By Sarah N. Lynch
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The U.S. Justice Department has asked a federal judge to sentence a former Louisville police officer who was convicted last year of violating Breonna Taylor’s civil rights to serve just one day in prison, despite the fact the conviction carries a maximum sentence of life in prison.
In a court filing, the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division late on Wednesday downplayed the conviction of former Louisville police officer Brett Hankison, noting he “did not shoot Ms. Taylor and is not otherwise responsible for her death.”
The filing said the one-day sentence would amount to time served since Hankison would “get credit for the day he was booked and made his initial appearance.”
Taylor, a Black woman, was killed by police in 2020 after they executed a no-knock warrant during a botched raid of her home. Her boyfriend, who was carrying a legally owned firearm, shot at police, prompting them to fire back 22 times into the apartment.
Her death, as well as the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, sparked mass racial justice protests around the country.
The Civil Rights Division during former Democratic President Joe Biden’s tenure brought criminal charges against the officers involved in both Taylor and Floyd’s death.
The division also launched civil rights probes which concluded that both the Louisville and Minneapolis police departments engaged in widespread civil rights abuses against people of color.
Harmeet Dhillon, the Trump-appointed head of the Civil Rights Division, killed efforts to enter into court-approved settlements with those departments, and rescinded the findings of civil rights abuses in May.
The sentencing memo submitted to the court in the Hankison case late on Wednesday was notable because it was not signed by any of the career prosecutors who had tried the case.
It was submitted by Dhillon, a political appointee, and her counsel Robert Keenan.
Keenan previously worked as a federal prosecutor in Los Angeles, where he argued that a local deputy sheriff convicted of civil rights violations, Trevor Kirk, should have his conviction on the felony counts struck and should not serve prison time because his actions amounted to a “low level of force.”
The efforts to strike the felony conviction led several prosecutors on the case to resign in protest, according to media reports and a person familiar with the matter.
Dhillon could not be immediately reached for comment on the sentencing recommendation.
(Reporting by Sarah N. LynchEditing by Andy Sullivan and Marguerita Choy)
