Woman Charged in Boyfriend’s Killing Says it Was an Accident: Police

he was the father of her children and the man she claimed to love now he's dead and she's behind bars accused of taking his life she allegedly said it was an accident but many on social media are not buying it now the search for the truth begins I'll walk you through what happened for Law and crime news I'm Kennedy Walker it's a story that's left a community searching for answers a young father shot and killed and the woman who allegedly pulled the trigger his girlfriend Hannah Cobb but questions are swirling on social media like what

really happened to Telvin Osborne that night why did police wait to arrest his girlfriend and if this was not an accident why is Hannah Cobb not facing a harsher charge according to police in the early hours of Sunday February 23rd 25-year-old Hannah cob shot and killed Telvin in the master bedroom of their home a home which they shared with their two two children it's just very tragic that that he has lost his life in this manner in a news conference obtained by wjbf news Burke County Sheriff Alfonso Williams said the shooting happened after a night

of drinking and an argument that turned physical but how did the gun come into play well according to an incident report obtained by law and crime Cobb allegedly told police that sometime after they returned home she was checking her firearm something she claimed the couple did together every night but get this despite the incident report clearly stating that Cobb allegedly said she was cleaning her gun when it fired Sheriff Williams says his office never received any information to support that important for us to clarify that at no point during the investigation U was there any

information about uh a person cleaning a weapon however Sheriff Williams made it clear this tragedy is not being ruled an accident it's crucial to note that the investigation has not been classified has not been classified as accidental but if this wasn't an accident then why isn't Cobb charged with a harsher crime like murder and why was she not arrested on the spot the delay sparked outrage from the victim's family and the community joining us now is legal expert Joe Tamborino Joe thank you so much for joining me today thank you for having me on so

given the details of this case including the alleged argument and the firearm discharge why do you think Hanah cob has been charged with involuntary manslaughter and not something more severe like murder well under Georgia law involuntary manslaughter is basically culpable negligence and that's very similar to many state laws and what that means is that what you were doing you were doing in an extremely negligent Manner and you were actually committing an underlying crime so in this case what the argument is is that she was operating a firearm or doing something with the firearm while she

was intoxicated and she discharged it and obviously it killed Mr Osborne so that's why this crime fits for right now now that doesn't mean she won't be charged with others in the future prosecutors based on new evidence can charge whatever they want as long as the evidence fits it so right now this is the charge but we don't know what it will be in the future yeah and I you know I think you touched on my next question just trying to figure out what could the like exact elements be that the prosecution may have considered

to charge her with that involuntary manslaughter well the elements would be this basically that she was under the influence of alcohol presumably that she was using her firearm in a reckless manner say that's a misdemeanor type crime and as a result of that she killed someone because it went off so even though she didn't mean for the gun to be fired since she did it in a reckless manner a couple negligence type of way she could be guilty of that crime and it's up to 10 years in prison now if all of a sudden more

evidence comes out like say you know more evidence comes out about an argument something like that could possibly the prosecutor go to a voluntary manslaughter which is more like a heat of passion type situation sure they could do that so just because you start out with one charge does not necessarily mean that that's the only charge from now till trial and the incident report obtained by law and crime suggests that Cobb said the gun discharged accidentally while she was checking it claiming that they did this every night do statements like this play a significant role

in determining charges in these kind of cases yes they do statements like that as well as the physical evidence I am sure there's crime scen investigation and what they're going to do is try to see where the gun was when it was discharged where were her hands when it was discharged was The Gun Say lying on her lap when it was discharged or was it pointed at Point Blank Range against Mr Osborne so many factors are going to go into that they will also examine Mr Osborne's body was there any type of stippling or evidence

on the skin or clothing which would show that the firearm was very close to him or did none of that exist and perhaps he was 20t away which would inure more toward the argument that it wasn't accidental discharge all of these factors are going to be highly relevant now according to reports it does appear that Miss cob was trying to administer first aid does that help her case yes what happens after an incident is just as important as what happened during the incident because if all of a sudden you accidentally say uh shoot someone or

injure someone if you run from the scene well that's like a consciousness of guilt if you act in some callous way and you don't render any assistance perhaps you don't even call 911 right away again that could show an indifference to the harm that was done to the victim however if upon discovering that you actually hurt this person and possibly killed him and you immediately provide assistance yes that's relevant to what's called State of Mind of the defendant or the suspect now we already mentioned about you know what the incident report said that Miss Cobb

