The family of Breonna Taylor have filed a wrongful death lawsuit after the 26-year-old EMT was shot to death by Kentucky police officers who raided the wrong home, NBC News reports.
The incident took place in the early hours of March 13. According to the lawsuit filed against three Louisville Metro Police Department officers last month, police were dressed in plain clothes and unmarked vehicles forced their way into the residence without announcing themselves, multiple neighbors confirmed. Police were met with gunfire from Taylor’s boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, who assumed the cops were robbers and fired in self-defense.
Taylor’s legal team includes attorney Benjamin Crump, who is also representing the family of Ahmaud Arbery, and previously represented Trayvon Martin’s family. “Breonna Taylor was sleeping while black in the sanctity of our own home,” attorney Benjamin Crump said on Wednesday (May 13).
“They thought they were being burglarized,” Crump told CBS This Morning. “Does the 2nd Amendment not apply to African Americans? This was a completely unnecessary and justifiable killing of an innocent woman.”
LPD raided #BreonnaTaylor‘s bf’s apt w/o notice, fatally shooting her 8 times. The apt’s address wasn’t on the search warrant & LPD’s suspect was already in custody. 2 months later & the only person arrested is Bre’s bf. This makes no sense! #JusticeForBreonnaTaylor #SayHerName pic.twitter.com/dgeWR4CF7z
— Benjamin Crump, Esq. (@AttorneyCrump) May 13, 2020
The LMPD disputed allegations that officers did not “announce their presence as police who were there with a warrant.” Police obtained a “no-knock” search warrant for an alleged “trap house” more than 10 miles away from Taylor’s apartment. Taylor’s address was a part of the search warrant but police had already arrested a suspect prior to reaching the location. And despite the “no-knock” warrant, the LMPD insists that officers knocked on Taylor’s doors and announced themselves.
Per the Courier Journal, police supposedly believed that one of the two men at the center of the narcotics investigation received mail at Taylor’s residence and potentially stashed drugs. No drugs were found in the apartment.
Sam Aguilar, another attorney for the family, said that the warrant was “another wild goose chase to try to get drug dealers” and that Taylor got “lumped right into the middle of it.”
“If they really thought that Breonna (Taylor’s apartment) was a place for him to pick up packages and that these packages contain things that they shouldn’t, why in the world are they waiting until the middle of March to execute a no-knock drug raid?” added Aguilar.
Officer reportedly fired 20 rounds into the apartment, shooting Taylor eight times. Walker was arrested for assault and attempted murder on a police officers. The officers were not required to wear body cams because they are apart of LMPD’s Criminal Interdiction Division. Taylor did not have a criminal record and neither did Walker before being slapped with charges for shooting at officers.
Taylor became an EMT in 2017 and worked as an emergency room technician at the University of Louisville Health’s Jewish Hospital East.