NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — New podcast video, uncovered by NewsChannel 5 Investigates, reveals even more disturbing claims pushed by Millersville's conspiracy cop.
In that podcast, Shawn Taylor — now the assistant police chief in Millersville, a small town just north of Nashville — spreads false and dangerous conspiracy theories about last year's Covenant School shooting that left three students and three staff members dead.
This development follows an exclusive NewsChannel 5 investigation that first raised questions about Taylor's many bizarre conspiracy theories.
"So this has a whole lot more to it than what the general public knows," Taylor claimed during a podcast discussion last year of the Covenant shooting.
He joined fellow conspiracy theorists Michael Jaco and Alfredo Luna. Like Taylor, Luna is another former cop who regularly promotes bizarre ideas on his own podcast.
Jaco argued the whole tragedy was faked.
"I think it was a training thing, like we're talking about. Same thing with Uvalde — I don't think that happened as well."
Jaco followed up by asking Taylor for his thoughts, and Taylor did not disagree.
"Well, I'm going to kinda, I'm going to be kind of all over the place on this," he answered.
In the video, Shawn Taylor cannot seem to decide which ridiculous idea he likes more.
Perhaps, he suggested, the mass shooting was part of a plot to distract from political problems facing Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee or the criminal investigation of Nashville District Attorney Glenn Funk's office.
"They executed a search warrant on his office the Friday before the school shooting," Taylor said, referring to Funk. "So is this trying to take light off of him, trying to take light off the governor? Maybe."
Even more disturbing, Taylor claimed — with zero evidence — that the shooter was actually trying to take out a school official who was somehow involved in a sinister scheme.
"You guys know that I am digging into the child trafficking and human trafficking — and this woman just happened to be a part of that," Taylor told his fellow conspiracy theorists.
"Wow," Jaco exclaimed.
"And she was being looked at in that realm of trafficking of children," Taylor continued.
Metro Nashville police say that is a complete lie.
As NewsChannel 5 Investigates previously reported, Taylor also believes in the discredited QAnon conspiracy theory that Democrats kept child sex slaves locked up in the basement of a pizza parlor in D.C. — the so-called Pizzagate hoax.
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Still, Taylor's lies don't stop there.
"What people do not know is they did a training and simulation at that school the week previous," he told the other podcasters.
"Wow!" Jaco replied.
Luna followed up, "And that's confirmed, Shawn?"
"Yes," Taylor insisted.
Again, Jaco exclaimed: "Wow."
"The same thing happened at Uvalde," Luna claimed.
Taylor agreed.
Again, police say Turner's claims are 100% false, that officers had never trained at Covenant.
But that did not stop Taylor from imagining that the bodycam video — from the heroic officers who charged into the school and ended the shooting — was actually from the same training exercise that he also imagined.
The brave staff who helped direct police to the shooter, in Taylor's twisted mind, may have been role-playing.
"Have you ever seen civilians so calm and so composed during an active shooter scenario?" Luna asked.
"Absolutely not," Taylor responded. "They are screaming."
Jaco chimed in, "I said the same thing. And he's not running to the gunfire. He's just strolling along."
Taylor agreed.
Rather than seeing the shooting as a horrific event that cost six innocent people their lives, Taylor claimed that perhaps it was some combination of his kooky ideas.
"Could it be that this woman who was involved in the child trafficking was taken out, and they needed a bigger scenario so they used this as this training op, and then they removed this woman on the side?" Taylor asked.
Then, there are the protests on Tennessee's Capitol Hill calling for new gun laws.
Shawn Taylor suggested it was really part of a transgender plot.
"Within a day or so of the shooting, you had the Capitol overrun with people that were backing the transgender community and all of that," he insisted. "They organized marches for the kids to create gun control."
Again, these protests had nothing to do with transgender issues — except in the mind of the man who now has a gun and a badge.
"The people know and the three of us know something's not right, it doesn't pass the smell test, something's up," Taylor insisted.
Metro Nashville Police Chief John Drake issued a statement, condemning Taylor's conspiracy theories.
