What's new
Fantasy Football - Footballguys Forums

Welcome to Our Forums. Once you've registered and logged in, you're primed to talk football, among other topics, with the sharpest and most experienced fantasy players on the internet.

Black lives matter (3 Viewers)

jm192 said:
Police are allowed to defend themselves.  Self defense laws in the State of Kentucky are the same for police as everyone else.  Breonna Taylor was caught in the cross fire of self defense and died.  
Someone may have already brought this up, but I saw something earlier about how someone's right to defend themselves (including cops?) doesn't protect them from collateral damage.  So the police would be in the clear if they hit the BF, but because Taylor was unarmed that's not a clean shot.  They might have a loophole since she was the name on the warrant, but self-defense is a poor defense as they shot someone who was not a threat.  That's according to some KY lawyer I saw on TV.  

 
  • Smile
Reactions: JAA
Someone may have already brought this up, but I saw something earlier about how someone's right to defend themselves (including cops?) doesn't protect them from collateral damage.  So the police would be in the clear if they hit the BF, but because Taylor was unarmed that's not a clean shot.  They might have a loophole since she was the name on the warrant, but self-defense is a poor defense as they shot someone who was not a threat.  That's according to some KY lawyer I saw on TV.  
That's the biggest issue I see as well.  Let's assume one of the bullets that went through the wall killed someone else.  Are they still off the hook?

 
  • Smile
Reactions: JAA
Someone may have already brought this up, but I saw something earlier about how someone's right to defend themselves (including cops?) doesn't protect them from collateral damage.  So the police would be in the clear if they hit the BF, but because Taylor was unarmed that's not a clean shot.  They might have a loophole since she was the name on the warrant, but self-defense is a poor defense as they shot someone who was not a threat.  That's according to some KY lawyer I saw on TV.  
I live in KY.  I've spoken to lawyers I know.  I've read/listened to in-state awyers on TV and online.  

My understanding is they were shot at and shot back.  You can't exactly pause and wait to see who has the gun.  It's a stretch to suggest they could have identified who is and isn't a threat while being shot at.  Shots came from a direction, they shot in that direction.  It's a great notion that cops are super soldiers that are going to stay cool while being shot in the leg while in an unknown environment, risk their lives further to hopefully figure out who does and doesn't have a gun, see how many people there are and yada yada.  But I also think cops are human and are going to defend their own lives.  And they should be able to.

It's a perfectly reasonable defense.  

 
That's the biggest issue I see as well.  Let's assume one of the bullets that went through the wall killed someone else.  Are they still off the hook?
I mean, I think you're changing the entire conversation at that point.

Hankison fired into 3-4 other apartments.  If his bullet killed someone, then he's killed someone by being wreckless.  That would warrant manslaughter.  

But if Cosgrove fires in the direction of Walker and it goes through the wall and hits Bob in Apartment 11, is that a charge?  I don't think so.  

But at that point--how far are we prepared to extend it?    So everytime a police officer shoots their weapon, if it goes through a wall, they could be charged?  So either don't defend yourself or go to jail for manslaughter?  You basically can't do the job at that point.  

If an officer is wreckless and kills someone, charge them.  Hankison was wreckless.  His bullets didn't kill Breonna Taylor.  You can't charge the guy who didn't kill her.  He's charged for being wreckless, as he should.  

 
I mean, I think you're changing the entire conversation at that point.

Hankison fired into 3-4 other apartments.  If his bullet killed someone, then he's killed someone by being wreckless.  That would warrant manslaughter.  

But if Cosgrove fires in the direction of Walker and it goes through the wall and hits Bob in Apartment 11, is that a charge?  I don't think so.  

But at that point--how far are we prepared to extend it?    So everytime a police officer shoots their weapon, if it goes through a wall, they could be charged?  So either don't defend yourself or go to jail for manslaughter?  You basically can't do the job at that point.  

If an officer is wreckless and kills someone, charge them.  Hankison was wreckless.  His bullets didn't kill Breonna Taylor.  You can't charge the guy who didn't kill her.  He's charged for being wreckless, as he should.  
But Breonna didn't have a weapon.  So she wasn't killed in "self-defense".  How far away from Walker does she have to be for it to be reckless?  3 ft?  6 ft?  20 ft?

So no, I don't think we're changing the entire conversation.  I think it's a very different conversation if it was Walker that was killed and not her.

 
But Breonna didn't have a weapon.  So she wasn't killed in "self-defense".  How far away from Walker does she have to be for it to be reckless?  3 ft?  6 ft?  20 ft?

So no, I don't think we're changing the entire conversation.  I think it's a very different conversation if it was Walker that was killed and not her.
Again,

If you're shot at--is it a reasonable expectation you pause and identify who does and doesn't have a weapon?  I don't have an answer for you on the cut off in terms of feet.  Do we even know how far apart they were?  Were they standing together?  

It's absurd to me that with a bullet in your leg, you're required to stop and see who is and isn't armed before defending your life.  Shots were fired, an officer was hit--the threat surely seems pretty real--so shots were returned.  Someone was hit.  It doesn't matter if it was the gunman.  It doesn't matter if they were unarmed.  They were shooting back to defend their lives. 

