Ex-officer who fired into Black woman’s apartment on trial again

LOUISVILLE, KY. >> A former Louisville police officer who fired into Breonna Taylor’s apartment the night she was killed is going on trial in federal court this week for violating Taylor’s civil rights during the botched 2020 raid.

The trial will mark a second attempt by prosecutors to convict Brett Hankison for his actions on the night Taylor, a 26-year-old Black woman, was shot to death by police after they knocked down the door of her apartment. Hankison was acquitted in a state trial last year.

Jury selection lasted all day Monday and will continue this morning. Lawyers are working to select 16 from a pool of about 50 potential jurors.

Taylor was shot to death by officers who were executing a drug search warrant, which was later found to be flawed. Taylor’s boyfriend fired a single shot that hit one of the officers as they came through the door, and officers returned fire, striking Taylor in her hallway multiple times. The other 32 bullets fired in the raid came from police, investigators determined.

When gunfire erupted, Hankison ran to the side of the apartment and sprayed bullets through Taylor’s windows, later saying he thought he saw a figure with a rifle. None of the rounds he fired hit anyone, despite straying into another apartment where a couple with a child lived. Officers found no drugs or long guns in Taylor’s apartment.

Hankison is one of four officers who were charged by the U.S. Department of Justice last year with violating Taylor’s civil rights. The two counts of civil rights violations against him carry a maximum penalty of life in prison if he is convicted.

Taylor’s killing along with George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minnesota police in 2020 ignited protests that summer around the country over racial injustice and police brutality. U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland announced the federal indictments in the Taylor case in August 2022, remarking that Taylor “should be alive today.”

Hankison