According to Daily Mail
The family of the slain black EMT whose fatal shooting by police during a botched drug raid in March has sparked national outrage says that Louisville cops obtained the warrant based on false information that investigators gave to the judge.
Attorneys for the family of 26-year-old Breonna Taylor filed a lawsuit against Louisville Metro Police Department alleging that a detective falsely claimed that a drug suspect was receiving postal packages at her house.
In the early morning hours of March 13, Louisville police executed a ‘no-knock’ raid on her home as part of an investigation centered on two men suspected of selling drugs in the Russell section of the city.
Police suspected Taylor’s home was used to receive drugs, and a judge signed off on a ‘no-knock’ warrant allowing law enforcement officials to raid her home.
Just before 1am, Louisville police said they identified themselves before using a battering ram to enter Taylor’s home, where she and her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, were in bed.
Taylor’s neighbors and her family dispute this. They said police never identified themselves, and that Walker, who was legally allowed to carry a firearm, shot at the cops thinking that he was being robbed.
Police responded with gunfire, killing Taylor, who suffered eight gunshot wounds.
Walker was arrested and charged with first-degree assault and attempted murder of a police officer after Sgt. Jonathan Mattingly was shot in the leg during the raid.
Mattingly, Officer Brett Hankison, and Officer Myles Cosgrove were the three detectives who raided Taylor’s home.
Hankison is named in a separate federal lawsuit filed by a Louisville resident, Kendrick Wilson, who alleges that the officer harassed suspects with unnecessary arrests and even planted drugs, according to the Courier Journal.
All three officers are named as defendants in the lawsuit filed by Taylor’s family.
Taylor had no criminal record and worked for two local hospitals. The lawsuit alleges that police fired at least 20 rounds into the home.
The warrant which was approved by a judge the day before Taylor died was based on a detective’s belief that one of the drug suspects in Russell, Jamarcus Glover, used Taylor’s residence to receive mail, keep drugs, or stash money from the sale of drugs.
Glover was arrested in a separate raid that same night more than 10 miles away from Taylor’s home.
A Louisville detective wrote in an affidavit that he saw Glover leave Taylor’s apartment two months before the raid with a United States Postal Service package which he then transported to a ‘known drug house,’ according to the Courier Journal.