She was unfortunately hit.  Self defense isn't defined by who the bullets hit.  It's the act.  I don't believe they saw an unarmed black woman and their uncontrollable racism took over.  They reacted to being shot at, and this was the result.  

I hope if you're ever shot at, you hold yourself to the standard you're demanding of the police.  

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Again,

If you're shot at--is it a reasonable expectation you pause and identify who does and doesn't have a weapon?
Is this a serious question?  I think you need to reread that question.

Absolutely you need to try and identify who has a weapon and who is shooting at you. You don't get to start shooting at anyone that is around the area where bullets may have come from. 

The mental gymnastics that we see here at times to justify "self-defense" are amazing to me. 

 
Is this a serious question?  I think you need to reread that question.

Absolutely you need to try and identify who has a weapon and who is shooting at you. You don't get to start shooting at anyone that is around the area where bullets may have come from. 

The mental gymnastics that we see here at times to justify "self-defense" are amazing to me. 
LOL I think we're done here.  

It's insane to ask someone who is shot in the leg to wait to shoot back.  Police get to defend themselves same as everyone else.  Sometimes people get hit in the line of fire and it's tragic.  It doesn't mean they killed her in cold blood.  Kentucky law sees this as self-defense.  That's what several lawyers have said on the situation.  It's what the grand jury said on the situation.  

You can call it mental gymnastics and burn Louisville to the ground.  But the decision was made in accordance with the law. You asking how far away she has to be just proves that you don't have the facts to argue whether or not she was in the line of fire from where they were shot.  But you're sure quick to condemn.

 
Jesse Jackson has now called for NBA, WNBA and NFL players to discourage high profile athletes  the University of Kentucky and University of Louisville.

That'll show the cops!

 
Is this a serious question?  I think you need to reread that question.

Absolutely you need to try and identify who has a weapon and who is shooting at you. You don't get to start shooting at anyone that is around the area where bullets may have come from

The mental gymnastics that we see here at times to justify "self-defense" are amazing to me. 
So why isnt the boyfriend in jail? 

 
  • Smile
Reactions: JAA
What an absurd statement.

From Politifact:

https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2020/jul/30/facebook-posts/black-lives-matter-not-terrorist-organization/

No, Black Lives Matter is not a terrorist organization

- The State Department keeps a list of foreign groups that have been formally designated terrorist organizations. Black Lives Matter, a domestic organization, is not on it.

- There is no legal process for designating domestic groups as terrorist organizations.

- Black Lives Matter is not listed as a perpetrator group in a global database of nearly 200,000 terrorism incidents.
Lol...the first point is sooooo dumb.  Of course they are not a foreign group, thus not on the state department list.  The second point is not quite as dumb, but still pretty dumb.  Because there is no legal process does not mean they are not.  

 
Lol...the first point is sooooo dumb.  Of course they are not a foreign group, thus not on the state department list.  The second point is not quite as dumb, but still pretty dumb.  Because there is no legal process does not mean they are not.  
Don't call stuff dumb. Even if you think it is. You can make your point without calling others dumb.

 
LOL I think we're done here.  

It's insane to ask someone who is shot in the leg to wait to shoot back.  Police get to defend themselves same as everyone else.  Sometimes people get hit in the line of fire and it's tragic.  It doesn't mean they killed her in cold blood.  Kentucky law sees this as self-defense.  That's what several lawyers have said on the situation.  It's what the grand jury said on the situation.  

You can call it mental gymnastics and burn Louisville to the ground.  But the decision was made in accordance with the law. You asking how far away she has to be just proves that you don't have the facts to argue whether or not she was in the line of fire from where they were shot.  But you're sure quick to condemn.
The problem I have with this is the fact that you have officers exercising a warrant late at night with obviously bad intel. What was so urgent that this couldn’t be handled another way? Stake it out and wait for him to leave, or at least make sure the person you’re looking for is there before you knock down a door. 

 
  • Thanks
Reactions: JAA
Correcting the misinformation about Breonna Taylor

Wednesday’s announcement from Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron about criminal charges in the Breonna Taylor case set off a frenzy of misinformation on social media. Based on what we do know — which I’ve culled from my own reporting, reporting from the New York Times and the Louisville Courier-Journal, as well as from conversations with the lawyers for Taylor’s family — the decision to charge Detective Brett Hankison with wanton endangerment was probably correct, as was the decision not to charge the other officers involved in the shooting. If ballistics had conclusively shown that one of the bullets from Hankison’s gun killed Taylor, he could be charged with reckless homicide, but according to Cameron, the bullets that struck Taylor could not be matched to Hankison’s gun. There’s the problem that the police who conducted the raid were relying on a warrant procured by another officer, which was then signed by a judge. There were many flaws and abrogations in that process, but it would be unfair and not legal to hold them accountable for any of that.

