The charges mark the first federal counts against any of the officers involved in the botched raid. In addition to the civil rights offenses, federal authorities charged the four with unlawful conspiracies, unconstitutional use of force and obstruction, Garland said.
Taylor’s mother, Tamika Palmer, said she has waited 874 days for federal charges to be filed and has beaten “everything sent to break her.” Her daughter’s death has taken her to a “place we can’t even imagine,” she said.
“Every day has been March 13th for me,” Palmer said, referring to the day Taylor was killed in 2020.
Former Detective Joshua Jaynes, 40, Detective Kelly Goodlett and Sgt. Kyle Meany, 35, was accused of submitting a false affidavit to search Taylor’s home before the Louisville Metropolitan Police Department raid and then working together to create a “false cover story in an attempt to escape responsibility for his roles in preparing the order’s affidavit. which contained false information,” according to court documents.
Former detective Brett Hankison is alleged to have “willfully used unconstitutionally excessive force … when he fired his service weapon into Taylor’s apartment through a boarded-up window and a boarded-up glass door.” He is accused of depriving Taylor and a guest at his home “of their constitutional rights by shooting through a bedroom window that was covered with blinds and a blackout curtain,” the US Department of Justice said.
The 46-year-old also faces charges of depriving three of Taylor’s neighbors of their constitutional rights because, according to the indictment, the bullets he fired went through a wall of Taylor’s home and to an adjacent apartment.
Jaynes and Meany are accused of deliberately depriving Taylor of his constitutional rights by drafting and approving a false affidavit to obtain a search warrant, even though they knew “the affidavit contained false and misleading statements, omitted material facts, was based on outdated information and was not supported by probable cause,” the DOJ statement said. Both men “knew that the execution of the search warrant would be by armed LMPD officers and could create a dangerous situation for both those officers and anyone in Taylor’s home.” , he said.
Goodlett conspired with Jaynes and Meany to “forge the search warrant for Taylor’s home and cover up their actions afterward,” the statement said.
Jaynes and another detective tried to cover up their actions by writing a fake investigative letter and making false statements to investigators, the release said. Jaynes falsified a report in hopes of preventing a criminal investigation into Taylor’s death; Meany also made false statements, according to the release.
Goodlett and Jaynes met in a garage weeks after the failed raid and conspired to pass false information to investigators, the attorney general alleged.
“We allege that Ms. Taylor’s Fourth Amendment rights were violated when defendants Joshua Jaynes, Kyle Meany, and Kelly Goodlett sought a warrant to search Ms. Taylor’s home knowing that the officers lacked probable cause for the search,” Garland said.
The affidavit falsely claimed that agents had verified that the target of their drug trafficking investigation had received packages at Taylor’s address, but Jaynes and Goodlett knew that was not true, Garland said.
Jaynes, who appears practically straight from a detention center in shorts and a polo shirt, pleaded not guilty. The prosecution does not ask that he be detained pending trial, but does prohibit him from contacting potential witnesses or defendants in the case.
Hankison, who fired 10 shots into Taylor’s home and was acquitted earlier this year of state unlawful threatening charges, was charged with two federal counts of deprivation of rights under the law. Hankison’s attorney declined to comment. Only Hankison was charged at the state level.
The officers who executed the search warrant were not involved in drafting the warrant and did not know it contained false information, the attorney general said.
“We share but cannot fully imagine the pain felt by Breonna Taylor’s loved ones and all those affected by the events of March 13, 2020,” Garland said. “Breonna Taylor should be alive today.”
According to the DOJ, a conviction on the charge of willfully violating someone’s rights carries a statutory maximum penalty of life in prison when the violation results in death. A conviction on one count of obstruction carries a maximum sentence of 20 years, and the charges of conspiracy and making false statements carry maximum sentences of five years, according to the department.
Lawyer: “A big step towards justice”
Civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who represents Taylor’s family, applauded the charges as well as the “tough fight” put up by Taylor’s family, attorneys, advocates and community members. In 2020, Crump and his team reached a settlement that paid Taylor’s family $12 million and led to sweeping police reforms, including the use of social workers to support certain police leads and the requirement that commanders review and approve search warrants before seeking judicial approval. .
“Today was a big step toward justice. We appreciate the diligence and dedication of the FBI and DOJ as they investigated what led to Breonna’s murder and what happened next. The justice Breonna received today was not would have been possible without the efforts of Attorney General Merrick Garland or Assistant AG for Civil Rights Kristen Clarke,” Crump said in a statement. “We hope this announcement of a guilty plea sends a message to all the other officers involved that it’s time to stop covering up and it’s time to accept responsibility for their roles in causing the death of a young black woman innocent and beautiful”.
Clarke said in a statement: “Since our nation’s founding, the Bill of Rights of the United States Constitution has guaranteed that all people have the right to be safe in their homes, free from false warrants, unreasonable searches and the use of unjustifiable material. and excessive force by police. These charges reflect the Department of Justice’s commitment to preserving the integrity of the criminal justice system and protecting the constitutional rights of all Americans.”
In January 2021, LMPD terminated Jaynes and his colleague Myles Cosgrove. Cosgrove was fired for his use of deadly force by firing 16 rounds into Taylor’s home and failing to activate his body camera, according to a copy of his termination letter.
Jaynes was fired for “failing to complete a search warrant operations plan form” and for failing to verify that Taylor’s ex-boyfriend, Jamarcus Glover, had been receiving packages at Taylor’s home, according to the letter from termination
After his firing, Jaynes’ attorney, Thomas Clay, said the move was not unexpected and vowed to fight for his client’s reinstatement.
“Our position is that he did nothing wrong in any of the activities related to this search,” Clay told CNN in January 2021.
Cosgrove fired the shot that killed Taylor, Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron has said, adding that the shooting was justified because Taylor’s boyfriend shot the officers first. Kenneth Walker II, Taylor’s boyfriend, has repeatedly said he thought the officers were intruders and fired a shot when they broke down the door.
Crump’s co-lawyer Lonita Baker took aim at Cameron after Garland’s announcement Thursday, saying the attorney general has “no right to hold any political office” representing Kentucky.
“The federal government had the courage to do what Daniel Cameron didn’t do,” he said.
A review board upheld Cosgrove’s termination last year, and Jaynes lost a similar appeal before the board in June. according to CNN affiliate WDRB.
Louisville’s police union said at the time that the layoffs were “unjustified.”
“There is certainly no evidence in this case that LMPD policies and procedures were violated to the extent that would warrant his termination,” the River City Fraternal Order of Police said in a statement. “Not only did Interim Chief (Yvette) Gentry make the wrong decision, but she sent an ominous message to all sworn officers in the Louisville Metro Police Department.”
Taylor, a 26-year-old emergency technician, was shot and killed in her apartment during a botched forced-entry raid in the early hours of March 13, 2020. Her death, along with that of other black people at the hands of Law enforcement – including George Floyd in Minnesota and Ahmaud Arbery in Georgia – sparked a summer of protests calling for police reform.
No officer involved in the raid has previously been charged with Taylor’s actual murder.
State prosecutors charged Hankison only in connection with the shooting. LMPD fired Hankison in June 2020, and in September 2020, a grand jury indicted Hankison on three counts of criminal endangerment for blindly firing 10 shots into Taylor’s home.
A jury acquitted Hankison of all charges in March.
CNN’s Amir Vera and Michelle Watson contributed to this report.
