One of the catalysts of the protests and heated discussions of race that roiled the country in 2020 was the shooting of Breonna Taylor, a 26-year-old EMT who died of gunshot wounds when police raided her boyfriend’s apartment where she was staying. Taylor’s death came just weeks after racist vigilantes killed Ahmaud Arbery in Georgia and two months before the death of George Floyd, which dominated the news cycle all summer.
“When police carrying out a drug warrant broke down Taylor’s door in March 2020, Walker fired a shot that struck an officer, former Sgt. Jonathan Mattingly, in the leg,” Fox News explains. “Walker said he believed an intruder was bursting in. Officers returned fire, striking and killing Taylor in her hallway.”
The narrative was that overzealous police killed Taylor. Activists instructed us to “say her name” to exemplify that cops snuffed out the promising life of a young black woman. Of course, Taylor’s death was a tragedy, and nothing can bring her back.
Attorney General Merrick Garland filed federal charges against two former Louisville police officers, Joshua James and Kyle Meany, while making a grandstanding photo op in Louisville in 2022. James and Meany weren’t directly involved in the shooting, but Garland accused them of falsifying the warrant that led to the fatal shooting.
Last week, a federal judge dropped two charges against James and Meany. Fox News reports, “In an order Thursday, U.S. District Judge Charles Simpson dropped felony ‘deprivation of rights under the color of law’ charges against” the two officers.
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What’s more, Simpson laid the blame for Taylor’s death squarely at the feet of Taylor’s boyfriend, Kenneth Walker. In his ruling, Simpson wrote that Walker’s "conduct became the proximate, or legal, cause of Taylor’s death” and added that "there is no direct link between the warrantless entry and Taylor’s death."
As a result, Fox notes, “The judge effectively reduced the civil rights violation charges against Jaynes and Meany, which had carried a maximum sentence of life in prison, to misdemeanors.”
What this means for Walker is unclear. The city of Louisville awarded him $2 million to settle lawsuits in 2022, which indicated that authorities have treated him as a victim almost as much as Taylor was.
The Department of Justice indicated that it is assessing the next steps in light of Simpson’s ruling, and James and Meany’s attorneys have expressed gratitude for the ruling. Taylor’s family has issued a statement that it disagrees with the decision.
"Obviously we are devastated at the moment by the Judge’s ruling with which we disagree and are just trying to process everything," the statement reads in part.
"The Assistant United States Attorneys on the case have informed us of their plan to appeal," the statement adds. "The only thing we can do at this point is continue to be patient. The appeal will extend the life of the case but as we’ve always maintained, we will continue to fight until we get full justice for Breonna Taylor."
A grand jury refused to indict former Det. Myles Cosgrove and former Sgt. Jonathan Mattingly, who executed the warrant, on any charges. Likewise, an FBI investigation concluded that the two officers weren’t liable for any criminal acts.
It’s still a tragedy that Taylor died in the shooting, but Judge Simpson rightly called off the dogs on some of these charges that Garland, ever eager to score points with the far left, leveled against these officers. Hopefully, authorities will charge Walker, and we can truly achieve justice.
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