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Louisville Police Release Internal Report Into Breonna Taylor Shooting

NOEL KING, HOST:

The Louisville Metro Police Department yesterday released a long-awaited investigative report into Breonna Taylor's killing by police. The report attempts to explain why officers were at her door that night. Eleanor Klibanoff is a reporter at member station WFPL. She's been reading into that report. Good morning, Eleanor.

ELEANOR KLIBANOFF, BYLINE: Good morning.

KING: So this was an investigation by the Louisville police into the Louisville police. What have you learned that you didn't already know?

KLIBANOFF: Right. So my colleagues and I are continuing to get through this massive file. But it looks like this internal investigation shows us a lot about the narcotics investigation that led police to Taylor's apartment that night, as well as more detail on what happened while they were serving that search warrant that ultimately left Taylor dead. You know, and as a reminder, this happened in the early hours of March 13. Louisville police had a no-knock warrant that would have allowed them to enter Taylor's apartment unannounced. And this is for a narcotics investigation targeting Taylor's ex-boyfriend, Jamarcus Glover. Taylor's boyfriend fired at what he thought were intruders and struck one officer. The officers fired back and killed Taylor in her hallway. So this investigative report sort of looks at how police investigated that whole shooting start to finish after it happened.

KING: Why does this report say the officers got a no-knock warrant for Taylor's home?

KLIBANOFF: So this no-knock warrant is sort of the central question in this investigation...

KING: Yeah.

KLIBANOFF: ...And throughout this case. And one of the things this internal investigation shows us is that Detective Joshua Jaynes, he told these investigators that he believed that Jamarcus Glover, Taylor's ex-boyfriend, was using Taylor's apartment to store money and receive packages. Here's Detective Jaynes speaking with investigators in an audio interview released yesterday.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

JOSHUA JAYNES: It looks like it would be a USPS - a suspected USPS package. And so at that point, I believe that, you know, this guy has got to be getting - I'm hoping at this point he's getting dope delivered to him.

KLIBANOFF: So that's him saying, I'm hoping at this point he's getting dope delivered to him. And so Jaynes obtained this no-knock warrant for Taylor's apartment. And he told a judge when obtaining the warrant that he had confirmed with the postal inspector that Glover was getting packages at Taylor's apartment. But this investigation shows us that's not true. It was actually a neighboring police department that checked with the postal inspector, and the postal inspector said there were no packages sent to Taylor's address. One of the interesting things in this report, it shows the officers from that neighboring police department were shocked when they saw what Jaynes had put on that affidavit that led to the search warrant.

KING: OK. That is really interesting. Last week, recordings of the grand jury that considered the charges against the officers, the charges that eventually led to one officer being indicted - those recordings, those grand jury recordings were released. How does this new report fit into what the grand jury members heard?

KLIBANOFF: Right. So that grand jury was brought by Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron, and he has said that his office sort of started their investigation from scratch rather than relying on this investigation. But the grand jury did hear some of these interviews. And the question remains, you know, what of this file did they not hear that might have changed their consideration of this case?

KING: And just briefly, are there more investigations coming?

KLIBANOFF: Yes. The FBI is still considering how Jaynes obtained this warrant, and there's also an internal Louisville police investigation to see if they violated internal agency policy.

KING: Eleanor Klibanoff of member station WFPL in Louisville.

Thanks so much, Eleanor.

KLIBANOFF: Thank you.

(SOUNDBITE OF CHRISTIAN SCOTT'S "JENACIDE (THE INEVITABLE RISE AND FALL OF THE BLOODLESS REVOLUTION)") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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