The Death of Breonna Taylor (2020)

March 13, 2020

In the early morning hours of March 13, 2020, 26-year-old Breonna Taylor, an African-American emergency medical technician, was shot and killed by Louisville Metro Police Department officers who forced their way into her apartment while executing a search warrant. Taylor's death, alongside the killing of George Floyd months later, became a catalyst for one of the largest waves of civil rights protests in American history. The case also triggered years of legal proceedings that reshaped debates over no-knock warrants, police accountability, and federal civil rights enforcement.

The Night of the Raid

Just after midnight on March 13, 2020, LMPD officers Jonathan Mattingly, Brett Hankison, and Myles Cosgrove arrived at Breonna Taylor's apartment on Springfield Drive in Louisville, Kentucky, to execute a search warrant connected to a narcotics investigation targeting a former boyfriend of Taylor's who did not live at the address. Taylor and her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, were asleep when officers forced entry. Walker, believing an intruder was breaking in, fired a single shot, striking Sergeant Mattingly in the leg. Officers responded by firing 32 rounds into the apartment, six of which struck Taylor. She died in her hallway. No drugs were found in the apartment, and the primary suspect police were investigating had already been arrested elsewhere earlier that night. Hankison later became the only officer charged, though not for Taylor's death directly—he was indicted for wanton endangerment for shots that entered a neighboring apartment. In September 2020, a Jefferson County grand jury declined to indict any officer for killing Taylor herself, a decision that intensified public outrage across the country.

National Protests and Reckoning

Taylor's death, initially overshadowed by early pandemic news, gained widespread attention by late May 2020 as details emerged and public pressure mounted. Her case became inseparable from the broader national reckoning over police violence against Black Americans, particularly after George Floyd's killing in Minneapolis on May 25, 2020. Protesters in Louisville and cities nationwide chanted "Say Her Name" and "Justice for Breonna," demanding the officers involved be criminally charged. Louisville's mayor fired Hankison in June 2020, and the city later banned no-knock warrants entirely, renaming the reform "Breonna's Law." In September 2020, Louisville agreed to pay Taylor's family $12 million in a wrivil settlement, one of the largest such payouts in city history, alongside promised police reforms. Taylor's image appeared on murals, magazine covers, and protest signs throughout 2020, cementing her as a central figure in that year's racial justice movement alongside Floyd and others killed by police.

Federal Charges and Convictions

After Hankison's acquittal on state wanton endangerment charges in March 2022, the U.S. Department of Justice, under Attorney General Merrick Garland, pursued federal civil rights charges. In August 2022, the DOJ charged Hankison with unconstitutional use of excessive force violating Taylor's civil rights, and separately charged three other officers—Kelly Goodlett, Joshua Jaynes, and Kyle Meany—with conspiracy for falsifying the affidavit used to obtain the search warrant and later attempting to cover up the false information. Goodlett pleaded guilty in 2022. Hankison's federal trial ended in a mistrial in late 2023 after jurors deadlocked, but a second trial concluded in November 2024 with a guilty verdict on charges of excessive force. In July 2025, U.S. District Judge Benjamin Beaton sentenced Hankison to 33 months in prison and three years of supervised release—a sentence notably harsher than the no-prison-time recommendation the Justice Department itself had requested, reflecting the judge's independent assessment of the severity of Taylor's death.