Officers not Charged in Breonna Taylor’s Death
On Tuesday, it was revealed that a grand jury prosecuted a former police detective for endangering Breonna’s Taylor’s neighbors by shooting his gun recklessly; however the two officers who shot and killed Taylor were not charged for her murder.
Breonna Taylor was a 26-year-old emergency room technician that was shot six times on March 13 in her apartment by police. Three police officers were at her apartment implementing a search warrant for a drug raid.
According to legal experts, it was unlikely that the officers would be charged for Taylor’s murder because it was her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, who shot first and shot one of the officers in the leg. Taylor’s boyfriend mistook the officers as intruders since they entered the premises without announcing their presence. However, the officers were issued a no-knock warrant, giving them the right to enter the apartment without prior notification.
Brett Hankison was fired for shooting into the sliding glass patio door and window of Taylor’s apartment that were covered with blinds. This was in violation of his department’s policy since he did not have a line of sight.
The top prosecutor said that Jonathan Mattingly and Myles Cosgrove, the other two officers, had been “justified to protect themselves and the justification bars us from pursuing criminal charges.”
Louisville city officials agreed that Taylor’s family would receive a 12 million dollar settlement after the family filed a wrongful death lawsuit in April against the city. Since the announcement from the grand jury, a state of emergency has been declared in Louisville and the National Guard has been installed.
Mayor Greg Fischer issued a curfew from 9 p.m. to 6:30 a.m. through the week. Despite the curfew, protests continued on the streets of Louisville and led to two officers shot on Wednesday night without any life-threatening injuries.