Louisville officer fired after being federally charged over Breonna Taylor raid

A Louisville police sergeant going through federal civil rights expenses within the 2020 capturing dying of Breonna Taylor has been fired. Louisville Metro Police Chief Erika Shields introduced Friday that she made the choice to terminate Sgt. Kyle Meany after “careful consideration and not with ease.”

“I fully respect the judicial process and realize Sergeant Meany has yet to be heard before a jury of his peers,” she wrote in a press release obtained by CBS News. “That being said, he is facing multiple federal charges after a lengthy investigation by the DOJ. As an employer, the character of our organization is paramount and it is not reasonable to expect continued employment under such conditions.”

Meany is certainly one of 4 present and former Louisville law enforcement officials who had been federally charged on August 4 in reference to the raid that led to Taylor’s capturing dying, together with Brett Hankison, Joshua Jaynes and Kelly Goodlett. Hankison and Jaynes have already been fired, and Louisville police reported earlier this month that “termination procedures” had been underway for Goodlett and Meany.

The 4 face numerous civil rights violations, together with illegal conspiracy, use of pressure and obstruction of justice. U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland mentioned the civil rights expenses in opposition to three of the officers stem from alleged falsification of the affidavit used to acquire the search warrant that licensed the early morning raid on Taylor’s condo.

Taylor, a 26-year-old EMT, was shot on March 13, 2020, when Louisville law enforcement officials stormed into her condo the place she was asleep along with her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker. Walker thought the officers had been intruders and fired his handgun at them as they had been coming into, putting one within the leg. The officers fired 22 pictures into the condo in response, certainly one of which struck Taylor within the chest, killing her.

In charging paperwork, prosecutors mentioned Goodlett and Jaynes included false and deceptive information in an software for the search warrant, particularly {that a} postal inspector had knowledgeable Goodlett that the goal of their drug trafficking investigation was receiving packages at Taylor’s deal with. That was false, prosecutors allege, however Meany, their supervisor, authorised the warrant software anyway.

Meany can also be accused of mendacity to investigators concerning the officers’ unannounced entry into Taylor’s house. According to charging paperwork, Meany advised the FBI that his officers executed the warrant on the request of the SWAT unit, when the truth is he knew that the unit didn’t put in such a request.

In March, Hankison was acquitted by a Kentucky jury on a separate indictment by which he was charged with two counts of deprivation of rights for firing 10 rounds by means of a window and glass door in Taylor’s condo.

– Stefan Becket contributed to this report.