Field Notes: Breonna Taylor's lasting impact on Louisville
A deeper look at the action taken by lawmakers in the aftermath of Breonna Taylor's death
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Updated: 5:07 PM EST Jan 15, 2021
Courtenay Tucker
Field Notes: Breonna Taylor's lasting impact on Louisville
A deeper look at the action taken by lawmakers in the aftermath of Breonna Taylor's death
Share
Updated: 5:07 PM EST Jan 15, 2021
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hard night say her name thing is Selma of our generation on. We want the world to know that people from across the nation are going to converge in Louisville, Kentucky, to consistently fight from Brown Taylor, 911 Operator Harris. Where is your emergency? I don't I don't know what happened. If somebody kicked in the door inside my girlfriend, how does your girlfriend? She's 26. Bring you, said 26. What was she shot at? I don't know. He's on the grill like I don't know. I don't know. Okay, you said she's 26 of she alert and able to talk to you. No, she's not breathing tired. Okay, you said you're an apartment number four Around 1 a.m. March 13th, The Louisville Metro Police Department Criminal Interdiction unit executed a search warrant at the home of Briana Taylor. Taylor and her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, were inside at the time. According to the search warrant, police requested a no knock entry. But in a press conference the day after the shooting, police said they announced themselves before entering. It's been exactly two months since Briana Taylor was killed in an officer involved shooting at her home since then. Her family says they've got no answers. And her attorneys air calling the raid sloppy police work. We actually close our office on March 13. I will always remember that as far as when it relates to Cove it. We had a C l u was like, we're not gonna be in the office until further notice. So that was the same morning. You know, after 12 midnight that Rihanna was killed, the media wasn't really covering it. And then in March was when we started getting phone calls from different folks in the community about this is what happened. And on that call, I introduced myself. And I said, You know, I worked at a C l u and I will help change policy to ban no knock warrants. I had no idea what that meant. I hadn't talked to anyone on the team about it, but I knew that as we do stuff around policy, it was important that we take the lead on that word. And really, it just went from there. The goal was to draft something and to get community partners toe, look over it, give input, signed onto it, and we wanted as the community to present to our Metro Council as I'm doing that work, we found out that two members of Metro Council was actually in the process of drafting an ordinance, and so after talking to them, we gave them what we had, and they actually took what we gave them and added it into the ordinance that that first ordinance that they found in a unanimous vote, local Metro Council voted Thursday to ban Ln p d officers from using no knock warrants, calling it Brianna's Law. From the day that we launched that campaign to the day it passed, it was 16 days. She's she would be so happy. Briana, that's all she wanted to do was save lives. So with this law, she'll get to continue to do that The day that we were able to pass Brianna's Law in Louisville, one of the things that her mother said was passing This law allows Briana to do what she wanted to do, and that was to save lives. And she said that she would be able to save lives even in her death. And so for me, that's been my motivation and my course this is honoring my black woman. This is the way that we honor her and put politics to the side. And so we were able toe pass that in 16 days and hindsight 2020 Like looking back, I wish we would have slowed down toe like made that piece of legislation the model. I think that Brianna's law locally and Louisville is a model of like this is what means toe happen. But I do think that we fell short on some ways with it. What the local ordinances lacking that we're hoping to get done at the state level is the warrant process. So, like, yes, they did get a no knock warrant. But also one of the issues is the warrant process. So we learned later down the line that the information on the warrant was like over 30 days old. And so now that we've got Mawr, information about the case has allowed us to help shift and say, like what a larger statewide piece of legislation is. The people closest to the pain should be the closest to the solutions on. So that's why it's important that Rihanna's Law for Kentucky is born from legislators in Jefferson County. So you asked and we answered. You asked that we end home invasions by police, and that's what Brianna's Law for Kentucky does. With the passing of Brianna's law, Briana will continue to be able to do what she set her goals and like to do, and that was to save lives. So that's what we're gonna do. We're gonna pass Brianna's law. Meanwhile, here in Kentucky, all eyes are way are going to make that happen. Someone recently said that you know the language we use is bipartisanship, but the goal is justice. And so for me, when I look at passing Brianna's law, it's about saving human life. Yeah, it's important for her family that they minimize the risk of what happened to Briana Taylor happening to any other family in Louisville, Kentucky. But the settlement also includes a series of reforms to the Louisville Police Department. All search warrant applications will have to be approved by a commanding officer before they go to a judge. The city will also implement a program that tracks use of force incidents and complaints, and we'll negotiate with the police union to expand random drug testing and the records kept in an officer's personnel file. I don't think that we hardly ever see that. It's the first time we've ever seen it here in Louisville. So I think that that was a brilliant move from the legal team. Some of the things that were announced today, they were impressive. And for lawyers who I think normally people think it's just all about the money to say no, we care about something bigger than that. This mother cares that no other mother has to go through what she's gone through. It is a tremendous win for our community. I do think that it's a way to keep pressure on the city and say that these are things that you need to continue to dio way are tired and we have been tired for a long time. This is not new. This injustice is not new. Tow us. In fact, we have become conditioned for injustice and what you see now is protesters saying gnome or we are always going to raise our voices. We are always going to push for change. I think that this is a case that not on Lee is, ah, huge case for Kentucky, but Briana Taylor is at the center of a national conversation. It was too late to get folks to run for seats in this past election. But what we did do we have been occupying the space. We call it Injustice Square Park now, I mean, we were having voter registration. People were set up out to get people registered, to vote, to talk to people about voting and then from there, Actually, when it was time for early voting, we had a march. Some of our young leaders actually led us in a march from that space that we have been occupying to the polls. I think on that day we had about 75 to 100 people that marched and went and voted. A lot of folks were first time voters on whether they had never voted before or because they had just got their rights back due to a pass, a felony in their background so that that was a good way to pivot as faras. Teaching people like this is how you engaged civically and like this is what it means. Some of the young people were coming up with slogans and protest the policy from the streets to the board seats, you know, trying to really use the culture of what we were building to get folks to understand, like what's next? And so we will see what that looks like in 2021 2022. I think that in 2022 we will see some folks on the ballot who got civically engaged this year. During this time, her beautiful spirit and personality is working through all of us on the ground. So please continue to say her name. I think that one thing that it's taught me is that anyone really has the ability to change something that's happened in our society. We just have to really have the will to do that and make the right connections and and get the right team around you to make it happen. But it also makes me sad that it had to be because of Briana Taylor