Federal Judge Says Breonna Taylor’s Boyfriend Caused Her Death, Dismisses Felony Charges Against Officers

A federal judge in Kentucky threw out major charges against two former Louisville officers who were accused of falsifying a warrant that led police to Breonna Taylor’s door before they fatally shot her in March 2020.

U.S. District Judge Charles R. Simpson III on Thursdaydismissed the felony deprivation of rights charges against former Louisville Police Detective Joshua Jaynes, who was accused of knowingly drafting a false search warrant affidavit on Taylor’s home, and former Sgt. Kyle Meany, who approved the warrant.The charges were announced in 2022 by U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland.

In the early morning hours of March 13, 2020, three plainclothes Louisville police officers—Brett Hankison, Jon Mattingly and Myles Cosgrove—executed a no-knock search warrant on Taylor’s home.

Taylor’s boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, said he believed it was a break-in and fired a shot from a gun that he legally owned in the dark, which struck Mattingly.

The officers fired 32 shots in return, with six of the bullets killing Taylor.

The judge ruled that “there is no direct link between the warrantless entry and Taylor’s death,” writing that Jaynes and Meany were not involved in the raid on Taylor’s home.

Instead, the judge wrote, it was Walker’s decision to open fire that was the legal cause of Taylor’s death, saying his “conduct became the proximate, or legal, cause of Taylor’s death.”

“While the indictment alleges that Jaynes and Meany set off a series of events that ended in Taylor’s death, it also alleges that [Walker] disrupted those events when he decided to open fire” on the police, Simpson added.

The dropped charges carried a maximum sentence of life in prison. Motions to dismiss other charges were denied and the two still face civil rights charges. If found guilty of those charges, they could face prison time.

Meany is still facing one felony count for allegedly lying to the FBI, which could carry up to five years in prison.

Jaynes still faces two felony counts of covering up Taylor’s death, which could lead to a 40-year prison sentence.

Walker was never charged with Taylor’s death and that although he was initially arrested and charged with attempted murder of a police officer, that charge was later dismissed after his attorneys had argued that Walker didn’t know he was firing at police.

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