Getty Demonstrators maintain the decorations around the Breonna Taylor memorial in Jefferson Square Park on September 30, 2020 in Louisville, Kentucky.
The Breonna Taylor shooting case has gripped the nation for months as protestors took to the streets to fight for justice after the 26-year-old EMT student was shot to death in her Louisville, Kentucky apartment where police were serving a no-knock warrant. Taylor died March 13, 2020.
The case is being examined in a special episode of ABC 20/20, “Say Her Name,” which airs at 9 p.m. Eastern time Friday, November 20, 2020.
Here’s what you need to know:
An Anonymous Juror Said Prosecutors Failed to Explain Possible Homicide Offenses Against the Officers Involved in Taylor’s Shooting Death
A grand jury who served in the Breonna Taylor case chose to spoke out anonymously after a circuit judge granted them permission to speak about the secret proceedings. Officers were serving a no-knock warrant at the apartment, but said they chose to knock and announced their presence. Taylor’s boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, fired shots at officers, saying he believed the police were intruders in the home. Taylor was shot to death in the gunfight, and an officer, Sgt. Jonathan Mattingly, was injured by Walker.
A grand jury who heard the case did not announce any charges related directly to Taylor’s death, according to NPR. The three officers involved were Myles Cosgrove, Mattingly and Brett Hankison, a police officer who was terminated in June. Hankison was charged with three counts of wanton endangerment for shooting into one of Taylor’s neighbor’s apartments, and has pleaded not guilty.
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A grand juror, “Anonymous Grand Juror #1,” told WFPL they were not presented with any additional charges and did not discuss potential homicide charges.
“The grand jury never heard anything about those laws,” the juror said in a statement.
Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron contradicted the statement at a press conference in September, according to the news station.
“What I will say is that they [the grand jury] were walked through all the homicide offenses,” he said.
Mattingly, Who Was Injured in the Shooting, Said Taylor’s Shooting Was Not Racially Motivated
TONIGHT: ‘BREONNA TAYLOR: SAY HER NAME’ | What you haven’t seen – personal home videos, new exclusive interviews & police body camera video. The 20/20 event special with the Courier Journal premieres tonight at 9|8c on ABC. #SayHerName #BreonnaTaylor
Sgt. Johnathan Mattingly, who was shot in the leg while serving the warrant at Taylor’s apartment, made a statement separating the shooting from other high-profile killings of Black people in 2020 and recent years.
“It’s not a race thing like people want to try to make it out to be. It’s not. This is a point where we were doing our job, we gave too much time when we go in, I get shot, we returned fire,” Mattingly told ABC News. “This is not us going, hunting somebody down. This is not kneeling on a neck. It’s nothing like that.”
He said police expected to find Taylor home alone, and said they knocked multiple times and gave her time to respond. In hindsight, he said that was a mistake.
“What would I have done differently, the answer to that is simple now that I’ve been thinking about it,” Mattingly said. “Number one, we would have either served the no-knock warrant or we would have done the normal thing we do, which is five to 10 seconds. To not give people time to formulate a plan, not give people time to get their senses so they have an idea of what they’re doing. Because if that had happened … Breonna Taylor would be alive, 100 percent.”
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