Felony charges dismissed against 2 former Louisville officers charged in Breonna Taylor raid
Taylor was shot and killed in her apartment during a flawed forced-entry raid in the early hours of March 13, 2020
LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- A federal judge on Thursday dismissed felony charges against two former Louisville Metro Police Department detectives who worked on the search warrant in the deadly raid on Breonna Taylor's home.
Motions to dismiss other charges were denied.
Taylor, a 26-year-old emergency room technician, was shot and killed in her apartment during a flawed forced-entry raid in the early hours of March 13, 2020.
Louisville detective Joshua Jaynes and Sgt. Kyle Meany were federally charged in 2022 with submitting a false affidavit to search Taylor's home ahead of the Louisville Metropolitan Police Department's raid, and then working together to create a "false cover story in an attempt to escape responsibility for their roles in preparing the warrant affidavit that contained false information," according to court documents.
US District Court Judge Charles Simpson on Thursday ruled that the decision by Kenneth Walker, Taylor's boyfriend, to fire his gun when officers burst into the home was "the legal cause of Taylor's death," rather than warrantless entry, according to court documents. After Walker fired the shot, thinking they were intruders, a volley of gunfire came from the officers and Taylor was shot multiple times.
The court ruled that "there is no direct link between the warrantless entry and Taylor's death."
"We are [very] pleased by the Court's ruling," Brian Butler, attorney for Kyle Meany, told CNN via email.
The judge dropped felony charges against both men that carried a maximum penalty of life in prison, saying the "alleged facts do not fit the ... felony offenses as written."
"Taylor's death was proximately caused by the manner in which the warrant was executed," court documents say. "[Kenneth Walker's] decision to open fire, as alleged and argued, was the natural and probable consequence of executing the warrant at 12:45 a.m. on 'an unsuspecting household.' That decision prompted the return fire which hit and killed Taylor."
While the former officers were charged with using a dangerous weapon to deprive Taylor of her Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable search, Simpson's order says it has not been proven the "Execution Team used their firearms for the purpose of subjecting Taylor to the search."
With the use-of-a-dangerous-weapon language struck by the judge, the charge becomes a misdemeanor punishable by a fine or imprisonment for no more than one year, or both, according to court documents.
CNN has reached out to the Louisville Metro Police Department and the US Department of Justice for comment on the judge's decision. CNN has also reached out to an attorney representing Jaynes.
CNN has sought comment from an attorney representing Taylor's family.
RELATED: DOJ charges 4 current, former police officers in connection with raid that killed Breonna Taylor
Taylor's 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 nationwide protests in 2020 calling for police reform.
"The tragedy of Breonna Taylor's death and the gravity of her family's grief are not lost on this Court," court documents said.
Meany still faces one charge of false statement to federal investigators, which carries a maximum of five years in prison. Jaynes faces two charges of falsification of records in a federal investigation and conspiracy to falsify records and witness tampering, and could be sentenced to a total of 40 years.
Jaynes, who had written the search warrant for the raid on Taylor's home, was fired in 2021 for "failing to complete a Search Warrant Operations Plan form" and being untruthful about verifying that Taylor's previous boyfriend, Jamarcus Glover, had been receiving packages at Taylor's home, according to a copy of his termination letter obtained by CNN.
Meany was terminated from the department in 2022. Louisville Police Chief Erika Shields released a statement at the time saying, "I fully respect the judicial process and realize Sergeant Meany has yet to be heard before a jury of his peers. That being said, he is facing multiple federal charges after a lengthy investigation by the DOJ."
RELATED: 1 year later, Breonna Taylor's mother, advocates still want accountability for police who killed her
Shields, who was hired to lead the Louisville Metropolitan Police Department months after the death of Taylor, stepped down as police chief there at the beginning of 2023.
Brett Hankison, another former Louisville detective federally charged in connection with Taylor's death, will face a new civil rights trial in October, after a jury was deadlocked in his initial trial. Prosecutors alleged Hankison used unjustified force the night Taylor was killed and violated her civil rights and those of her boyfriend and next-door neighbors. He could face life in prison if found guilty.
Ex-detective Kelly Hannah Goodlett pleaded guilty in federal court in 2022 to conspiring to falsify an affidavit for a warrant to search Taylor's home and to covering up the false document by lying to investigators. Goodlett has yet to be sentenced.
(The-CNN-Wire & 2024 Cable News Network, Inc., a Time Warner Company. All rights reserved.)