“The claims referenced are patently false," Drake said. "Creating or perpetuating baseless rumors such as these is irresponsible and serves no purpose but to cause harm to our community, especially to Covenant families.”
Part One: Meet Millersville's conspiracy cop. He believes the completely bogus QAnon conspiracy theory that falsely claimed Democrats had kept child sex slaves locked up in the basement of a pizza parlor in Washington, D.C.
He imagines sinister plots involving some of the country's most prominent political figures, including his theory — with no evidence whatsoever — that former Vice President Al Gore was involved in the disappearance and murder of 20-year-old Holly Bobo in 2011.
Taylor recently landed in Millersville as assistant police chief, promising to root out the corruption he sees there.
You can continue reading at this hyperlink.
Part Two: The controversy over Millersville's conspiracy cop, first uncovered by NewsChannel 5 Investigates, has now become the latest scandal rocking the tiny town just north of Nashville.
Now, two city commissioners want a special meeting to figure out how Shawn Taylor landed his job as the city's assistant police chief.
At the center of the controversy: Do Millersville residents want a high-ranking police official — with a gun, badge and the power to arrest people — who believes in bizarre conspiracy theories with no real evidence to back them up?
You can continue reading Part Two at this link.
Part Three: An attorney for Millersville conspiracy cop Shawn Taylor has told Millersville's city commission, whom he also represents, that they should not question the assistant police chief's bizarre theories or psychological fitness because his client Shawn Taylor could sue his other client, the city.
The attorney's advice, delivered in an email sent Thursday, responded to a request from two city commissioners for a special meeting to review Taylor's hiring following NewsChannel 5's investigation of the self-described "gypsy cop."
"Interrogating Assistant Chief Taylor about his political viewpoints or political speech will violate his First Amendment rights and thereby expose the City to significant legal liability...," wrote Bryant Kroll.
You can read more of this installment at this link.
Part Four: Anna Caudill agreed to watch the video of Shawn Taylor knowing there might be only so much she could handle.
"So we'll start this," I reassured her, "and then, when you've had enough, you just stop it."
In the podcast video uncovered by NewsChannel 5 Investigates, Taylor shared bogus conspiracy theories about Nashville's Covenant School shooting. Now the assistant police chief in Millersville, Taylor was between police jobs at the time he recorded the podcast with two other conspiracy theorists.
For Anna, the mass shooting was personal.
Among the three children and three adults killed that day was her friend, Katherine Koonce, the school's beloved headmaster who was gunned down as she tried to stop the shooter.
You can read more of Anna's story by tapping on this link.
Part Five: First, he went after Millersville’s former mayor.
Now, the town’s assistant police chief says his two critics on the city commission could be next.
Shawn Taylor, who has become known as Millersville’s conspiracy cop, made those comments as he turned to a group of far-right podcasters to defend himself against questions raised by NewsChannel 5 Investigates.
Tap this link to read from those Taylor's accused.
Part Six: Millersville officials are standing with their assistant police chief and his bizarre conspiracy theories regarding Nashville's Covenant School shooting.
City Commissioner David Gregory urged his fellow commissioners to demand that Shawn Taylor apologize for a 2023 podcast in which he had questioned the official story. Taylor falsely claimed that video released by police was actually staged.
But the three-member majority ignored Gregory's plea, just as they have refused a recent request by Gregory and Commissioner Cristina Templet for a special meeting of the city commission to discuss Taylor's hiring.
Read how this meeting played out at this link.
Part Seven: Bryant Kroll wears a lot of hats.
He's the attorney representing the embattled City of Millersville. He also represents Mayor Tommy Long, who faces accusations of misconduct in an ouster suit. Plus, he's the personal attorney for Police Chief Bryan Morris and Assistant Police Chief Shawn Taylor, representing them in a lawsuit against the City of Ridgetop.
To understand the role he plays, you can read that here.
Part Eight: In Shawn Taylor's world — in the immortal words of Taylor Swift — "I'm the problem, it's me."
Not his bizarre conspiracy theories — with no evidence — imagining some of the most prominent people in the country are engaged in child sex trafficking.
I explain how we got here in this piece, which you can click on here.
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