Earlier today, I spoke with the family of Brianna Taylor.
This morning, they were informed that the Justice Department has charged for
current and former Louisville Metro Police Department officers with federal
crimes related to Ms Taylor's death.
Those alleged crimes include civil rights offenses, unlawful conspiracies,
unconstitutional use of force and obstruction offenses.
>> You guys remember Brianna Taylor?
Because I was concerned that everyone had forgotten about the insane and
unjust way she was gunned down by cops who indiscriminately shot
bullets into her apartment.
But luckily today, federal officials charged for current and
former police officers in Louisville Kentucky who were involved in that
fatal raid on her apartment.
Now, these are the first federal charges against any officer involved in the raid
and they do accuse them of several crimes, including lying to obtain a warrant.
Finally, I remember covering the story and being so outraged that no one was focusing
on the lie that was told to obtain the warrant for the raid in the first place.
But there's more, it also accuses them of,
other acts that led to her death, which I'm gonna detail for you right now.
So here's a reminder of what happened for
those of you who need that refresher cuz it did happen two years ago.
During the nighttime raid in March 2020, officers knocked down the door and
fired a volley of gunshots after Brianna Taylor's boyfriend shot
an officer in the leg believing that intruders had burst into the home.
I think anyone would have that kind of reaction, right, because it's a raid.
It's a no knock warrant, they burst into the home and
in self defense Brianna Taylor's boyfriend shoots his gun.
Two officers shot Taylor,
a 26-year old emergency room technician who was pronounced dead at the scene.
Now, what spurred this raid in the first place?
It's important understand this context.
So, the cops had been investigating two men who they believed were
selling drugs out of a house that was far from Taylor's.
Okay, so this is all about drug trafficking, which by the way,
no knock warrants for drug trafficking,
I think is something that should be reconsidered to say the least.
But the cops said they believed that one of those men had used her apartment,
Brianna Taylor's apartment to receive the packages and
that's how they got the warrant for the raid.
But here's the important part, neither of the officers who shot and
killed Taylor have ever been charged nor are they named in the new indictments.
The charges instead named three officers who were part of
an investigative unit that obtained the search warrant for
the raid along with a fourth officer who was later fired from the department.
Because officials said he had fired blindly into Taylor's apartment and
struck a neighboring apartment.
They were more concerned about the neighboring apartment than the fact that
Brianna Taylor had been gunned down as an innocent individual who was in that
apartment during this terrible raid.
That former officer, by the way, the one who shot indiscriminately
Brett Hankinson already faced state criminal charges in that case.
But those were the only charges that were ever filed until Thursday, but
he was acquitted.
The new indictment accuses him of federal civil rights violations.
Now, here is Merrick Garland explaining some of the charges in more detail.
>> The federal charges announced today allege that members of the place based
investigations unit falsified the affidavit used to obtain the search
warrant of Ms Taylor's home.
That this act violated federal civil rights laws and
that those violations resulted in Ms Taylor's death.
Specifically, we allege that Miss Taylor's Fourth Amendment rights were
violated when defendants Joshua Jaynes, Kyle Meany and
Kelly Goodlett sought a warrant to search Miss Taylor's home knowing that
the officers lacked probable cause for the search.
We allege that the defendants knew the affidavit in support of that warrant
contained false and misleading information and that it omitted material information.
>> And he's right about that for instance,
prosecutors said on Thursday that two detectives and
a police sergeant had falsely claimed in this affidavit used to obtain the warrant.
That Brianna Taylor's boyfriend had been receiving packages at Taylor's apartment.
In fact, according to the indictment, the officers had no of such packages,
but misrepresented their case to the judge who authorized the raid.
In fact, they claimed in order to obtain the warrant for the raid,
that they had spoken to the postal service about the packages that were
being sent to Brianna Taylor.
But later, a representative of the post office came out and
said, no one ever said that, that is a lie, that is completely made up.
And that element of the story drove me crazy because no one seemed to be focusing
on that and that was a huge, huge lie that led to the warrant that was used for
this raid that ended up killing Brianna Taylor.
One of the officers charged Joshua Jaynes,
a former detective who was also fired over his role in the raid.
Sent a draft of the affidavit to Kelly Goodlett,
another detective now facing charges,
in which he included the false claim about the packages the prosecutor said.
And prosecutors are alleging that those officers were aware that they had
included false and misleading information to obtain the warrant.