allegedly said about her allegedly uh trying to clean her gun something that the couple allegedly did every single night together but the sheriff held a news conference this week mentioning that there was no information suggesting cob was cleaning the weapon despite again that incident report how significant is that discrepancy very significant on a couple of respects number one is you have to be careful when you're a law enforcement agency that before you go out in front of the press before you start taking questions you got to get your story right you got to make sure

that you have the reports you you have anything surrounding the incident as much information as you can and then you could go out and answer some questions so so you got to make sure that happens number two is you have to question well where was this incident report if you have a representative from the law enforcement agency saying here's what I know about the case but he doesn't know about the incident report where was it it questions who generated that report where did it go why wasn't it given to the higher ups in the agency

and so on now in cases like this where there's a claim of an accidental shooting how difficult is it to prove intent in a court of law well that's going to come back to a few things number one first of all is the physical evidence like what we discussed how exactly was Mr Osborne shot where was he was he approximate to where the gun was is there any type of physical evidence like stippling anything on him like that where was the gun when M Cobb had it was it actually held in her hand was it

on her lap was it on a table were there other instruments around the gun such as cleaning instruments were they being deployed at the time of the shooting all of the physical evidence then you go to the next level the next level is what were the statements what were her statements what was said on 91 one there's going to be a lot of information surrounding that and then you get to the next level after that was it with which is the surrounding circumstances in many situations like this you're going to have search warrants being executed

on all sorts of accounts meaning cell phone devices social media emails uh the history of what a person Googled all of these things you're going to try to get as much information about this couple's history were they always arguing was there any type of domestic abuse in the past were there any restraining orders what did this couple say individually to their friends or to their family what did they say to each other what were the texts between each other so that's how you go through physical evidence the statements and all of the surrounding circumstances and

clearly more evidence can come out you know as this story unfolds but in that same news conference this week the sheriff did mention that there seemed to be no history or no prior domestic violence in their relationship how does the lack of Prior domestic violence reports between the couple impact how the case is being viewed legally well it will certainly impact the charges because if there's some long history of domestic violence like say Miss Cobb and we're just saying hypothetical say she was arrested in the in the past or there were restraining orders against her

for committing domestic violence on Mr Osborne clearly relevant in a situation like that but if there were no reports of domestic violence no restraining orders nothing of the sort well then obviously it would help Miss cob the defendant because it would show that there was no animosity between the two she held no grudges against him and if there was an argument perhaps it was just a typical argument that couples have and with the delay in Cobb's arrest in the family's public outrage how does public perception affect the legal process well in today's world it affects

it a lot and there are two reasons for that one is social media there's no doubt about that uh people go on their social media and start saying all sorts of things without knowing the full story and the second is what's going to happen in court because Georgia has cameras in the courtroom so that means that you know what the public reads about what social media says about it will be impacted by what we see in the courtroom so yes um you know it's unfortunate in many situations but you know the Public's perception of the

case does matter and does the fact that the couple had two children together does that matter at all Yes um anything surrounding their familial life anything surrounding what they did as a family how they interacted uh the ties that they had to each other in the community and clearly when you have children your ties as a married couple or a cohabitating couple are stronger because you have living human beings that you have uh brought into this world so all of that is relevant in this type of a situation and lastly do you think there's a

chance that the charge could be upgraded to anything later on whether that be murder whether that be voluntary do you think that's possible and if so what would need to be proven for that to happen it is always possible in fact so many times before trial on cases involving a homicide and remember a homicide itself doesn't necessarily mean a crime was committed I mean for instance you can have a homicide where it's pure accident there are no criminal charges at all a homicide just means a human being cause the death of another human being but

depending upon what comes out of any case involving the death of a human being sure you might have you know charges that happen in the F in the future a greater manslaughter charge perhaps an intentional murder charge things along those lines so it's always possible and in many cases it happens great well this is definitely something that we will be following closely thank you so much Joe for coming on today thank you this story has made its rounds on social media and the community and many people are focusing and commenting on the racial dynamics of

the couple and the alleged crime the delay and the arrest has already sparked significant outrage but the racial elements of the case can raise broader questions about how racial tensions can influence both public perception and the legal process joining me to talk more about this is civil rights and criminal defense attorney Tyler Bailey Tyler thank you so much for joining me today of course so to start can you give us your perspective on the racial Dynamics at play in a case like this where a white woman is involved in the shooting death of an unarmed