But “not illegal” should not mean “immune from criticism.” Part of the problem was Cameron himself, who was selective in what information he released to the point of misleading the public about key facts in the case. (This raises real questions about whether the grand jury was also misled. That’s why an attorney for Taylor’s boyfriend Kenneth Walker, who fired at the police during the raid, is demanding that Cameron release the evidence that was presented to the grand jury.)

Furthermore, Taylor’s death was not, as Cameron suggested, simply a tragedy for which no one is to blame. The police work in this case was sloppy, and the warrant service was reckless. Taylor is dead because of a cascade of errors, bad judgment and dereliction of duty. And it’s important that the record on this be clear. So here are some correctives for the misinformation I’ve seen online:

“This was not a no-knock warrant.”

It absolutely was. It says so right on the warrant. Moreover, the portion of the warrant authorizing a no-knock entry cited only cut-and-pasted information from the four other warrants that were part of the same investigation. This is a violation of a requirement set by the Supreme Court that no-knock warrants should be granted when police can present evidence that a particular suspect is a risk to shoot at police or destroy evidence if they knock and announce. They didn’t do that.

The police claim they were told after the fact to disregard the no-knock portion and instead knock and announce themselves, because, by that point, someone had determined that Taylor was a “soft target” — not a threat, and not a major player in the drug investigation. But there are problems with this account. If Taylor was a “soft target,” why not surround the house, get on a megaphone, and ask her to come out with her hands up? Why still take down her door with a battering ram? Why still serve the warrant in the middle of the night?

“The police knocked and announced themselves, and a witness heard them.”

In what was probably the most frustrating part of Cameron’s press event, he cited a single witness who claimed to have heard the officers identify themselves as police. I spoke with Taylor’s lawyers in June, who at that time had interviewed 11 of her neighbors. Many lived in the same apartment building as Taylor. According to the lawyers, no neighbor heard an announcement. The New York Times interviewed 12 neighbors. They found one — just one — who heard an announcement. And he only heard one announcement. He also told the paper that with all the commotion, it’s entirely possible that Walker and Taylor didn’t hear that announcement. Cameron neglected to mention any of this.

Moreover, in a CNN interview Wednesday night, Walker’s attorney, Steven Romines, said the witness to whom Cameron was referring initially said he did not hear the police announce themselves. And he repeated that assertion in a second interview. It was only after his third interview that he finally said he heard an announcement. That’s critical context that Cameron neglected to mention.

“Even Kenneth Walker has admitted that the police pounded on the door for 30 to 45 seconds. Therefore, by definition, this was not a ’no-knock’ raid.”

With a few exceptions, when conducting a raid, government agents must knock and announce their presence and purpose, and give anyone inside the opportunity to let the officers in peacefully — thus avoiding violence to their person and destruction of their property. If the police simply pounded on the door for 45 seconds and never appropriately announced themselves, that’s even worse than not knocking at all. It likely made Walker even more fearful that the people outside the door were there to do harm to him and Taylor.

“If the police say they announced themselves, and one neighbor heard it, then they probably did. So what if the other neighbors didn’t hear it? They were probably asleep.”

The entire purpose of the knock-and-announce requirement is to provide ample notice to the people inside the home the police are trying to enter. If the police didn’t yell loudly and clearly who they were — loud enough for the people inside to hear — the knock-and-announce portion is rendered meaningless, and the entire action becomes no different than a no-knock raid. As the Times reported, the officers on this raid were trained by a man who, oddly enough, is now president of the Louisville city council. “During his 19-year career as a police officer, he had instructed recruits at the local training academy about ‘dynamic entry.‘ Especially when executing a warrant at night,” he told the paper, “he told them to yell ‘police’ at the top of their lungs, specifically so that occupants would not mistake them for an intruder.” That clearly did not happen here.

“Breonna Taylor was not asleep in her bed when she was shot.”

This is true. And it’s also true that many media reports and activists stated she was. I’m not sure what difference this makes. She and Walker were in their bed when police began pounding on the door. They were awakened at 12:40 a.m. There’s every reason to believe Walker when he says they were frightened.

“The man who shot at the police, Breonna Taylor’s boyfriend, was also a drug dealer.”

Taylor’s ex-boyfriend was dealing drugs. That man, Jamarcus Glover, was the main focus of the police investigation. Walker, Taylor’s boyfriend at the time of her death, was not named in any investigation.

A few people have pointed to a leaked police memo that includes quotes from Glover taken from recorded phone conversations at the jail as proof that the two knew one another. The Louisville police themselves have said the leaked memo was an early, unverified draft written mid-investigation, that these quotes were taken out of context, and that the way they’re being used is deeply misleading. (For example, Glover said Walker was also in jail. He was — because police had arrested him after the raid.)

“Breonna Taylor’s ex-boyfriend implicated her in his drug dealing.”

The Times reported that according to friends, family and Taylor’s social media posts, she was on and off again with both Glover — who friends, family and Taylor herself thought was bad for her — and Walker, who they say treated her well and was, by all accounts, a good and decent man. Glover was in and out of jail, and Taylor paid his bail more than once. She seemed to genuinely care for him, even as she was trying to extricate herself from his life. (She had blocked him on her cellphone.)

