrest of Tupac Shakur when the rapper failed to show up today for a court hearing on weapons charges a week after he was shot in a robbery.

Shakur was charged with a felony count of carrying a concealed 9mm pistol in a vehicle when he and Maurice Harding were stopped April 29 for speeding in Hollywood.

Harding was charged with the same offense, and Shakur also was charged with an additional count of carrying a loaded firearm.

When Shakur, 23, and Harding, 27, failed to show up for the pretrial hearing today, Superior Court Judge Paul Flynn revoked their $20,000 bail and issued arrest warrants, Deputy District Attorney Scott Goodwin said. Calls to Shakur lawyer Johnnie Cochran Jr. weren't returned.

WASHINGTON POST

Shakur has had repeated brushes with the law. He was convicted last week in New York City of sexually abusing a 20-year-old woman he had invited to his hotel room. The jury acquitted him of sodomy and weapons charges.The day before his conviction he was shot in the hand, head and groin and robbed of more than $40,000 in jewelry in the lobby of a Manhattan recording studio.

His lawyers said he was unable to attend a hearing this week to set a sentencing date for the sexual abuse conviction because he was still recovering from his wounds. That hearing was postponed until Dec. 14.

They have not said where Shakur is recuperating, and his condition was not known.

The sexual abuse conviction doesn't carry an automatic prison sentence, but Shakur and codefendant Charles Fuller, 24, could each get maximum seven-year terms.

Shakur has faced criminal charges six times since March 1993, ranging from two counts of aggravated assault stemming from a gunfight with two off-duty officers in Atlanta to an assault charge in Michigan to violating probation in California. The Atlanta charges were later dropped.