GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. —
On Friday, a jury found former Louisville, KY, police officer Brett Hankison guilty of violating Breonna Taylor’s civil rights in the 2020 raid that took her life. He was acquitted on another charge saying he used excessive force on Taylor’s neighbors.
“I feel good inside now because now that we're on the other side of things, where we can rejoice and be happy and know that if someone does wrong, they have a consequence for it, and there's some accountability that is also held behind it, especially when there's someone like professionals and law enforcement, when they're known to protect and serve us,” Dee Dee Taylor, Breonna Taylor’s older sister, said. “So we're ecstatic today.”
The federal jury returned the verdict late Friday night, after they deliberated more than 20 hours over three days, according to ABC News.
Hankison fired 10 shots into Taylor’s apartment during the raid but didn’t hit anyone. Some of his shots hit neighbor’s apartments.
“Many times, our American citizens have completely given up on the Constitution, feeling like the systematic things have kind of overwritten the things that are in the constitutions, or making them feel like certain stakeholders have certain power over that constitution,” Dee Dee Taylor said. “To actually help be upheld to that constitution, we're honored, and we have a national standard for everybody to now follow and kind of feel comfortable by when it comes to our rights.”
According to ABC News, the jury sent a note Thursday asking the judge whether they needed to know if Breonna Taylor was alive as Hankison fired his shots.
That was a point of contention during closing arguments, when Hankison’s attorney Don Malarcik told the jury that prosecutors must “prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Ms. Taylor was alive” when Hankison fired.
Hankison’s previous trial in November 2023 ended in mistrial after the jury was deadlocked. Hankison is the first officer to be convicted in the raid.
“This verdict shows a huge layer of accountability, so I know that law enforcement are going to have to take account of that in many measures,” Dee Dee Taylor said.
She said over the nearly five years since her sister passed, talking to others about what happened in 2020 was grim. With the new verdict, she said conversations will be different.
“I get to give hope to other people, knowing that other families don't have to experience this.”
Hankison will be sentenced on March 12, 2025, one day short of the five-year anniversary of Breonna Taylor’s death. He faces life in prison.
In March 2020, Taylor, a Grand Rapids native, was shot eight times by Louisville police officers when they conducted a no-knock warrant. Taylor and her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, were sleeping at the time, and at the time Walker told police he fired at the officers in self-defense.