Only one cop faced any legal consequences after the killing
of Brianna Taylor during an early morning, no knock raid.
And unfortunately now we know that he's been cleared of all charges that happened
earlier today.
A Kentucky jury was cleared or has cleared a former police officer who fired
shots during the 2020 raid that ended in Brianna Taylor's death.
The jury on Thursday found Brett Hankinson not guilty of three counts of wanton
endangerment for firing shots that ripped into a neighboring apartment.
For those of you who might have forgotten what he did.
He wasn't even like in the apartment as he was firing his weapon,
he was in the parking lot, just indiscriminately firing away,
putting people's safety at risk.
Okay, so a couple and a small child lived in that neighboring apartment and
were present at the time of the shooting.
Taylor's boyfriend, Kenneth walker was startled by the cops and
he fired one shot because this is a no knock raid in the middle of the night.
He had no idea what was going on and
he thought that someone was trying to enter like a home invasion.
So he fired one shot and that's what led to the officers firing in this
case with Hankerson doing so indiscriminately from the parking lot.
Now prosecutors called 26 witnesses and
they argued that Hankerson shot blindly into a window from outside
the apartment in a direction perpendicular to where the shot originated.
The gunfire went through Taylor's apartment and endangered a man,
a pregnant woman and her five year old son who lived next door, prosecutors said.
One or two more inches and
I would have been shot testified the neighbor Cody Etherton.
So, the jury has cleared him of all charges though, apparently just firing
in an incredibly belligerent and irresponsible way is totally fine.
Hankerson himself testified during the trial that he saw a muzzle flash from
Taylor's darkened hallway after police burst through the door and
thought officers were under heavy fire.
So he quickly wheeled around the corner and
sprayed 10 bullets hoping to end the threat.
But as prosecutors noted, the shell casings were all in the parking lot.
>> Yeah I mean, look, the guy's totally unhinged.
You could hit your fellow cops, you're firing wildly and
he almost hit a baby in another apartment.
But I think it's part of police culture, You know, hey,
there's a slight threat to your safety.
And in this case the threat by the way was real.
They had got into the wrong apartment.
And they got a legal gun owner who fired because he thought it was robbers right,
if somebody coming to assault them.
Yes, there was gunfire, but firing indiscriminately isn't gonna help anyone.
And where does the police culture come from?
Where the guy just do it.
Who cares right.
Well, it comes from things like this.
The jury let him off.
Wow I mean, he was trying to do the right thing.
So he almost killed the baby.
So what not?
So what that's negligent.
That's I mean, at a bare minimum.
That's deeply, deeply negligent.
So he got acquitted and that's.
But I don't agree.
And guys just always, I always put myself in each person's position, right.
You could do that to, let's say this.
Edwin's in trouble.
He's our stage manager, he's in this room and
I think somebody's firing at him from over there.
What I fire knowing that bat is on that is in that line of fire.
Bart's our audio guy.
Well, of course not.
I might hit bat, that's it.
That's insane, right.
And if I did that's negligent at a minimum.
But if it's a cop, they're like, yeah, who cares, It's so frustrating.
>> He was scared and he was worried.
>> Well, you're a cop.
Your job is to not be scared.
>> So I, and I want to be clear that he was let go from the police department,
so he's no longer a cop.
So at least we have that.
But again, this goes along with the problematic culture that we've been
talking about when it comes to local policing.
The reason why they just willy nilly opened fire like this is because they
know that there are no consequences and
people get hurt, innocent people die as a result of that culture.