Rappers YBN Cordae and Trae Tha Truth were among 87 people arrested on Tuesday afternoon (July 14) for protesting outside the home of Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron demanding justice in the police-caused killing of Breonna Taylor.
“The protestors chose to occupy the front yard of a home owned by the Kentucky Attorney General and continuously chant towards he and his neighbors. At his request, they were trespassed from the property,” read a statement from a spokesperson for the Louisville Police Department. “All were given the opportunity to leave, were told that remaining on the property would be unlawful, and chose not to leave.”
According to the Louisville Courier-Journal, Cordae (born Cordae Amari Dunston), Truth (born Frazier Othel Thompson III) and their fellow activists were demanding that Republican Cameron, the state’s first black attorney general, charge the three police officers who murdered 26-year-old ER tech Taylor inside her home on March 13, when plainclothes officers using a no-knock warrant broke down her door and unloaded more than 20 rounds into the apartment after Taylor’s boyfriend fired once out of fear that intruders were breaking in; Taylor was shot eight times.
To date, one officer had been fired over the incident, but none have been charged.
The LMPD declined to confirm the names of those arrested in the incident or provide their bail status.
YBN Cordae allegedly arrested during a protest for Breonna Taylor today. pic.twitter.com/DtR8hplgzV
— HipHopDX (@HipHopDX) July 15, 2020
While a spokesperson for Cordae declined to comment on the arrest at press time, among the others also reportedly arrested in the incident, according to Courier-Journal, were Bronx-based rapper Mysonne, Love and Hip-Hop star Yandy Smith, The Real Housewives of Atlanta’s Porsha Williams, Minneapolis NAACP President Leslie Redmond and Houston Texans wide receiver Kenny Stills.
The group of more than 100 marched to Cameron’s house during a protest organized by the national social justice organization Until Freedom, with the paper reporting that dozens of officers surrounded the protesters, many of whom sat down on Cameron’s lawn before they were handcuffed.
The protesters were charged with the Class D Felony of intimidating a participant in the legal process, as well as the Class B misdemeanor second-degree disorderly conduct and the violation of third-degree criminal trespass.
Cameron asked the police to remove the protestors from his property, but they reportedly refused to leave. Taylor’s killing has become an international cause in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, sparking national and international protests and a massive social media campaign urging Cameron to charge the officers involved in the case with murder.
Linda Sarsour, one of the founders of Until Freedom, who was also arrested in the incident, told the New York Times, “No one engaged in any threats of violence nor engaged in any violent activity toward Mr. Cameron or anybody else.”
Mark Osler, a former federal prosecutor and law professor at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota, told the paper that the felony charges were “unusual” since felony intimidation charges are typically filed against someone trying to intimidate a witness or juror in a court case, not against protesters who gather on a public official’s property.
“That would usually be a trespass, not an intimidation charge,” Osler said. “Certainly not a felony.”
Everyone from Beyoncé, to Lizzo, Justin Bieber, Queen Latifah, Sia, Common, Demi Lovato, Janet Jackson, Cardi B and dozens more have used the hashtag #JuticeForBreonna and #SayHerName to demand action