Tennessee man dies in Nashville prison after being charged in wife's death, awaiting trial
A man awaiting trial after the 2021 shooting death of his estranged wife, killed minutes after police said they could not arrest him on a protection order violation, has died in a Nashville prison.
James Leggett, 29, died on July 4 at Riverbend Maximum Security Insitution, Tennessee Department of Corrections spokesperson Dorinda Carter said by email Tuesday.
"His cause of death is pending official determination by the medical examiner," she said.
Leggett faced a host of charges after Michaela Carter, 24, was killed in November 2021. At the time of the shooting, Leggett was on a 10-year suspended sentence with probation for a robbery conviction. Upon his arrest in the Carter case, he was transferred to prison to serve the remainder of the suspended sentence.
Carter first took out a protection order against Leggett after a July 2021 incident in which she said she was attacked with a glass liquor bottle. Leggett was charged with aggravated assault. The charges were dismissed less than two weeks later, but a judge granted Carter's protection from abuse petition.
In November 2022, Leggett began calling Carter repeatedly and sent her text messages from an unknown number, things he was barred from while under the protection order, court documents show. Carter, who was with her mother, pulled over and called police, later showing them evidence of his attempts to contact her, documents show.
Police told her they were not able to verify there was a violation of the order, but told Carter to swear out a warrant and escorted the two women home. Minutes after the officers left, Leggett showed up to the apartment, kicked down the door and shot Carter twice and her stepfather three times, according to court records.
Carter died a week later.
The inaction by the police sparked a lawsuit, filed by Carter's mother Kimberly Jones-Mbuyi. In February, that lawsuit settled for $250,000 and the Metro Nashville Police Department made two changes to its domestic violence policy as a result.
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Man accused of killing wife, awaiting trial, dies in Nashville prison
