By his own admission, Kentucky attorney general Daniel Cameron, a Republican, did not ask the grand jury to charge anyone for Breonna Taylor’s death at the hands of Louisville police on March 13, 2020.
And it now appears from 20 hours of grand jury recordings released on Friday, October 2, 2020, that Cameron only presented the police version of what happened to the jurors. That version is disputed.
Taylor was shot by three cops after her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, shot at people breaking into the apartment he thought were intruders.
Walker maintains they never identified themselves as police. The cops claim they did and a single witness — who has changed his story — backs them up. Cameron had that witness testify. Twelve other witnesses say they didn’t. Cameron didn’t let the grand jury hear those witnesses.
Benjamin Crump, an attorney for Taylor’s family, said, “We’re still trying to figure out what evidence did Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron present to that grand jury? Did he present any evidence on behalf of Breonna Taylor?” The answer appears to be no.
The recordings don’t include the AG’s arguments to the grand jury because those aren’t evidence. But Cameron has said he didn’t ask for charges for Taylor’s death because he thinks the officers were justified. It appears he — not the grand jury — decided the cops wouldn’t be charged for that, because he believes they were justified. That was supposed to be the grand jury’s decision.
Cameron resisted disclosing anything about the grand jury proceedings. A member of the grand jury was so disturbed by what happened in the proceedings the person went to an attorney who persuaded a judge to order released of the recordings.
Attorneys for Taylor’s family have been accusing authorities of a “cover up” almost since the shooting (see, e.g., story here). Local authorities dragged their feet for months before the state took over the investigation. It’s still too soon to call the grand jury proceeding a sham and whitewash. But it’s getting there fast.
The city and its insurers paid the Taylor family $12 million. That’s an unusually high settlement. Police-inflicted wrongful deaths usually settle for $2 to $5 million. If the intent of the high settlement was to make the Taylor family go away and not look too closely under the surface, then it may begin to look like the authorities spent $12 million of taxpayers’ money to buy these officers their freedom.
This article is based on reporting from CBS News here and here.
Prosecutors are not required to bring up chares to a grand jury they don’t believe they can win on in a court room. One may even argue for them to present charges they cannot hope to win a guilty verdict is misconduct, and unethical conduct that should lead to them beibg disbarred.
No one’s saying Cameron did anything unethical. Cops don’t have to arrest perps. Prosecutors don’t have to charge them. That doesn’t make them innocent. If the cops who killed Taylor are prosecutable, and Cameron is protecting them, that doesn’t make him guilty of misconduct or unethical conduct. It does make him a snake.