There were a few other incidents in the warrant that some have said implicated Taylor. In December 2016 she rented a car, then loaned it to Glover. He then loaned it to a man involved in his drug dealing — and that man was later found dead in the car. But police who investigated were satisfied that Taylor had no knowledge of the murder, or of how Glover had used the car when she loaned it to him. The other incident occurred two months before the raid, when Glover retrieved a package he had ordered delivered to Taylor’s home. The police claimed a postal inspector told them this package was “suspicious.” The postal inspector later said he had no record of that. According to attorneys for Taylor’s family, the package contained clothes and shoes.

Some have again pointed to that leaked memo, in which Glover seemed to suggest storing money at Taylor’s apartment. But the police found no cash in the apartment. Glover has also since publicly said that Taylor had no involvement in his drug dealing. And he may have had some incentive to say otherwise: In July, attorneys for Taylor’s family say prosecutors presented Glover with a plea bargain that listed Taylor as a co-defendant, suggesting that he’d get reduced charges if he implicated her. (Prosecutors say the plea deal was just a draft, though Taylor’s family’s attorneys say that claim is dubious.)

“The judge who signed the warrant is not to blame.”

The warrant in this case was signed by Louisville Circuit Judge Mary Shaw. In an op-ed in the Courier-Journal, one of Shaw’s fellow judges defended accusations that she had “rubber-stamped” the warrant. Judge Charles L. Cunningham wrote that “affidavits are excruciatingly detailed,” said Shaw scrupulously reviews search warrant affidavits, and said the accusation from an attorney for Taylor’s family that Shaw took only 12 minutes to review the five warrants in the investigation was riddled with “falsehoods and misstatements.”

Here’s what we can say: The portion of the warrant affidavit that requested a no-knock raid was the exact same language used in the other four warrants. It stated that drug dealers are dangerous and might dispose of evidence if police knock and announce. It contained no particularized information as to why Taylor herself was dangerous or presented such a threat. And that, according to the Supreme Court, is not sufficient to grant a no-knock warrant. Yet Shaw granted it anyway. Perhaps she provided more scrutiny to the other parts of the affidavit. But she did not ask for more evidence in the no-knock portion. And she should have.

The only possible defense of Shaw here is that, as regular readers of this page know, judges seem to grant no-knocks when they aren’t merited and in defiance of Supreme Court precedent with regularity. And there’s no harm done if the no-knock position of the warrant is illegal, because the same Supreme Court has said the Exclusionary Rule doesn’t apply. And that is precisely the problem.

“If Kenneth Walker hadn’t shot at the cops, Breonna Taylor would still be alive.”

Walker admits he fired first. But he says he fired only after he and Taylor repeatedly asked who was pounding at the door, got no answer, and after a battering ram busted open the door. If Walker reasonably believed that the men breaking into the apartment were not police, he had every right to defend himself and Taylor. At that point, the police also had the right to return fire. The latter would be true even if the courts later determined that the police had failed to properly identify themselves (which would make this a no-knock raid) and the no-knock portion of the warrant was later determined to be illegal (which it was). That’s how the law works.

But there is every reason to believe Walker did not know the men outside the door were police. Walker is not a criminal. There were no drugs in the house. You don’t need a license to have a gun in a private home in Kentucky, but Walker had gone the extra step to obtain a concealed carry license. (Kentucky changed its law in 2019, and no longer requires a license for concealed carry either.) That isn’t something hardened criminals hellbent on killing cops tend to do. Neither is calling 911, which Walker also did after the shooting. Moreover, Walker knew about Taylor’s past involvement with the drug dealer Glover — and that Glover wasn’t happy about Taylor seeing Walker. He has said he feared that it was Glover or his associates outside the door. That too seems entirely reasonable.

Cameron’s statement gives the implication that Walker should have known that the men were police. But if police and prosecutors truly believed Walker knew, or should have known, that the raiding men were police, they would have prosecuted Walker for knowingly trying to kill them. Police and prosecutors don’t take that sort of thing lightly. They did arrest him for firing at the officers. But they later dropped those charges and released him. That speaks volumes.

The really sad part about this is that Cameron’s misleading statement about the witness who heard police announce — along with the fact the Walker fired first — has led some to put the blame for Taylor’s death on Walker. What Walker did that night is what just about anyone would have done if they thought they or their loved ones were under attack. Walker and Taylor were in love. They had been discussing marriage. He was defending a woman he wanted to marry, and with whom he wanted to raise a family. To put her death on him only adds to his pain and grief. It’s just incredibly cruel.

“This is just an all-around tragedy. We shouldn’t focus on who to blame, whether its police, prosecutors, Walker or Taylor.”

The most serious questions here concern the investigation itself, and why these officers were asked to serve a warrant on Taylor’s home in the first place. There’s the lie about the postal inspector. There is the fact that despite the surveillance on Taylor’s home, the police didn’t know there was another person inside. There are the police bullets that were inadvertently fired into surrounding apartments. There’s the cut-and-paste language used to secure the no-knock portion of the warrant. There’s also the fact that the officer who procured the warrant was not part of the raid team. There’s the fact that five officers involved in the Taylor raid were involved in another violent, botched raid on an innocent family in 2018.

