>> The Louisville Courier Journal is reporting that there are a number of so-called legal
experts who believe that the three cops who were involved in the murder of Breonna Taylor
should not be charged with murder or manslaughter.
Now this article goes to great lengths to make it clear that at least three of the attorneys
that they spoke to are in fact black but honestly, I don't care.
I don't agree with their reasoning.
More importantly, I don't agree with the way that the plainclothes cops busted into that
home based on a warrant having to do with alleged drug trafficking.
They busted into that home at around 12:30 AM.
So let me ask you something.
If plainclothes individuals bust into your home, you don't know who they are.
Okay, you don't know what's going on, you have no drugs in the house, you have done
nothing wrong, which was the case with Breonna Taylor.
What would your reaction be?
You'd be terrified, you'd be scared, and if you have a weapon, which her boyfriend Kenneth
Walker did, you would use that weapon to try to defend yourself.
Now Kenneth Walker fired a warning shot as soon as those plainclothes police officers
used a battering ram to bust into their apartment.
And because of that, they opened fire and unfortunately killed Breonna Taylor, right,
tragically murdered her.
And so the Courier Journal is reporting that in interviews and emails, seven experienced
Louisville defense lawyers who are not involved in the case and who have an average of 37
years each in practice, say the officers should not be charged with murder or manslaughter.
Because they had a legal right to defend themselves once her boyfriend shot at them.
Let's stop right there.
In order to obtain the warrant to bust into that home to do that no-knock raid, they lied
and said that the post office said that there were questionable suspect packages that may
have included drugs shipped to Breonna Taylor's home.
Later, an official with the post office said that that was a lie.
That no one within the post office said that.
So they lied in order to get that no-knock warrant and bust into that home at 12:30 in
the morning, roughly 12:30 in the morning.
Already, false premise to get that warrant, and they murdered an innocent person as she
was sleeping in her own apartment.
There were no drugs found.
They were plainclothes cops.
I mean, this just blows my mind that these arguments are being made, right?
They did not have a right to enter that apartment because they lied about the evidence necessary,
the probable cause necessary to obtain the warrant from the judge.
>> Yeah, I mean it's one of those, I mean often, okay, what's really horrifying about
all this is that what if they're right and it was legal?
And so often what's the biggest scandal is the stuff that is legal.
I mean, the fact that no-knock warrants is even a thing that exists in-
>> Over drugs.
Yeah, is insane.
It's insane that no-knock warrants is even an option that's available.
I think obviously, you have to look at the facts, like you always do really well, but
often what it does is it obscures the bigger picture that something like no-knock warrants
are even a valid option for a police department to do.
And yeah, I mean, this is such a flagrantly obvious case of just insane overreach on so
many levels, just the idea of just being murdered in your home by the police is just crazy.
I mean, it's not the first time it's happened either.
And during the story of that cop who was drunk and went to the wrong apartment, and entered
the wrong apartment, and then startled the woman that was living there and shot and killed
her.
>> Remember the story of the cop who thought she was entering her apartment?
>> Yeah, that's what I mean, that's the one I'm referring to, yeah.
>> Yeah, and saw the actual resident of the apartment that she wrongly went into laying
on the couch.
She shot and killed him immediately, no questions asked.
No, this is the kinda stuff that happens and I can't even stand the way this article is
written, right?
Where they're like, three out of these seven defense attorneys are black.
And they're saying no manslaughter, no murder charges.
But I don't care about the race of anyone who's making these arguments because the argument
is wrong, it's wrong.
So I agree with you, Nando.
The way the system is is wrong, right?
Overall, the fact that these types of no-knock warrants exist for drug charges needs to be
changed.
>> Yeah.
>> But if we just even put that aside and focus squarely on how they obtain that warrant
wrongfully, how they lied about what the post office told them in order to get that warrant
from that judge.
How are you gonna argue that no charges, no charges?
And yes, they could face a civil suit and they absolutely should.
There's no question about it.
But is this story gonna lead to them changing the system or questioning whether no-knock
warrants make sense in cases like this?
Of course it's not.
>> Yeah.
>> And the the lack of justice is what infuriates people.
And that's why you have people protesting out on the streets right now.
This is the kinda stuff that makes people feel that their lives aren't valued.
>> Yeah, and it's like, what is that journalist kind of doing there?
What kind of role are they playing?
I mean, often the case with local news organizations is that they're incredibly tied in with the
local cop, police departments.
They're just a very kind of symbiotic relationship there.
The local news, they need scoops and the cops give them the best scoop, so there's just
a virtuous cycle there between those two institutions.
Usually, it's not always the case, but it's very often the case.
And again, it's one of those like you're looking for the teeniest technicality as a way to
obscure the bigger injustice of it all, like you said, the lack of justice.
I mean, it's like one of those, a two year old could know that this is just wrong.
And you can you can talk yourself into a pretzel by finding some obscure legal workaround to
whatever the thing is.
But at a certain point, all that stuff is just obscuring the truth, which is not what
you should be doing as journalists, right?
You can technicality away anything.
But if it doesn't pass the common sense two year old test, then what are you doing, what
are you actually doing?
>> Yeah, no, I think you brought up such a great point about the media, because Ben Mankiewicz
worked in local news for a long time and he shared a story that I think is so important.
He was talking about police and how involved they are in the way that local news covers
them.
And he shared an anecdote about how if you say something without kinda getting a green
light from the cops as a local reporter, they punish you by not inviting you to certain
press conferences.
>> Yeah.
>> By refusing to alert you when there's gonna be some sort of perp walk, right, the kind
of stuff that honestly local news is run on.
>> Yeah, the scoops that you need.
>> Exactly, and so he mentioned that when he was talking to Cenk on Old School.
If you're watching this as a member you have access to those archives.
Definitely check that out.
It's important to know about these things and know about the influences behind the scenes.
Even for me, and I'm pretty savvy about this kinda stuff, but even for me it was really
an enlightening conversation.
That gives you a sense of how much propaganda, pro-cop propaganda there has been in everything.
In video games, in the way that news stories are crafted, especially in local news.
We need to be aware of this stuff when we're trying to dissect narratives.
>> People underrate the power of local news because no young people watch it and it's
just kind of a thing that is not in the cultural zeitgeist in any way.
But tons of people watch it and especially for local affairs.
I mean, they really do shape the narrative.
And as you said, that local TV news, and this wasn't the case for this particular story,
which was written in a newspaper, but the local TV news, I mean, they have essentially
become media wings of the local police department.
I mean, it's just as they get starved of resources more and more, they rely on the police department
for content, like you said.
And there's actually a great episode of the podcast called Citations Needed about this
whole dynamic.
They went a deep dive in all of this, and it's something that I saw very up close working
in a network with a local news station next to us.
I mean, they need to feed the beast.
Like everyone else, the content beast never stops, and cops is just a great, reliable
fodder to put on the screen every single day.
There's something and if you get that cut off as a local journalist, you are done, done,
your career is done