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Topics: US News, Police, Crime, Gun Crime, Breonna Taylor
Niamh Spence
Topics: US News, Police, Crime, Gun Crime, Breonna Taylor
A Judge has dropped charges against the former police officers who shot Breonna Taylor dead in her home, instead ruling that her boyfriend's actions resulted in her tragic death.
Breonna, a 26-year-old Black medical worker, was shot and killed by officers who had knocked down her door while executing a search warrant on March 13, 2020.
Her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, fired a shot that hit one of the officers as they came through the door and they returned fire, striking Breonna multiple times.
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Court documents in 2020 detailing her death revealed she was left lying on the floor for up to six minutes after the fatal shooting without receiving any aid.
Federal charges made by the US Justice Department against former police officers Joshua Jaynes, Brett Hankison and Kelly Goodlett, along with Sergeant Kyle Meany were announced by US attorney general Merrick Garland earlier this month.
Charges for falsifying a search warrant have now been dismissed, which sees the charges against Jaynes and Meany reduced from potential life imprisonment to misdemeanors.
Officers Hankison and Goodlett are still facing multiple charges, but for Jaynes and Meany, there are less due to them not being present at the raid and fatal shooting.
Hankison was dismissed from the Louisville Metro Police Department in 2020, and was acquitted by a jury of state charges of wanton endangerment earlier this year in Louisville.
Jaynes applied for the warrant to search Breonna’s house. He was fired in January 2021 by former Louisville Police interim chief Yvette Gentry for violating department standards in the preparation of a search warrant execution and for being 'untruthful' in the Taylor warrant.
Despite the false warrant, he's not been found as the cause of Taylor's death.
US District Judge Charles Simpson has ruled that Breonna's death was instead caused by the actions of her boyfriend.
In his ruling, Judge Simpson said 'there is no direct link between the warrantless entry and Breonna's death'.
However, he did not dismiss a conspiracy charge against Jaynes and another charge against Meany, who is accused of making false statements to investigators.
In his ruling, he laid the blame for Breonna's death over her boyfriend's actions, saying Walker's 'conduct became the proximate, or legal, cause of Breonna's death'.
He added: "While the indictment alleges that Jaynes and Meany set off a series of events that ended in Taylor's death, it also alleges that (Walker) disrupted those events when he decided to open fire."
The ruling by Judge Simpson comes after US attorney general Merrick Garland brought charges against the officers.
He said federal officials 'share but cannot fully imagine the grief' felt by Ms Taylor’s family as he added: "Breonna Taylor should be alive today."
In 2022, the city of Louisville agreed to pay $2 million to settle lawsuits filed by Kenneth Walker in federal and state court.