Detective Myles Cosgrove, one of the officers who opened fire during the raid and Detective Josh Jaynes, who was not at the raid, but the person who obtained the search warrant for Taylor's home, have both received pre-termination letters their attorneys
Two Louisville, Kentucky police officers involved in the botched raid that led to the shooting death of Breonna Taylor in March will likely be terminated, according to the attorney for one of the officers, according to NPR.
Detective Myles Cosgrove, one of the officers who opened fire during the raid, and Detective Josh Jaynes, who was not at the raid, but the person who obtained the search warrant for Taylor's home, have both received pre-termination letters their attorneys said, according to CBS News.
Jaynes' pre-termination letter, which was signed by Interim Police Chief Yvette Gentry, accuses Jaynes of lying on the application for the search warrant, according to a copy of the letter obtained by CBS News. In the application, Jaynes claimed he received information from a U.S. Postal Inspector that Jamarcus Glover, Taylor's ex-boyfriend, had been receiving suspicious packages at Taylor's apartment.
According to Chief Gentry’s letter, the information Jaynes presented was "not truthful." The letter alleges that Jaynes lied about that information coming from a postal inspector when it in fact came from LMPD sergeant John Mattingly, who himself heard it from "a Shively Police Officer,” CBS News reported.
In May, Jaynes was asked by a Public Integrity Unit investigator if he had intentionally misled the judge in order to get the warrant approved, according to CBS affiliate WLKY-TV. Jaynes had acknowledged that “he could have worded a little bit differently in there.”
In a recorded interview, Jaynes was heard saying, "But I try to be as – as (unintelligible) as detailed. Or sometimes it's good to be not as detailed,” CBS News reported.
Gentry's letter also claimed that Jaynes did not complete the necessary search warrant operations plan on or before March 13, the day of the raid that resulted in Taylor's death, the news outlet reported.
"Because the operations plan was not completed properly, a very dangerous situation was created for all parties involved," the letter reads. "You were the officer who conducted the majority of the investigation, however, neither you, your direct supervisor, or his lieutenant were or available at the scene when the search warrant was executed."
Attorney Thomas Clay, who is representing Jaynes, called the allegations of untruthfulness “totally unfounded” and told CBS News that Jaynes did not personally create the operations plan. He also said a representative from the mayor’s office was present at the final briefing conducted just prior to the raid, and the plan had been reviewed by multiple levels of command.
"We intend to show up to the pre-termination hearing on Dec. 31 and we're going to contest this action, although I'm not optimistic about Interim Chief Gentry changing her decision," Clay told NPR.
The move comes nine months after the 26-year-old Black woman was killed in her apartment while police attempted to carry out a search, NPR reported.
In June, detective Brett Hankison was terminated for his involvement in Taylor’s death. He has also been charged with three counts of wanton endangerment for bullets that hit an apartment of one of Taylor’s neighbors. He is currently contesting his termination and has pleaded not guilty. Mattingly and Cosgrove have not been charged in connection to the incident. Kentucky’s attorney general has stated that their use of force was justified because Walker fired first. No one has been charged with causing Taylor's death.
On Dec. 26, a ceramic statue of Breonna Taylor, located in downtown Oakland, California in Latham Square and near Oakland City Hall, was partly smashed into little pieces and vandalized, only two weeks after it had been installed. Since the incident, the bust has been missing from its pedestal, The New York Times reported.
Leo Carson, the bust's sculptor, told KQED that the sculpture was created to support Black lives.
"This vandalism is an act of racist aggression, and it shows why sculpture and art matters," he said. "I made this sculpture to support the Black Lives Matter movement, and while I'm overcome with rage and sadness at their cowardly act, their vandalism will make her even more potent.”
According to a spokeswoman with the Oakland Police Department, a police report has been filed and the vandalism is under investigation. The police did not respond to an inquiry on the whereabouts of the bust, according to The New York Times.
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