RICHMOND, Va. -- Friday’s decisive decision by Baltimore’s top prosecutor to charge six police officers in the death of Freddie Gray, brings Henrico County’s Commonwealth’s Attorney, Shannon Taylor, back to 2002 when her then boss, charged a Richmond cop for killing an unarmed man.
“It can be a very difficult time, it can be a stressful time,” Taylor said.
Former Richmond Commonwealth’s Attorney David Hicks opted to press charges against Richmond Detective David Melvin for shooting and killing an unarmed robbery suspect when Taylor worked in his office.
Seeing Baltimore City State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby’s decision to move forward with those charges without putting the case to a grand jury first, leads Taylor to believe she must have some pretty compelling evidence.
“It is not a requirement to have a special grand jury to look at the facts if there has been a clear presentation of facts,” Taylor said.
Taylor said it will be interesting to see if Mosby ends up prosecuting her to appoint a special independent prosecutor citing Mosby’s personal and professional relations with Gray’s family attorney who donated $5,000 to her campaign.
“Well that was kind of the allegation that was made with the Joe Morrissey situation…Mr. Morrissey had made a contribution to my campaign,” Taylor said.
In that instance, a special prosecutor ended up handling the case, but Taylor said that is not necessarily what we’ll see here.
“We simply have to trust the judgment of our colleagues,” Taylor said.