And there’s the 2015 study by criminologist Bryan Patrick Schaefer, who was allowed to embed himself with the Louisville police department. As Schaffer wrote, “Of the 73 search warrant entries observed, every entry involved using a ram to break the door down. Further, the detectives announce their presence and purpose in conjunction with the first hit on the door. A detective explained, ‘As long as we announce our presence, we are good. We don’t want to give them any time to destroy evidence or grab a weapon, so we go fast and get through the door quick.‘”

Schaefer added that in the raids he observed, the difference between how police served a no-knock warrant and a knock-and-announce warrant was “minimal in practice.”

Schaeffer also found that for warrant service, Louisville police fill out a “risk matrix” to determine whether to bring in a SWAT team. A case has to meet a minimum score before determining whether SWAT will be used. The other raids done in conjunction with the Glover investigation did use SWAT, which also means police ensure there are ambulances and medical personnel nearby. I happen to think SWAT teams are overutilized. But if you are going to break into someone’s house, a well-trained, full-time SWAT team is far preferable to a bunch of cops in street clothes kicking down a door.

The irony here is that Taylor was not deemed threatening enough to merit a SWAT team. Instead, she was subjected to all of the most dangerous aspects of a SWAT raid, undertaken by officers in street clothes. There were no medics nearby. In fact, an ambulance on standby was told to leave the scene an hour before the raid. After she was shot, Taylor lie in her house for 20 minutes before receiving any medical attention.

And there are more questions:

— Why serve a warrant in the middle of the night on a witness tangential to an investigation?

— Why did the police alter the times on their reports?

— The most recent activity involving Taylor on the search warrants was in January. Why wait until March to serve the warrant on her apartment?

— Why didn’t police do any further investigation to better establish how involved in the drug conspiracy Taylor really was?

To simply blow this off as a tragedy for which no one is to blame is an insult to the life and legacy of Taylor, but also to the dozens of innocent people who have been gunned down in their own homes before her. And the effort by Cameron and others to make all of this go away by feeding the public half-truths that blame the victims in this story — Taylor and Walker — for Taylor’s death is inexcusable.

We could prevent the next Breonna Taylor. We could ban forced entry raids to serve drug warrants. We could hold judges accountable for signing warrants that don’t pass constitutional muster. We could demand that police officers wear body cameras during these raids to hold them accountable, and that they be adequately punished when they fail to activate them. We could do a lot to make sure there are no more Breonna Taylors. The question is whether we want to.

 
Correcting the misinformation about Breonna Taylor
I'm in agreement with virtually everything written there.  To me, there's no question that Breonna Taylor is dead because law enforcement (including the judge) acted in ways that law enforcement shouldn't.

The only thing I'd add to the reporter's list of questions is why wasn't there body camera footage?  We know that at least one of the officers was wearing one that night.

 
The only thing I'd add to the reporter's list of questions is why wasn't there body camera footage?  We know that at least one of the officers was wearing one that night.
Since these officers were in the right, you'd think they would want the body camera footage out there so as to clear their good names.  How unfortunate for them that their superiors aren't releasing it.  

 
  • Smile
Reactions: JAA
Since these officers were in the right, you'd think they would want the body camera footage out there so as to clear their good names.  How unfortunate for them that their superiors aren't releasing it.  
Your point is well taken, but I think I remember reading previously that the body camera(s) were not activated, and thus there is no footage to be released.  Obviously that begs the question of why weren't the body camera(s) activated?  The other problem with that is it relies on the truthfulness of a statement by law enforcement, and we already know that law enforcement has not been truthful to date.  Originally, we were told that none of the officers were wearing body cameras, and only later learned they were, via internet sleuths identifying said camera on a picture of one of the officers.

Ultimately, I agree that officers may not have acted illegally here (outside of the reckless endangerment already charged, and potentially a violation of the requirements to have body cameras activated), but the fact remains that poor process and judgment on the part of law enforcement led to this woman's death.  Additionally, there has clearly been an effort by law enforcement to prevent transparency after the fact.

 
I think the real crux of the issue isn't what happened at the apartment.  It was a recipe for tragedy.  Law enforcement shouldn't be breaking down the door in the middle of the night for someone so tangential to the actual suspect.   In general, I'm pro law enforcement and have family that are officers, Troopers and military.  Was it race related?  I can't say but I have no idea why they were so overzealous in this case.

 
Last edited by a moderator:
I'm in agreement with virtually everything written there.  To me, there's no question that Breonna Taylor is dead because law enforcement (including the judge) acted in ways that law enforcement shouldn't.

