Armed Citizen Shoots Officer During “No Knock” Raid At Wrong House. His Girlfriend Was Killed And He’s Charged With Attempted Murder.

Published May 13, 2020

Posted By

0

By John Boch via TTAG

A lawsuit filed in Louisville alleges that three plainclothes cops in unmarked cars raided the wrong address looking for a suspect who was already in custody. When the officers forced the door, allegedly without announcing themselves or knocking, they woke EMT Breonna Taylor and her CCW-licensed boyfriend.

One or both of the residents, jarred awake by the commotion, fired on what they believed to be home invaders. Their rounds hit one of the officers in the leg. The suit alleges the officers responded with a fusillade of indiscriminate shots. They hit Taylor a total of eight times, killing her. Then they arrested her boyfriend for attempted murder of a police officers.

The story has made the national news now that Taylor’s family has hired Benjamin Crump to represent them. Attorney Crump, who rose to fame in the Trayvon Martin case, specializes in spinning the atrocity narrative on behalf of his clients, which includes the family of Ahmaud Arbery. Breonna Taylor was black and the officers are white.

NBC News has the story.

Taylor’s death gained national attention this week after the family hired attorney Ben Crump…
The lawsuit states that Taylor and her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, were asleep in the bedroom when police in plain clothes and unmarked vehicles arrived at the house around 12:30 a.m.
The officers were looking for a suspect who lived in a different part of the city and was already in police custody after he was arrested earlier.
The three officers entered Taylor’s home “without knocking and without announcing themselves as police officers,” the suit states.
The lawsuit says Taylor and Walker woke up and thought criminals were breaking in. Walker called 911 and, according to The Courier-Journal, police said he opened fire and shot an officer…

Break down the door of most law-abiding gun owners, especially in the middle of the night, and hot lead will likely greet the intruders. And for good reason, frankly. Anyone who kicks down your door isn’t delivering Girl Scout cookies.

The suit states that Walker had a license to carry and kept firearms in the home for protection.

In other words, he’s a good guy.

Taylor, 26, was shot eight times and died. Walker, 27, was arrested. According to jail records he’s been charged with assault and attempted murder on a police officer. An attorney for Walker could not immediately be reached.

Cough. Thin blue line?

“Breonna had posed no threat to the officers and did nothing to deserve to die at their hands,” the suit says, adding that she was unarmed.
“Neither of the two had any criminal history for drugs or violence,” it states. No drugs were found in the home.

Could this case look any worse for the three plainclothes cops?

Why yes, it could.

The gunfire from the officers struck objects in the living room, dining room, kitchen, hallway, bathroom and both bedrooms, according to the lawsuit.

Fortunately there were no children in the home during the raid.

“The officers failed to use any sound reasonable judgment whatsoever when firing more than 25 blind shots into multiple homes and causing the wrongful death of Breonna,” according to the suit.
Taylor’s mother, Tamika Palmer, filed the lawsuit in April in Jefferson Circuit Court alleging wrongful death, excessive force and gross negligence.

There are plenty of stories and videos of no-knock raids and raids during which the cops yell, “police” as they batter down the door to make entry. One would think these forced-entry raids would only be used in extreme cases. But apparently obviously not in Louisville drug investigations.

Here’s another of Crump’s cases – this one from Little Rock, Arkansas.