black man and how does this affect the Public's perception of this case well you know you look at this case and you immediately see racial Dynamics you see a young black man who's in a relationship with a Caucasian woman who's killed there's no witnesses to the crime and automatically the thing that stands out first is she was not immediately arrested and then they conduct this investigation it seems that she's given somewhat of a slap on the wris charge of involuntary manslaughter and I'm pretty sure we get into the legal dynamics of the case later on

but this is a situation where it seems that law enforcement with no Witnesses immediately believe the white woman when a black man is dead and you know doing the work that I do civil rights and criminal defense most of the time people don't believe our stories when they're told initially we don't get that benefit of Doubt so immediately the public perception is seeing that a white woman is immediately believed when she a black man is dead and there needs to be some accountability yeah and given the fact that this incident has already gone viral what

role do you think social media and public opinion play in shaping the course of legal proceedings especially in cases involving racial tension well Lady Justice has a blindfold and scales in her hands for a reason but that's just a statute in real life public perception public uh pressure does guide and move prosecutions it influences the head da influ influences law enforcement on how they should you know approach this case and although they should just look at the fact and make the best decision based off the information is in front of them public pressure definitely weighs

on people's hearts and Minds it does affect how um prosecutions go about and I think public perception and public pressure already result in her being criminally charged because initially um they ruled the death as accidental and so they're saying they're still investigating it maybe there'll be more charges I do think that voluntary voluntary manslaughter would have been a more appropriate charge and we'll see what happens yeah the sheriff did um hold a press conference this week and then he made it clear that this was not accidental so we'll see how things move forward from there

but again the sheriff also mentioned that there were no prior reports of domestic incidents between the couple how does that fact or lack thereof complicate or shape the Public's understanding of this case in the context of race I think the public is is rightfully confused here because they're hearing facts as far as this shooting not being accidental and they're really looking at the term involuntary involuntary manslaughter when they think it should be murder in Georgia there's really only one murder statue which is murder and then you have two manslaughter statutes which is involuntary manslaughter and

voluntary manslaughter and just because it um wasn't accidental they're saying that she acted recklessly and cleaning her gun allegedly when um this gentleman was killed more I think really the racial Dynamics in the facts of the case you hear that he comes home around 5 something in the morning after a long night of drinking they both may have been drinking I believe and there was an argument that ensued and so you logically think that she was upset for whatever reason he was out all night drinking coming back late and she got her gun and she

killed him now that do sound accidental to me if anything at the minimum sounds like she acted rationally in a heat of passion and shot him which would have really led to a more appropriate charge of voluntary manslaughter versus involuntary manaugh Slaughter which would have been her acting recklessly cleaning a firearm it was on safety and killing him in a reckless manner in your experience how does the presence of racial tension in high-profile cases like this one create additional challenges for law enforcement prosecutors and defense attorneys it really just weighs on them you know they

they watch the news they have parents they have friends they have social media like everybody else but you know once you get past the immediate hoop law the media Tik Tok Facebook YouTube and everything and in between you have to get to the nitty-gritty of the case most cases are not tried immediately after a a murder or investigation it may be a year or so before this case goes to trial and the lawyers involved with it will try to uh well at least the prosecutor will try to say look at the facts of this case

he'll try to eliminate jurors who may be racially motivated one way or the other and the defense will try to probably use that to uh also help his client's case out saying that this woman is being prosecuted for racial tensions that are irrelevant to this case this was a situation where she accidentally shot him he'll probably argue that she should have never even been charged with uh involuntary manslaughter so the racial Dynamics really affect everybody during the investigation and throughout the you know the pre-trial phase of the case but during the trial of it is

used sometimes to inflame jur jurors who are s sitting there and also to raise the just the profile the case in general and you've been doing this for a long time you've seen a lot of cases you know similar cases where the racial background of the parties involved led to public outcry and led to calls for a different legal response what can we learn from those situations that might apply here every case is different and so things es and flow so if you think about the summer of 2020 when you had George Floyd you had