The only thing I'd add to the reporter's list of questions is why wasn't there body camera footage?  We know that at least one of the officers was wearing one that night.
I disagree.  There is so much information that is not reported by the MSM.   It was not just Breonna ex-boyfriend but a lot of his friends coming to her house picking up packages and selling drugs out of other houses.  Recorded conversations indicated she knew exactly what was going on and there were numerous related drug busts which found a ton of drugs.  She may have moved on, but she had close relations to some big time drug dealers and there were a ton of drugs which were moved through her house previously.  There was ample justification for a no knock warrant.  It was an unfortunate chain of events, but the police work was fine.  She had previously knowingly allowed massive amount drugs to be moved through her home.  

 
I disagree.  There is so much information that is not reported by the MSM.   It was not just Breonna ex-boyfriend but a lot of his friends coming to her house picking up packages and selling drugs out of other houses Recorded conversations indicated she knew exactly what was going on and there were numerous related drug busts which found a ton of drugs.  She may have moved on, but she had close relations to some big time drug dealers and there were a ton of drugs which were moved through her house previously.  There was ample justification for a no knock warrant.  It was an unfortunate chain of events, but the police work was fine.  She had previously knowingly allowed massive amount drugs to be moved through her home.  
Do have any proof of this? A link from any credible source that confirms the above bolded claims?

 
Last edited by a moderator:
  • Smile
Reactions: JAA
New Body-Cam Footage Raises Questions About Breonna Taylor Death Investigation

Hours of body camera footage from Louisville Metro Police Department officers and SWAT team members paint a telling picture of the immediate aftermath of the police raid in which Breonna Taylor was killed.

The footage, which was obtained by VICE News and documents what was seen by officers who responded to the scene after the shooting, has not previously been made public. It shows officers appearing to break multiple department policies and corroborates parts of Taylor’s boyfriend’s testimony. It also raises questions about the integrity not only of the crime scene but of the ensuing investigation into what happened that night.

 
  • Smile
Reactions: JAA
I disagree.  There is so much information that is not reported by the MSM.   It was not just Breonna ex-boyfriend but a lot of his friends coming to her house picking up packages and selling drugs out of other houses.  Recorded conversations indicated she knew exactly what was going on and there were numerous related drug busts which found a ton of drugs.  She may have moved on, but she had close relations to some big time drug dealers and there were a ton of drugs which were moved through her house previously.  There was ample justification for a no knock warrant.  It was an unfortunate chain of events, but the police work was fine.  She had previously knowingly allowed massive amount drugs to be moved through her home.  
Apparently the police intel was very outdated since there were no drugs or drug money found during the raid on her apartment

 
Why is this about race and not the drug war and no-knock warrants? It would seem to me that the culprits here are policemen who are acting within an unjust and unreasonable system. Any system where SWAT teams roam the streets and where authorities are not required to announce their presence when entering private residences means something is seriously amiss. It's high time to end the drug war and the fallacy that people have any legislative right over what other people put in their bodies. Preemptive arguments about the damage done by drugs no longer hold when we've turned the machinations of the state so far afield that the agents and procedures used by the state threaten civilians, users, and bystanders more than the drugs ever could.

As for the tactics used in the drug war, no-knock raids and plainclothes cops acting without visible signs of authority sanction on their persons are just begging the average citizen to act in self-defense. And who can blame those individuals for doing so? They think they're being attacked by other lunatic civilians. It's a bad mess we've gotten ourselves into being such busybodies about other people's habits that we've concocted a whole system that systematically places people in great danger and harm over simple and consensual transactions between adults.

 
I disagree.  There is so much information that is not reported by the MSM.   It was not just Breonna ex-boyfriend but a lot of his friends coming to her house picking up packages and selling drugs out of other houses.  Recorded conversations indicated she knew exactly what was going on and there were numerous related drug busts which found a ton of drugs.  She may have moved on, but she had close relations to some big time drug dealers and there were a ton of drugs which were moved through her house previously.  There was ample justification for a no knock warrant.  It was an unfortunate chain of events, but the police work was fine.  She had previously knowingly allowed massive amount drugs to be moved through her home.  
“The police work was fine.”  Ugh

 
“The police work was fine.”  Ugh
It was actually very good work which resultrd in numerous arrests and recovery of lots of drugs.  It is largely documented in this video which includes among other things video stills of known drug dealing thugs picking up packages from her apartment and delivering it to known trap houses where drugs were sold.  But facts are not very important in these cases,  The false narratives the media spins is far more important.  

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Apparently the police intel was very outdated since there were no drugs or drug money found during the raid on her apartment
It is the most effective way to do it.  You do surveiilence of numerous spots, you collect data and piece together your case, get your warrants and coordinate the raids on multiple locations simultaneously.  Sure the onvestigation goes on over several months, but the video they had from her place was only about a month old (end of Jan, raid was early March).

 
It was actually very good work which resultrd in numerous arrests and recovery of lots of drugs.  It is largely documented in this video which includes among other things video stills of known drug dealing thugs picking up packages from her apartment and delivering it to known trap houses where drugs were sold.  But facts are not very important in these cases,  The false narratives the media spins is far more important.  
I didn’t see any stills in that video. Just the worst episode of “around the horn.”

