Ex-police officer to face trial in fatal Louisville shooting
A federal trial is set to begin Monday for a former Louisville police detective charged with violating the civil rights of Breonna Taylor and others during a 2020 apartment raid that left Taylor fatally shot.
Prosecutors say former Louisville Metro Police Department detective Brett Hankison violated the civil rights of Taylor, her boyfriend, and several neighbors when he and other officers attempted to execute a search warrant on Taylor’s apartment on March 13, 2020, as part of a drug investigation.
Authorities in Louisville say Hankison fired five gunshots through a bedroom window and another five shots through a sliding-glass door. Investigators determined that the fatal shot that killed Taylor was probably fired by another detective,
Myles Cosgrove.
Cosgrove and John Mattingly, another former officer who also fired shots that struck Taylor, have not been charged in the case. Cosgrove was fired from the police department for his role in the raid; Mattingly retired in 2021.
Hankison was charged with federal civil rights violations because he used excessive force without legal cause, prosecutors said, putting Taylor, an emergency room technician, her boyfriend, and neighbors in jeopardy. Hankison was the only officer who faced state charges in connection with the raid, and he was acquitted on all three counts of felony wanton endangerment last year.
The Justice Department, after a two-year civil investigation into the Louisville police department, announced in March that officers had engaged in systemic civil rights abuses and excessiveforce misconduct in the years leading to Taylor’s death.