Trial for ex-officer charged in connection with raid on Breonna Taylor’s apartment begins Wednesday

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — The only Kentucky officer facing criminal charges in the botched Breonna Taylor police raid will stand trial Wednesday.

Brett Hankison, now a former officer, is charged with shooting into Taylor’s neighbor’s apartment. No officers are facing charges connected to Taylor’s death.

Hankison’s jury was selected from a larger-than-normal pool because of the national publicity Taylor’s case has attracted. The jury pool was selected from a pool of about 250 people.

The 12 jurors and three alternates are expected to tour Taylor’s apartment and hear testimony from Hankison during the trial.

Taylor, a 26-year-old medical worker, was killed on March 13, 2020, during a raid on her apartment. Officers attempted to serve a narcotics warrant in connection with an investigation into an ex-boyfriend.

Taylor’s then-boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, says he did not hear police announce themselves and says he fired a “warning shot” toward the front door, thinking the officers were intruders. Police returned fire.

Taylor was shot several times and later died. Her death, which occurred just weeks before the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, helped spark months of protests in Louisville and across the country.

Hankison is charged with three counts of wanton endangerment, a low-level felony that is punishable by a maximum of five years in prison.

A grand jury chose not to indict two other officers involved in the raid. In September 2020, Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron said two other officers, Jonathan Mattingly and Myles Cosgrove, were “justified” in using lethal force because they had been fired upon first.

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