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Which seems to also fit with the irregularities and issues in this report.

Aarin Sarpee initially told investigators that he didn't hear police say who they were before ramming through Taylor's door. Two months later, he drastically changed his recollection.

He is the only witness who has now claimed the police identified themselves. 
🤔 soooo many oddities around the handling of this incident from the warrant through the handling afterwards.  I would hope we can all agree these sort of things should not happen.  Dude is clearly on video saying they did not announce themselves.  I wonder how he came to change his mind.  No wonder they didnt want to release the body cam footage or even turn them on.

 
Last edited by a moderator:
  • Thanks
Reactions: JAA
Why is this about race and not the drug war and no-knock warrants? It would seem to me that the culprits here are policemen who are acting within an unjust and unreasonable system. Any system where SWAT teams roam the streets and where authorities are not required to announce their presence when entering private residences means something is seriously amiss. It's high time to end the drug war and the fallacy that people have any legislative right over what other people put in their bodies. Preemptive arguments about the damage done by drugs no longer hold when we've turned the machinations of the state so far afield that the agents and procedures used by the state threaten civilians, users, and bystanders more than the drugs ever could.

As for the tactics used in the drug war, no-knock raids and plainclothes cops acting without visible signs of authority sanction on their persons are just begging the average citizen to act in self-defense. And who can blame those individuals for doing so? They think they're being attacked by other lunatic civilians. It's a bad mess we've gotten ourselves into being such busybodies about other people's habits that we've concocted a whole system that systematically places people in great danger and harm over simple and consensual transactions between adults.
Well, we could view this as a war-on-drugs issue and take concrete steps to improve the criminal justice system for everybody, or we could put more social justice politics into our sporting events.  Obviously it's more important to turn sports into quasi-religious events, so the criminal justice thing will just have to wait.  Thank you for your patience. 

 
It was actually very good work which resultrd in numerous arrests and recovery of lots of drugs.  It is largely documented in this video which includes among other things video stills of known drug dealing thugs picking up packages from her apartment and delivering it to known trap houses where drugs were sold.  But facts are not very important in these cases,  The false narratives the media spins is far more important.  
Do you mind giving the approximate time of the vide when they show the video stills?

I watched the 1st segment (youtube inserts commercial breaks)

I found it “funny” that the 1st guy speaking complains saying something like ‘that the media isn’t telling the whole story, they are only telling you what they want you to hear’

Then proceeds to not tell the whole story about Taylor, he ex-boyfriend and the rental car. Sure he mentions that she was being looked at because she rented a car and let the ex-boyfriend use the car and that the ex-boyfriend used the car in a crime.

However he neglected to mention that the police did an investigation on Taylor related to that crime and concluded that not only was she not involved but that she had no idea a crime had been committed.

 
  • Smile
Reactions: JAA
Why is this about race and not the drug war and no-knock warrants? It would seem to me that the culprits here are policemen who are acting within an unjust and unreasonable system. Any system where SWAT teams roam the streets and where authorities are not required to announce their presence when entering private residences means something is seriously amiss. It's high time to end the drug war and the fallacy that people have any legislative right over what other people put in their bodies. Preemptive arguments about the damage done by drugs no longer hold when we've turned the machinations of the state so far afield that the agents and procedures used by the state threaten civilians, users, and bystanders more than the drugs ever could.

As for the tactics used in the drug war, no-knock raids and plainclothes cops acting without visible signs of authority sanction on their persons are just begging the average citizen to act in self-defense. And who can blame those individuals for doing so? They think they're being attacked by other lunatic civilians. It's a bad mess we've gotten ourselves into being such busybodies about other people's habits that we've concocted a whole system that systematically places people in great danger and harm over simple and consensual transactions between adults.
My guess is that because the “battlefields” for the “war on drugs” are often minority neighborhoods. Plus the difference in the amount of or level of punishment for the same drug crimes between the races Penalties for crack vs. powder coke etc.

 
My guess is that because the “battlefields” for the “war on drugs” are often minority neighborhoods. Plus the difference in the amount of or level of punishment for the same drug crimes between the races Penalties for crack vs. powder coke etc.
The question I asked was really a normative rhetorical device, not anything I was confused about. The front lines for the drug war are often in minority neighborhoods in denser areas and there does seem to be a disparity in both attention and sentencing, along with codified sentencing disparities. My question is why throw race into it when it's a general policing/legal problem? Do we really think we'd see the violence we see in inner cities if most narcotics were legal? It's the black markets and the force that goes with ensuring one's share of that market that makes the cities so violent, IMHO. That and the slow degradation of human life, but that's happening everywhere and is another story for another time. But my question was really a normative one.

 
Walking my dog today I saw two homes that had Trump-Pence signs and Black Lives Matters signs on the same lawn.  My wife thought it was odd but I said many people have open minds and different views and that they can beleive in both.

 
  • Love
Reactions: JAA
But Breonna didn't have a weapon.  So she wasn't killed in "self-defense".  How far away from Walker does she have to be for it to be reckless?  3 ft?  6 ft?  20 ft?

