Ex-cop cleared in Breonna Taylor death, indicted for shooting into neighbor’s apartment
A Kentucky grand jury has cleared current and former police officers in the shooting death of Breonna Taylor — indicting one ex-cop for “wantonly” firing shots into another apartment the night she died.
The 12 jurors returned three counts of wanton endangerment in the first degree against Brett Hankison for shooting his gun into an apartment next to Taylor’s. Occupants of that residence were identified by their initials in charges — and none of them were “BT.”
None of the other officers involved in the raid were indicted.
According to Kentucky penal code, “a person is guilty of wanton endangerment in the first degree when, under circumstances manifesting extreme indifference to the value of human life, he wantonly engages in conduct which creates a substantial danger of death or serious physical injury to another person.”
The charge, a class D felony, carries up to five years in prison and an up to $10,000 fine.
Circuit Judge Annie O’Connell issued a warrant for Hankison’s arrest and set bond at $15,000 full cash.
The grand jury — tasked with determining whether there is enough evidence to bring criminal charges — also weighed four degrees of homicide, ranging from reckless homicide to murder. It also could have voted to not indict Hankison at all.
Protesters gathered in Jefferson Square ahead of the highly anticipated announcement, with some crying after the charges were read. About 15 minutes after the decision, a woman could be heard screaming while trash cans were set on fire.
Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron held a lengthy press conference afterward, saying Taylor was struck by six bullets — including one fatal round that came from Officer Myles Cosgrove’s gun.
Taylor, a 26-year-old EMT, was sleeping in her apartment on March 13 when cops — including Sgt. Jonathan Mattingly and officers Cosgrove and Hankison — burst in and opened fire, exchanging gunfire with Taylor’s boyfriend, Kenneth Walker.
Cameron said because Walker fired first, Cosgrove and Mattingly were “justified in their use of force after having been fired upon.”
Legal experts were dubious that the grand jury would return murder indictments — because Walker shot first, believing that the cops were intruders.
The police barrage killed Taylor, and Walker, who had a licensed gun, later told investigators he did not realize the intruders were cops.
Taylor’s death outraged local activists, but didn’t gain wider attention until early May, when her family filed a wrongful-death lawsuit.
After the police-custody death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25, Taylor’s case became a major rallying cry for worldwide Black Lives Matter protests denouncing racial inequality and police brutality.
The outcry from her death prompted Cameron, a black Republican, to convene a grand jury to hear evidence in the case earlier this month — with the panel meeting at an undisclosed location for security reasons.
Potential backlash from the grand jury’s decision prompted city officials to take security precautions this week.
Workers boarded up the windows of Louisville’s federal courthouse while a judge signed an order closing down the historic Gene Snyder US Courthouse and Custom House downtown as the city braced for unrest.
On Monday, the Louisville Metro Police Department declared a state of emergency, canceling time off and vacation time for all department personnel “until further notice” in the event the grand jury decision sparked a new round of riots.
“To ensure we have the appropriate level of staffing to provide for public safety services and our policing functions, effective immediately the LMPD will operate under the emergency staffing and reporting guidelines,” Acting Police Chief Robert Schroeder said in a memo.
On Tuesday, police also announced traffic restrictions and street closures in downtown Louisville.
The officers who conducted the botched raid were searching for drugs, but no drugs were found in the apartment.
Hankison, who squeezed off 10 shots, was fired in June by Schroeder, who accused him of “wantonly and blindly” firing into Taylor’s apartment.
“Your actions displayed an extreme indifference to the value of human life,” Schroeder wrote in his termination letter to Hankison.
Earlier this month, Taylor’s family settled their wrongful-death lawsuit for $12 million.