Breonna Taylor's Murder Highlights a Critical Gap in Our Justice System. We need to fix it.
By: National Police Accountability Project
Tags: Police, Police Reform, Police Brutality, Prosecutorial Misconduct, Breonna Taylor

In October, an anonymous juror in the Kentucky grand jury investigation into Breonna Taylor’s death said that the grand jury never deliberated whether homicide or other charges were justified against the police officers who shot Breonna Taylor — because the jurors were never given the chance.

The grand juror’s comments, along with subsequent comments by a second and then a third juror, make clear that the jury did not receive proper instructions or explanations on what charges could be brought forward against officers, or the laws that govern self-defense or justification. Without this critical information, jurors could only deliberate a narrow scope of the law — a scope defined and restricted by Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron.

That is not serving justice, it is a dereliction of duty. It’s also the primary reason why many well-meaning reform efforts happening across the country are doomed to come up short.

Attorney General Cameron’s handling of this investigation is not surprising or new, but rather underscores the culture of protection between prosecutors and law enforcement.

The relationship between law enforcement and prosecutors is necessarily entwined: they work hand in hand in criminal legal proceedings, and this professional familiarity and friendliness does not evaporate when police officers become defendants. While Attorney General Cameron’s intentional omission of information and potential charges feels especially egregious, the reality is that such decisions are being made all the time across the country, outside the attention of the public and the media.

If we aim to end the systemic abuses so painfully evidenced in Breonna Taylor’s killing, we need to change the policies and practices that govern this relationship. How? Truly independent prosecution for cases involving law enforcement.

Recognition of the conflict of interest presented by this relationship, and legislative action to respond to it, has already occurred in one US state. In 2014, Wisconsin began requiring independent investigations when a person is killed by a police officer in the line of duty.

And yet while this law has been lauded by many as a powerful check on police power, its breadth and significance have been restricted from the beginning. Beyond issues with the scope (what if someone is shot, but survives?), the policy has revealed the limits of justice when the prosecution of potential misconduct still lies in the hands of conflicted District Attorneys or Attorneys General. For while the law requires independent investigation, the decision to prosecute is returned to the hands of the local DA, who alone determines whether enough evidence has been gathered to justify charges. This detail helps to explain why so little has changed in Wisconsin since the law was enacted.

Assigning state or federal level prosecutors tasked solely with the work of investigating and prosecuting police misconduct charges so that local DAs no longer have that discretion would create an unbiased approach to seeking justice and would begin to heal communities disproportionately impacted by police brutality and go a long way to rebuilding trust that has long since evaporated.

The case of Breonna Taylor embodies the ways in which the current system of American policing continues to devalue Black life. The application for a no-knock warrant, the alleged failure of officers to knock and announce their presence when permission for the no-knock entry was withdrawn, the overwhelming deadly force employed, a police report rife with mistruths, and questions about whether the application for the warrant was based on fact, are among the many issues here that are typical of police abuse of force when raiding the homes of Black citizens for drugs.

Any form of “justice” that can be gained now is limited — it cannot bring Ms. Taylor back to her family and loved ones, and no settlement or charges will change that. But legal response, when genuinely enforced, can help to ensure that history does not repeat itself. If the officers responsible for Ms. Taylor’s killing were held accountable to the law they hold all other citizens to, it could avert future tragedies.

But this cannot occur when the individuals tasked with determining the charges and laying a path for recourse are working in partnership with those that have failed in their line of duty. In the same way that activists have long realized that the police cannot be expected to hold themselves accountable internally, neither can their peers and colleagues in the local DA’s office do so. As communities and legislators across the country continue to grapple with how to rein in and challenge the long-unchecked power of police, it is our hope that they take into consideration this critical relationship.

By Julia Yoo, President, NPAP

Julia Yoo is a nationally known civil rights attorney, based in San Diego and president of the National Police Accountability Project (NPAP), the country’s largest civil rights attorneys’ organization.