Suspected St. Louis cop killer, charged with 1st-degree murder, released on $5,000 bond

A suspect charged with the murder of a Demond Taylor, a Florissant Valley Campus Police Officer, has been released on $5,000 bond. The charges are linked to a 17-year-old cold case involving the murder of the police officer.

In 2008, Taylor was fatally shot when he was sitting in a car in St. Louis, Missouri. He was off duty when he was killed. The case went unsolved for 17 years, according to Fox 2. However, this past weekend, the circuit attorney’s office and the St. Louis police announced that murder charges were being filed against Brandon Levy, 46, in the case.

Police said that between 2018 and 2025, three witnesses came forward and each said that Levy was responsible for killing Taylor, and that he had believed the officer was a rival gang member. Taylor would have been 52 on Sunday. Levy was charged with one count of first-degree murder. But he was released after posting a $5,000 cash-only bond.

"After a confined docket hearing on August 25, 2025, Associate Circuit Judge Michael Colona modified the defendant’s bond to $50,000 cash-only, requiring 10 percent to be posted. The State requested that the bond conditions imposed on August 23, 2025, remain in place. The defendant posted bond, and the court released him under court-ordered conditions,” the St. Louis Circuit Attorney’s Office said in a statement.

“The court-ordered conditions require the defendant to attend all hearings, comply with all judgments and sentences, notify the court of any change of address, not tamper with victims or witnesses (and prevent others from doing so on his behalf), obey all laws, and not possess weapons or narcotics unless prescribed. The Circuit Attorney’s Office does not comment on pending cases,” the office added.

The preliminary hearing in the case is slated for September 25 after a bond hearing on September 3.