LOUISVILLE, Ky. — After three days of deliberations, a Louisville jury has reached a verdict in the federal retrial of a former LMPD detective charged in the Breonna Taylor case.
Brett Hankison was charged with violating the civil rights of Taylor and her neighbors the night of a botched raid at her apartment in March 2020.
Friday afternoon, the jury sent a note to Judge Rebecca Grady Jennings saying they believed they could not reach a unanimous decision. She encouraged them to reread the jury instructions and continue with deliberations, reminding them it was their "duty to make every reasonable effort you can to reach unanimous agreement."
Hours later, the jury returned to the courtroom saying they have found Hankison not guilty of violating the civil rights of Breonna Taylor's three neighbors who lived in an apartment adjacent to hers.
Around 9:30 p.m., jurors found Hankison guilty of violating Taylor's rights the night of the raid.
During the second day of deliberations on Thursday, jurors asked the judge a critical question providing insight into what was going on behind closed doors.
"Do we need to know whether Breonna Taylor was a living victim when Brett Hankison fired?" the jury asked.
The judge's instructions were clear: to convict Hankison, jurors must find he "deprived a living victim of a constitutional right."
This was Hankison’s third criminal trial in the case and he faces life in prison if convicted.
No prior jury has found him guilty on any charges in Taylor's case. Last November, Hankison's first federal trial ended in a mistrial after a jury deadlocked.
What happened during the trial?
Earlier this week Hankison testified in his own defense, insisting he saw the window and sliding glass door of her apartment “light up” with gunfire. He reacted by firing 10 rounds into the side of Taylor’s apartment.
Hankison has previously admitted he couldn’t identify a target when he fired through Taylor’s sliding glass door and window, leading prosecutors to argue that he fired blindly and recklessly.
Defense attorneys brought their own expert on use-of-force policies to the stand on Tuesday, who said Hankison's actions were justified given the available evidence, even despite him being unable to clearly identify a a target.
“He was doing what he needed to do to stop the threat,” the expert testified.
It came as several of the prosecution’s witnesses, former and current law enforcement including LMPD Chief Paul Humphrey, said they didn’t understand Hankison’s decision to fire that night, adding it didn’t align with LMPD policies or best practices.
"It's bad," Humphrey said. "You shoot the wrong person and innocent people die."
During his testimony on Monday, Hankison got emotional multiple times, shedding tears while recounting what he witnessed and explaining his decision after his fellow officer came under fire.
“It sounded like a semi-automatic or automatic weapon in that hallway executing everybody in my stack [of officers],” Hankison testified.
Hankison said that soon after officers knocked down Taylor’s front door, he felt an intense “boom” and saw a large muzzle flash which he believed came from a rifle. He said it was being held by the silhouette of someone standing in a “military shooting stance” about 15-feet away from officers.
Hankison reiterated what he’s told jurors in his two previous trials: That he was "trying to stay alive [and] trying to keep my partners alive.”
When asked if he was concerned about hitting one of his fellow officers, Hankison responded exactly how he did in 2022, saying “absolutely not.”
And in a shift from his last federal trial, Hankison pushed back on more of prosecutors’ arguments, even changing some of his testimony. Nearly a year ago, Hankison acknowledged an AR-15 style rifle was not involved in this incident.
Now, he testified, “I can’t agree with that.”
Investigators did not find an assault rifle on scene, though they did find shell casings later determined not to be connected to the case.
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