Shannon Taylor (attorney)

Taylor was born in 1967, attending the University of Virginia and receiving a bachelor's degree majoring in international relations in 1989. After graduating from the University of Virginia, she moved to Richmond, Virginia and worked at a law firm for a couple of years as a paralegal before attending University of Richmond School of Law and receiving her Juris Doctor in 1995.[1]

On August 11, 2011, Taylor announced her candidacy for the 2011 Henrico County Commonwealth's Attorney election.[2] The office was now an open contest as the incumbent, Wade A. Kizer, had announced that he would be suspending his candidacy for his fifth term.[3] Her opponent was attorney Matthew Geary, who was a schoolmate at law school and had been campaigning since 2009, and later Bill Janis, who announced his campaign days later.[4][5] Taylor won an upset victory over both, receiving 25,975 votes while Janis received 21,540 votes and Geary received 9,045 votes. Some, including Taylor, attributed the win to the split Republican votes between Geary and Janis.[6][7] Taylor planned to make the office more diverse and to create cooperation between the office and police.[8] Taylor also fired seven lawyers from the office, making many angry over the decision.[9][10] In 2015, Taylor announced that she would be running for a second term, remaining unopposed in the Democratic primary. She faced prosecutor Tony Pham, who won the Republican primary against Jeffrey Lee Everhart and Shannon Dillon. Pham took aim at Taylor's leadership but ultimately lost in the general election.[11][12] In the 2019 election, Taylor faced against Owen Inge Conway, one of the lawyers she fired when she initially took office.[13][14] Taylor won against Conway by a landslide with 56% of the vote.[15]

On June 7, 2020, a man his truck into a crowd of protesters and was caught.[16] The perpetrator was a Klu Klux Klan leader, with Taylor announcing charges for him on June 25.[17][18] He was found guilty and sentenced to six year in prison.[19]

In June 2020, there was speculation of whether Taylor would run for the 2021 Virginia Attorney General election, with Taylor's friend David Rook emailing supporters to support her in the run, although she did not make an official announcement.[20] Months later, in December 2020, Taylor released a statement that she would not run for attorney general.[21][22] In January 2021, she announced that she would endorse Mark Herring, the incumbent attorney general.[23][24]

In 2013, after it was revealed that Joe Morrissey had sex with a minor, Taylor released a statement that distanced her from the investigation and from Morrissey.[25][26] In 2016, when Morrissey exposed himself to a client after he was released, and Taylor started investigating the incident.[27] After the investigation, she said that although Morrissey was "was wrong and unethical", he would not be charged.[28][29][30]

In 2019, a criminal complaint filed with the United States Department of Justice provided evidence of alleged bribes being paid to Shannon Taylor during her 2015 campaign. The bribes were allegedly paid by a convicted felony drug dealer and his attorney through campaign contributions from 2014 to 2015, to gain the support of Shannon Taylor and stop a cocaine conviction. The drug dealer had pleaded guilty and was convicted of felony conspiracy to distribute cocaine, having admitted to distributing several kilos of cocaine in the Richmond area for over seven years.[31]

In June 2020, Taylor announced that her office would add a new deputy for police integrity to review police use of force accusations, investigate and review body-worn camera footage, and help determine whether charges are appropriate.[32][33] She created it in response to the killing of George Floyd the previous month, and began looking for a deputy to fill the office.[34][35] She appointed attorney Misty Whitehead, a Black Lives Matter supporter, to fill the position, but had funding pulled by County Manager John Vithoulkas after he said that Taylor did not talk to him about the office.[36][37][38]

In October 2020, protesters gathered at former rival Tony Pham's house to protest Pham's campaign against immigrants as he had become the Acting Director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in August. Many protesters were arrested for trespassing and littering, with many other participants refuting the accusations. Many called Taylor to release the arrested protesters.[39][40]

Taylor has called for the end of the death penalty in Virginia, citing that there is "absolutely no data, no research out there that suggests that the death penalty [...] deters people from crime".[41]