A federal jury convicted a former Kentucky police detective of using excessive force on Breonna Taylor during a botched 2020 drug raid that left her dead.
The 12-member jury returned the late-night verdict after clearing Brett Hankison earlier in the evening on a charge that he used excessive force on Taylor’s neighbors.
It was the first conviction of a Louisville police officer who was involved in the deadly raid.
Some members of the jury were in tears as the verdict was read around 9:30 p.m.
They had earlier indicated to the judge in two separate messages that they were deadlocked on the charge of using excessive force on Taylor but chose to continue deliberating.
The six-man, six-woman jury deliberated for more than 20 hours over three days.
Hankison fired 10 shots into Taylor’s glass door and windows during the raid but didn’t hit anyone. Some shots flew into a next-door neighbor’s adjoining apartment.
The death of the 26-year-old Black woman, along with the May 2020 police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, sparked racial injustice protests nationwide.
A separate jury deadlocked on federal charges against Hankison last year, and he was acquitted on state charges of wanton endangerment in 2022.
The conviction against Hankison carries a maximum sentence of life in prison. He will be sentenced on March 12 by U.S. District Judge Rebecca Grady Jennings.
Hankison was one of four officers charged by the U.S. Department of Justice in 2022 with violating Taylor’s civil rights. Hankison’s verdict is the second conviction from those cases.
The first was a plea deal from a former officer who was not at the raid and became a cooperating witness in another case.
