Key points
- A mistrial has been declared in the trial of former Louisville police detective, Brett Hankinson.
- The mistrial is the result of a deadlocked jury.
- Hankinson was charged with using excessive force and faced a maximum sentence of life in prison.
A mistrial has been declared in the trial of a former Louisville police officer who was charged over the raid that killed 26-year-old nursing student Breonna Taylor.
Brett Hankison, 47, was charged with using excessive force that violated the rights of Taylor, her boyfriend and her next-door neighbours.
During a flawed drug warrant search on March 13 2020, Hankison fired 10 shots into Taylor’s sliding glass door and window after officers came under fire. Some of his shots flew into a neighbouring apartment but didn’t injure anyone.
Hankinson and two other policemen had forced their way into Taylor’s apartment with a so-called "no knock" warrant. However, Harkinson was the only police officer to face charges.
At an impasse
On Thursday afternoon, jurors told US District Judge Rebecca Grady Jennings, who presided over the trial, they were at an impasse. She told them to keep trying, and they returned to deliberations.
Later that afternoon, jurors then told the judge they were deadlocked on both counts against Hankison, and could not come to a decision — prompting Jennings to declare a mistrial.
Lonita Baker, an attorney for Taylor's family, said afterwards that Taylor's mother, Tamika Palmer, was disappointed with the outcome but remained encouraged "because a mistrial is not an acquittal. And so we live another day to fight for justice for Breonna".
This isn’t the first time Hankinson has appeared in court. Last year, he was acquitted by a Kentucky jury on wanton endangerment charges. Months later, the US Department of Justice brought the new charges against Hankison, along with separate charges against other officers involved.
When the charges were announced in August 2022, US Attorney General Merrick Garland said Taylor "should be alive today". The charges that Hankison faced carried a maximum sentence of life in prison.
The prosecution argued Hankison couldn't see a target and knew firing blindly into the building was wrong.
Hankison's attorney, Stewart Mathews, countered that he was acting quickly to help his fellow officers, who he believed were being "executed" by a gunman shooting from inside Taylor's apartment.
No one charged
After police broke down Taylor's door, Taylor’s boyfriend, Kennet Walker, fearing a break-in, fired one shot from a handgun that wounded one of the other officers, Sergeant Jonathan Mattingly, who along with Detective Myles Cosgrove and Hankinson, then returned fire.
In September 2020, a Grand Jury found that Mattingly and Cosgrove were justified in returning fire.
Neither were prosecuted.
Currently, no one has been charged with the death of Taylor.
Taylor's death didn't initially garner much attention, but after the death of George Floyd by Minneapolis police in May 2020 and the release of Walker's 911 call, street protests over police brutality erupted around the country, with demonstrators shouting her name.
The case also cast intense scrutiny on so-called "no-knock" warrants, which were later banned in the city of Louisville.
