TAMPA — Cortnee Brantley has served her time for a federal charge related to a 2010 shooting that killed two Tampa police officers, but her legal troubles aren't over.
Brantley, 28, was released from a halfway house Monday after serving 10 months of a yearlong federal prison sentence for her conduct following the deaths of police officers Jeffrey Kocab and David Curtis by her ex-boyfriend, Dontae Morris.
Brantley was released from a halfway house overseen by the federal Bureau of Prisons' Orlando Residential Reentry Management Office, according to a bureau spokesman. The location of the halfway house was not released.
On Wednesday, Brantley is scheduled to be arraigned in Hillsborough Circuit Court on two charges — one of them a felony — stemming from a domestic dispute last January. She was arrested on the charges Jan. 2, days before she was to turn herself in to begin her federal sentence.
"Once she was released from federal custody, she could appear for these charges in state court," said Mark Cox, a spokesman for the Hillsborough State Attorney's Office.
According to Hillsborough County sheriff's deputies, Brantley and Leandra E. Echevarria were driving about 5:30 a.m. when they started fighting. Echevarria, then 25, told the Tampa Bay Times then that Brantley, a friend she met about two years ago, wanted to go home with her from the New Year's party, but Echevarria said no. Brantley got angry and tried to grab the steering wheel from Echevarria, who pulled into a parking lot on U.S. 301 S.
Echevarria got out of the car, followed by Brantley, who punched her in the head and yanked off a necklace, deputies said. Brantley then threw concrete blocks at Echevarria's Chrysler Crossfire, causing about $3,000 in damage, deputies said. They described a personal relationship between the two, which Echevarria denied.
Brantley was charged with domestic violence battery, a misdemeanor, and criminal mischief resulting in damage of $1,000 or more, a third degree felony punishable by up to five years in state prison.
Court records show Brantley is being represented by the Hillsborough Public Defender's Office. A message left at the office Monday was not immediately returned.
Brantley was driving Morris in her car in June 2010 when, during a traffic stop over a missing tag, he shot Kocab and Curtis. Morris ran from the scene and Brantley, 22 at the time, drove away. Police were not satisfied with her cooperation after the shooting, and the pair exchanged text messages and talked on the phone following the murders, including about where to hide Brantley's car.
A jury convicted her in 2013 of misprision of a felony, a seldom-prosecuted federal crime, finding that Brantley did not tell police Morris was in possession of a gun as felon. She remained free until she lost an appeal in fall 2015.
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Explore all your optionsMorris is on death row for killing Kocab, Curtis and another man.
Contact Tony Marrero at tmarrero@tampabay.com or (813) 226-3374. Follow @tmarrerotimes.