The third officer charged, Sergeant Kyle Meany,
who led the department investigative unit approved the affidavit despite
knowing that it contained the false information according to the indictment.
But somehow, if you don't think this is bad enough, it's about to get worse.
Let's watch.
>> The charges announced today also alleged that the officers responsible for
falsifying the affidavit that led to the search took steps to cover
up their unlawful conduct after Ms Taylor was killed.
We also alleged that they conspired to mislead federal state and
local authorities who were investigating the incident.
For example, we alleged that in May 2020,
those two defendants met in a garage where they
agreed to tell investigators a false story.
>> Just absolutely disgusting.
Falsifying whatever they need to falsify in order to obtain
the warrant in the first place.
The raid ends up killing an innocent woman in her own apartment.
And then,
there's a cover up according to what Merrick Garland said there after the fact.
And Emma, I'm wondering if you think that there will be a more receptive
reaction to ensuring that justice be served for Brianna Taylor.
Especially now that it's a abundantly clear that cops do in fact engage in
cover ups.
We see it playing out in Uvalde after the cops of course got a lot
of backlash in the way that they failed to respond to a mass shooter on
that campus in Uvalde, Texas.
What do you think is gonna come of this?
>> Yeah, I mean, I hate to be cynical, right?
Because this is a good thing that Merrick Garland and
the Biden administration is doing here.
But at the same time, I'm happy to know Merrick Garland's alive, right?
There could be a lot more being done right now and
I'm a bit unsatisfied by a piecemeal approach to targeting corrupt cops.
Because this is not a few bad apples and going after these cops that falsified
documents and tried to cover up their murder.
That's what happened of Brianna Taylor or at least killing,
I should say to protect myself legally, whatever.
But at the very least, I understand that they should be targeted but
they are not a few bad apples as I say.
This is what is incentivized in policing in this country.
And I remain incredibly frustrated by Democrats who like to
fundraise off of three issues pretty much over the past five years,
which is abortion access, which is gun violence and which is anti racism, right?
I mean, during Black Lives Matter,
there were a lot of fundraising emails that were sent out and yet
there's been no legislative response on really any of those fronts.
And the gun violence bill, that was just the bipartisan group of senators
came together on is garbage as well.
So, I'm happy that these cops should face some consequences for what was done here.
But I think that there needs to be a larger focus on how we can
prevent more Brianna Taylors from being killed by cops and
that's not making an example out of people.
We understand that that doesn't work.
There have been police brutality incidents since George Floyd, since Brianna Taylor.
There has to be an end to qualified immunity,
there has to be a restructuring of policing in this country,
which includes reallocating funds into different kinds of community programs.
That cops aren't at traffic stops with guns and
using these excuses as a way to terrorize black people in their community.
I mean, most cops in some of these areas view themselves as an occupying force and
that's because they've been emboldened
to act as such towards non white populations by governments.
And that is what has to change in my opinion.
>> Yeah, with what we're experiencing right now with a crime wave,
I would argue that reforming policing is a single most important thing to do.
Because what we're seeing is obviously distrust in cops.
I think that the protests have led to an unofficial strike by
police in the middle of a crime wave to make a point.
And you're right, it's a system that's rotten to its core, and we really,
really do need to reform it in order to respond appropriately to the crime wave.
In order to ensure that communities feel safe under the protection
of cops that are actually interested in protecting and serving.
And more importantly, policing needs to be re thought at least in the very least,
in regard to how they've been militarized as a result of our defense spending.
That is a huge problem as well.
I think part of the reason why they see themselves as an occupying force is
because they have the military weaponry that an occupying force would have.
And that's because we spend so much on defense to enrich
weapons manufacturers and private defense contractors.
The military ends up having a massive inventory and
surplus of this weaponry of the tanks and
all that military capability gets passed off to local police departments.
So yeah, they're gonna see themselves as an occupying force and
disadvantaged communities, poor people, people of color,
they're the ones who bear the brunt of this broken system.
So while it's okay, I think to celebrate the fact that Merrick Garland is alive and
he's actually doing something.
And maybe there will be some justice for
the family of Brianna Taylor at the end of the day, it's focusing on
a specific incident rather than doing more to reform the entire system.
All right.
>> We got militarized from the head down.
That's all also.
>> Yeah, that's exactly right.
That's exactly right.