Amar auy he had all those cases and it was really a heightened public awareness to uh you know unfor unfortunate racial Injustice and racial tensions we've kind of moved somewhat away from the big public cases where that has happened and this is a different situation this is a domestic situation where really the only um true sense of racial tension is from the public from what we're seeing the public who thinks that this investigation should have been handled differently there's been no evidence that I have seen yet showing that the accused had any racial animus in

her heart and mind when this happen but we'll see what where things go um you know and then ultimately when they get in that courtroom you know J judges do give good instructions telling the jurors that they should listen to the facts of this case that he will make decisions regarding the law and nothing outside of the facts case should guide your decision making when making a decision whether a person is innocent or they should be guilty or what they're accused of so racial tensions do affect everybody else around the case they affect things and

they do weigh on everybody who's involved but ultimately you know it's the facts of the case that really stand in every single prosecution and every single defense what role do civil rights lawyers play in ensuring Justice is served in such Charge cases public pressure does work and ultimately the uh defense attorneys um District Attorneys these are people uh as far as the prosecution side who are elected the district attorney is elected by the people so that's something they want to make sure it's fair they don't want a segment of the population feeling like the justice

system is not equal for them so generally most District Attorneys do take you know what the public thinks seriously and civil rights lawyers a lot of times even if they're not involved in the actual Criminal part of the case they do raise the public awareness about injustices they do often times talk to decision makers whether that's the elected district attorney whether that's the assigned prosecutor of the case or whether that's other local appointed and elected officials about a Justice that needs to be addressed on the political front now every case is like I said handled

on its merits and ultimately what you what we want to see is a fair judicial system and we want a jury that's impartial to make a decision based off the facts of the law and a lot of times the civil rights lawyers just really want to pressure uh I guess the system to recognize that to make sure Justice at least has his fair shot of being hurt and you know if we just take it a step back for a moment I know that a lot of the public outcry has been you know what the suspect

has been charged with you know why did it take so long for her to get charged in the first place in your opinion dealing with cases like this is this how it usually goes when there is a domestic situation like this that the person does get charged with involuntary manslaughter every case is different but you know the law enforcement Personnel that signed who responds to a a murder or a death usually does take their time to do a thorough investigation and my understanding is this happened on the Sunday and she was arrested on the Monday

so she was not immediately arrested in charged there were no witnesses to this crime that we know of yet we don't know if the children saw it uh there's no video evidence so they do need to be careful before you put somebody's life and Liberty at at risk you don't want to arrest somebody and then have to dismiss the case later on if it comes back unsubstantiated so law enforcement does need time to do an investigation this would be a different story there was a video there was Witnesses who said it happened differently there was

no video there were no Witnesses and she wasn't ultimately arrested in charge um they did say initially seem to be accidental but they did move forward charges this was not a situation when there was three weeks or a month worth of protest to see that she was charged there has been some public outcry that seems to be wondering why she wasn't charged immediately and just looking at the facts of seeing what she was charged with I don't think the biggest public outcry is that there needed to be a you know public demonstration of protesters in

marches to get the district attorney or the sheriff's department to arrest her in charge this individual correct and you know in the press conference the sheriff did say that this is an ongoing investigation so we really don't know what can come from this but he also mentioned in that same news conference that there seem to be no prior domestic violence records you know within their relationship do you think that the lack of Prior domestic violence records could be used to downplay the seriousness of the case or do you believe it may be used to argue

for a different outcome I don't think it would be used by either I mean the sheriff department saying that to me really is irrelevant the fact of the case is that he showed up late at night after being out all night around 5: something in the morning he was drinking and somehow he ends up shot and killed so the fact of there being no domestic violence doesn't really support anything unless there was supposed to be some theory that she was defending herself against him and there was there was other incident reports of of the individual

who was killed being an abuser to the accused I don't see any record of that I think they should really look at this wondering whether she had some motivation and reason for actually shooting and killing this individual that night not whether she was defending herself because there's no facts out there that shows that he abused her most of the facts to me show that she may have had a reason to shoot him and she wasn't just cleaning her her weapon at 5 in the morning and even if she was cleaning her weapon at 5 in

the morning the question is was she you cleaning her weapon to intimidate him putting the gun out there why were you late questions like that while she's cleaning the firearm and then he ends up shot right well just reading everything it appears that they were both out together and this is from um the sheriff in that news conference they were both having you know a night out together alcohol was involved and they came home together and then this whole alleged incident uh transpired so we're definitely waiting to see you know what happens and you know

if more charges or are going to be brought against the suspect but thank you so much for joining me today thank you Sheriff Williams says the investigation is ongoing and law enforcement has received search warrants to obtain phone records for Law and crime I'm Kennedy Walker