So no, I don't think we're changing the entire conversation.  I think it's a very different conversation if it was Walker that was killed and not her.
So you're saying the cops don't have the right to defend their own lives. Interesting. Her BF open fires on them and they're supposed to just wait to get shot? Yell, is anyone behind you so we can defend ourselves?

Come on man, your cop hate is off the hook

 
So you're saying the cops don't have the right to defend their own lives. Interesting. Her BF open fires on them and they're supposed to just wait to get shot? Yell, is anyone behind you so we can defend ourselves?

Come on man, your cop hate is off the hook
Where did I say anything of the sort?

There were many aspects of this whole incident that were awful. What I don't have an issue with is the police returning fire when they were shot at.  Never did, never said I did. 

What I do have an issue with is returning fire recklessly. That's actually what one of the officers was indicted with, so I'm not the only one who thinks that.

As a trained officer, who is already on alert since they are the ones breaking into the home in the middle of the night with guns drawn, you can't just recklessly return fire without regard to what's surrounding you, even when fired at. 

She didn't have a weapon but died. 

Just an FYI, Walker fired his gun once. The police returned fire, shooting 32 times. I'm sure you're ok with that, though, as they needed to protect themselves. Nothing reckless about that especially when none hit Walker and 6 hit Breanna.

 
Last edited by a moderator:
  • Thanks
Reactions: JAA
You have no issue with 3 officers firing 32 shots? There was even a break of a minute with no shooting before they opened fire again.
They have a split second to make decisions. How do they know he wasn't going to fire again? Walk a mile in their shoes once and see how easy it is. Take your life into your own hands every time they go on a call, especially in todays world.

Second guessing them is fun for a lot of people and pretty convenient. 

I'll back the badge almost every time. ALMOST, bad cops need to be weeded out and be gone.

 
Walking my dog today I saw two homes that had Trump-Pence signs and Black Lives Matters signs on the same lawn.  My wife thought it was odd but I said many people have open minds and different views and that they can beleive in both.
Or maybe somebody else put one of the signs up as a joke?  ;)  

 
Mr.Pack said:
They have a split second to make decisions. How do they know he wasn't going to fire again? Walk a mile in their shoes once and see how easy it is. Take your life into your own hands every time they go on a call, especially in todays world.

Second guessing them is fun for a lot of people and pretty convenient. 

I'll back the badge almost every time. ALMOST, bad cops need to be weeded out and be gone.
Here are the questions that I'd like answered before we "back the badge" on this one:

1. Why don't we have footage from the body camera that one officer who was involved in serving the warrant was wearing at the time (to say nothing of the officer who was wearing a body cam mount without a camera in the photograph taken after the incident)?

2. Why weren't the officers separated and removed from the scene once support officers arrived as required by department policy, and instead allowed to take part in questioning witnesses?

3. Why did the police department falsely claim that no officers were wearing body cameras?

.4. Why did the police department claim that the shot that hit an officer must have come from Taylor's boyfriend because all officers only carried .40 cal, when one of the officers (the one who has since been charged with recklessness) also carried a 9mm and ballistics have not matched with the boyfriend's weapon?

5. Why did the only witness (of more than ten) who claims the officers identified themselves change his story 2 months after his initial interview, in which he said they did not identify themselves, after at least one untaped interview of him by a police officer happened without being noted in official logs or files?

I'm sure there are others, but those are the ones that stick out at me.

 
Mr.Pack said:
ALMOST, bad cops need to be weeded out and be gone.
Also, let's get to this statement.

I agree.  How do we go about doing it?  Why isn't it being done?  More importantly, why does it seem like multiple instances of doing the exact opposite when supervisors keep "bad cops" on the force?

Lots of lip service with nothing truly being done about this.

 
Five officers involved in this raid were also involved in a botched raid in 2018.  In that case, again resulting in zero charges and a lawsuit against the city, those officers have learned how body cam footage could be used against them because it shows they executed a warrant by using a battering ram to knock in a door on a family without identifying themselves beforehand (only calling "Police" while knocking in the door with the battering ram.)

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/y3zkax/5-cops-involved-in-breonna-taylors-case-were-also-part-of-a-botched-raid-in-2018

 
  • Sad
Reactions: JAA
I'm confused on one point.  Did Walker shoot through the unopened door, or did he fire after the police had broken it open?  Seems like a big point that's unclear, to me anyway.
Walker told investigators he heard banging at the door and assumed it was Taylor's ex-boyfriend, Jamarcus Glover. Taylor, who had awoken, shouted, "Who is it?" but Walker said there was no response.

He said he and Taylor scrambled to get dressed and that he grabbed his gun, which his attorney has said he legally owns. He said both he and Taylor were yelling, "Who is it?" but received no response.

As they made their way toward the front door, Walker said, the door flew off its hinges.

"So I just let off one shot," he said. "I still can't see who it is or anything."

Police then returned fire, killing Taylor.
link
Sorry - have been away

Id like to add that the officers were in plain clothes.

 

Users who are viewing this thread

Top