Police in Louisville, Kentucky, did many questionable things before, during and after the March 2020 drug raid that delicate Breonna Taylor, 26-year-old EMT and aspiring nurse. Their errors included a misleading and legally deficient statement. search warrant affidavit; a reckless man, midnight breaking and entering That led to a deadly confrontation; and a conspiracy to cover up the misrepresentations that preceded the raid. But the most disconcerting aspect of the incident was Detective Brett Hankison’s decision to shoot blind 10 shots were fired from outside Taylor’s apartment through a bedroom window and a sliding glass door that was covered by blinds and curtains.

On Friday, after deliberating for more than 20 hours over three days, a federal jury in Louisville convicted Hankison of intentionally violating Taylor’s Fourth Amendment rights under color of law by firing five bullets through the bedroom window. Although none of the bullets hit Taylor, federal prosecutors argued that Hankison endangered her life by unlawfully using deadly force.

because he carry “involved the use of a dangerous weapon and an attempt to kill,” Hankison faces a maximum sentence of life in prison. The jury acquitted him of a second charge under the same statute, alleging that he violated the constitutional rights of Taylor’s neighbors, who were endangered by bullets that penetrated his apartment.

Hankison, who was dismissed from his job at the Louisville Metro Police Department in June 2020, he is the only officer directly involved in the raid who has been convicted of a crime. In March 2022, a state jury paid charged him with wanton endangerment, a charge based on the same use of force. Hankison was accused on federal civil rights charges five months later. Last year, his first prosecution on those charges ended with a mistrial after jurors failed to reach a verdict.

During his second federal trial, Hankison again testified who was trying to help two fellow officers inside Taylor’s apartment, Sgt. Jonathan Mattingly and Detective Myles Cosgrove, thinking they were under sustained fire. This is what was really happening, as described in a Department of Justice report. Press release on Hankison’s conviction:

During the execution of the warrant at Taylor’s home, officers knocked on Taylor’s door and announced themselves as police officers at approximately 12:45 a.m. No one answered the door and officers saw no indication that anyone was in the home. awake or I would have heard his announcement. . Police then opened the door and Taylor’s boyfriend, believing intruders were breaking in, fired his gun once at the officers, two of whom returned fire, striking and killing Taylor.

Taylor’s boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, has consistently said that he did not hear any announcements and had no idea that the intruders who had broken into the apartment were police officers. He was initially charged with attempted murder of a police officer, but prosecutors abandonment that charge two months later, implicitly admitting that Walker had a strong claim of self-defense. The bullet he fired hit Mattingly in the leg. In response, Mattingly and Cosgrove fired a total of 22 rounds down a dark hallway, where Taylor, who was unarmed, was near Walker.

Hankison, who could not see what was happening because he had moved from the door to the side of the apartment, testified that he mistook the hail of bullets from his colleagues for shots from a semi-automatic rifle. “I saw those windows and doors light up,” he said. saying. “It sounded like there was a strobe light there… In my mind, they’re shooting an AR-15, and it sounds like it’s getting closer and making more noise.” He added that “it sounded like a semi-automatic rifle making its way down the hallway and executing everyone.”

Still, Hankison’s response is difficult to understand, since he had no way of knowing who might be hit by his bullets. The Associated Press grades that “several witnesses, including the Louisville police chief,” testified that Hankison “violated Louisville police policy requiring officers to identify a target before shooting.”

However, defense attorney Don Malarcik insisted that Hankison had done nothing wrong. “He did exactly what he was supposed to do,” Malarcik. said the jurors during their final argument. “I was acting to save lives.”

Not so, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Songer. Hankison “violated one of the most fundamental rules of deadly force,” Songer said the jury “If they can’t see the person they’re shooting at, they can’t pull the trigger.”

According to Yvette Gentry, Louisville’s former interim police chief, Cosgrove, who fired 16 bullets into the apartment, including the one that killed Taylor, did something similar. Gentry canned Cosgrove in December 2020, saying he had fired “in three clearly different directions,” indicating that he “did not identify a target” and instead “fired in a manner consistent with suppressive fire, which is in direct contradiction to our training, values ​​and policy.”

Like Hankison, Cosgrove said he mistook the police gunshots (Mattingly’s) for incoming bullets. He said According to investigators, he was “overwhelmed by bright flashes and darkness,” leading him to believe that “these gunshots are still occurring because of those bright lights.” Cosgrove, who later job found as a deputy sheriff in Carroll County, Kentucky, suggested he fired his gun without thinking. “I just felt like I had shot it,” he said. “It’s kind of surreal. If you told me I didn’t do something at that moment, I’d believe you. If you told me I did do something, I’d probably believe you too.”

However, an investigation by Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron concluded that both Cosgrove and Mattingly had fired in self-defense, meaning criminal charges were not warranted. The fact that Walker also appears to have fired in self-defense underlines the imprudence of the “dynamic entry” tactics the police reflexively used in this case.

Taylor’s death inspired extensive local protests and became a leading display of the Black Lives Matter movement, along with the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis two months later. In September 2020, the city of Louisville agreed to a $12 million deal of a lawsuit filed by Taylor’s family. But except for Hankison’s botched prosecution, the raid did not result in any state charges.

The Department of Justice, on the other hand, obtained accusations against Hankison and three other current or former Louisville officers connected to the raid: former Detective Joshua Jaynes, who filed the search warrant affidavit; Sergeant. Kyle Meany, who approved it; and Detective Kelly Goodlett, who allegedly “conspired with Jaynes to falsify the search warrant for Taylor’s home and cover up his subsequent actions.”

jaynes sworn declarationthat linked Taylor to an ex-boyfriend’s drug trafficking based on little more than guilt by association, “contained false and misleading statements, omitted material facts, was based on outdated information, and was not supported by probable cause,” the department said of Justice. says. Jaynes, like Hankison, is accused of willfully violating Taylor’s Fourth Amendment rights. The former detective, who was dismissed in December 2020 for lying in his affidavit, he is also accused of falsifying records in a federal investigation and with conspiracy for “arranging with another detective to cover up the false affidavit after Taylor’s death by drafting a false investigative letter and making false statements to criminal investigators.”

Meany faces the same civil rights charge. He is also accused of making a false statement to federal investigators by claiming that police requested a no-contact search warrant for Taylor’s apartment because the police department’s SWAT unit had requested it.

Goodlett, the detective who allegedly conspired with Jaynes, pleaded guilty in August 2022, a few weeks after his indictment. Jaynes and Meany have not yet been tried. Last August, a federal judge dismissed increased the civil rights charges against them, rejecting the claim that their alleged misconduct “involved the use of a dangerous weapon” or “resulted in Taylor’s death.” Jaynes and Meany were accused again in light of that ruling last month.

“Brett Hankison was found guilty by a jury of his peers of intentionally depriving Breonna Taylor of her constitutional rights,” Attorney General Merrick B. Garland saying on Friday. “His use of deadly force was unlawful and put Ms. Taylor in danger.” While “this verdict is an important step toward accountability for the violation of Breonna Taylor’s civil rights,” Garland added, “doing justice for Ms. Taylor’s loss is a task beyond human capacity.”