2 Police Officers Shot in Louisville As Breonna Taylor Protests Intensify DMT.NEWS
This is a developing story. Please refresh for updates.
Two Louisville Metro Police Department officers were shot and taken to the hospital Wednesday night.
It’s unclear whether the shootings were related to the protests that have broken out across the city after a grand jury’s decision to charge only one officer involved in the raid that killed Breonna Taylor — or if the officers were fired upon together. A source with the Louisville Metro Police Department confirmed both shootings to VICE News’ Roberto Ferdman and said that suspects had been detained, but the department did not immediately respond to a further request for comment on the circumstances.
The officers’ conditions are not yet known. The FBI’s Louisville office said in a tweet around 9 p.m. Wednesday that its SWAT team had “responded to an LMPD officer being shot and will continue to assist in the investigation.” According to WAVE, a local NBC affiliate, the shooting happened at about 8:30 p.m.
A video posted to Twitter by the account @SVNewsAlerts appeared to show people running away from gunfire in downtown Louisville. Landmarks in the video correspond with where the shooting reportedly occurred, Brook Street and Broadway, when referenced with Google Street View.
“They’re blasting at the police!” one person can be heard saying.
Protests erupted in Louisville after a grand jury chose to indict ex-detective Brett Hankison on charges related to putting Taylor’s neighbors at risk—rather than directly related to killing the 26-year-old EMT. Hankison faces three charges of wanton endangerment for firing into a neighbor’s apartment, one for each person inside, none of whom were injured.
Two other officers, Jonathan Mattingly and Myles Cosgrove, both fired rounds that struck the 26-year-old, although neither were indicted by the grand jury Wednesday.
"Our investigation found that Mattingly and Cosgrove were justified in their use of force after having been fired upon by Kenneth Walker," Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron said Wednesday. "This justification bars us from pursuing charges in Ms. Breonna Taylor's death.”
Hankison had already been let go from the department in June over the incident, since he had fired his weapon indiscriminately and “displayed extreme indifference to the value of human life,” according to a termination letter from the police chief. However, none of his 10 rounds hit Taylor.
via https://www.DMT.NEWS/
by Emma Ockerman, Khareem Sudlow
