Officer convicted of 'excessive force' in death of Breonna Taylor—he fired shots but hit no one

A jury has convicted a former Kentucky police officer of using excessive force in the raid on the home of Breonna Taylor and her boyfriend Kenneth Walker that resulted in her death in 2020. It is the first conviction of an officer who was directly involved with the raid where Walker first shot at police officers, leading to officers returning fire and killing Taylor. A judge has previously found that Walker was responsible for Taylor’s death.

Brett Hankison, 48, the former officer who was convicted on the excessive force charge, fired his gun but did not hit anyone during the 12:40 am raid on Taylor and Walker, according to the Associated Press.



Walker fired on the officers as they entered the apartment, hitting and wounding one of them. Hankison then rounded a corner, shooting into the apartment with 10 shots that hit Taylor's glass door and windows, and flew into the neighboring apartment but hit nobody. He was cleared of a charge that he used excessive force on Taylor's neighbors.

The conviction for excessive force on Taylor was delivered late on Friday evening by the 12-member jury, despite the shots not causing physical harm to anyone. The jury of six men and six women deliberated for over 20 hours over the course of three days.

Hankison and his defense argued throughout the trial that the shots were meant to protect his fellow officers who had gotten shot at by Walker. Defense lawyer Don Malarcik argued that the jury had to "prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Ms. Taylor was alive" when Hankison fired the shots, or else excessive force would not apply.

Malarcik brought up an argument that Walker was just 12 inches away from shooting Hankison and that Walker never tried to open the door when the police were knocking. Walker instead decided to arm himself. Despite some reports’ claims that they did not knock beforehand, the Kentucky Attorney General determined that the police knocked before breaking into the apartment.

Tamika Palmer, Taylor's mother, celebrated the conviction, and said, "It took a lot of time. It took a lot of patience. It was hard. The jurors took their time to really understand that Breonna deserved justice." Taylor's death along with George Floyd's caused massive protests and riots across the United States during the summer of 2020.