A federal judge on Monday sentenced former Louisville police officer Brett Hankison to nearly three years in prison over a drug raid that resulted in the death of Breonna Taylor in 2020.
The judge’s sentence dismissed a request from the Department of Justice that Hankison be sentenced to only one day in prison and three years of supervised release, according to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/21/us/politics/breonna-taylor-brett-hankison-prison.html">The New York Times</a>. Hankison was convicted of excessive use of force for firing rounds through Taylor’s window during a drug raid. None of the shots hit Taylor.
Harmeet Dhillon, who leads the Justice Department’s civil rights arm, had asked the judge in the case, Rebecca Grady Jennings, for a sentence that included only one day in prison which would have essentially amounted to time served.
The Taylor family attorneys, led by Ben Crump, said in a statement: “While today’s sentence is not what we had hoped for — nor does it fully reflect the severity of the harm caused — it is more than what the Department of Justice sought. That, in itself, is a statement. The jury found Brett Hankison guilty, and that verdict deserved to be met with real accountability.”
Dhillon’s request symbolized the shift in focus of the Trump Justice Department away from Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion and racial justice priorities that dominated the previous administration. Taylor’s case made national waves in the wake of George Floyd’s death and was promoted as another example of allegedly endemic racial bias in law enforcement.
Police shot and killed Taylor in March 2020 while executing a drug raid on her apartment in connection with convicted drug trafficker Jamarcus Glover, who was <a href="https://www.wdrb.com/news/jamarcus-glover-the-target-of-the-breonna-taylor-raid-sentenced-to-7-years-in-prison/article_44b58304-eb9d-11ee-bbac-1b9e491f9c14.html">sentenced</a> to seven years in prison last year for violating his probation. Police targeted Taylor’s apartment in connection with Glover, who had dated Taylor previous to the raid, because Glover had stayed at the apartment and at times received his mail there.
Unknown to police at the time, Taylor’s boyfriend Kenneth Walker was with her in the apartment on the night of the raid. Police first knocked, then broke down the door, surprising Taylor and Walker. Walker, who told police he thought Glover was breaking into the apartment, fired on police officers, hitting one in the leg. Officers fired back, missing Walker, but fatally striking Taylor.
Two other officers involved in the raid, former detective Joshua Jaynes and former Sgt. Kyle Meany, are facing charges related to violation of civil rights and obstruction of justice.

Brett Hankison

Cop Receives Three-Year Sentence In Breonna Taylor Case. DOJ Said One Day Would Be Enough

Breonna Taylor

Department of Justice

Harmeet Dhillon

<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/louisville" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Louisville</a>’s police routinely violate constitutional rights and federal law, the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/department-of-justice" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Department of Justice</a> (DOJ) said following a two-year investigation following the death of <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/breonna-taylor" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Breonna Taylor</a>.
The DOJ announced the findings of its investigation on Wednesday in a press conference and 90-page report. Federal investigators <a href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-finds-civil-rights-violations-louisville-metro-police-department-and" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said</a> their review found that officers of the Louisville Metro Police Department (LMPD) “engage in a pattern or practice of conduct that violates the U.S. Constitution and federal law.”
Some of the report’s findings include use of excessive force, executing search warrants without knocking or announcing, using invalid search warrants, and violating the rights of protesters.
The LMPD “[u]nlawfully discriminates against Black (sic) people in its enforcement activities” and “discriminates against people with behavioral health disabilities when responding to them in crisis,” the DOJ said.
“The Justice Department has concluded that there is reasonable cause to believe that Louisville Metro and LMPD engage in a pattern or practice of conduct that violates the constitutional rights of the residents of Louisville — including by using excessive force, unlawfully discriminating against Black (sic) people, conducting searches based on invalid warrants, and violating the rights of those engaged in protected speech critical of policing,” Attorney General Merrick B. Garland said in a statement.
Garland added that the DOJ will “work closely with Louisville Metro and LMPD to negotiate toward a consent decree and durable reforms that protect both the safety and civil rights of Louisville’s residents.”
The DOJ <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/doj-review-memphis-police-department-wake-tyre-nichols-death-rcna73973" target="_blank" rel="noopener">announced</a> Wednesday that it would begin a similar review into the practices and procedures of the Memphis Police Department, focusing on its special police units. The review was prompted after a handful of officers were seen on video allegedly beating Tyre Nichols to death in January.
The Department of Justice launched its review of LMPD after police shot and killed 26-year-old Breonna Taylor during a no-knock police raid. During the raid, Taylor’s boyfriend fired at officers, later saying he believed that intruders had broken into the home. Taylor was shot multiple times when police returned fire.
<a class="c-link" href="https://onelink.to/dwapp" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-stringify-link="https://onelink.to/dwapp" data-sk="tooltip_parent" aria-describedby="sk-tooltip-1082">CLICK HERE TO GET THE DAILY WIRE APP</a>
The DOJ has <a href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/current-and-former-louisville-kentucky-police-officers-charged-federal-crimes-related-death" target="_blank" rel="noopener">pursued</a> charges against four officers involved in the raid, alleging a number of civil rights violations, obstruction, and inappropriate use of force.
A grand jury <a href="https://www.axios.com/2022/08/04/breonna-taylor-shooting-charges" target="_blank" rel="noopener">indicted</a> one of the officers in September 2020 on charges of wanton endangerment and disregard for the safety of Taylor’s neighbors. The officer was later acquitted of the charges last year.

Demonstrators

DOJ Accuses Louisville Police Of Civil Rights Violations, Discrimination After Breonna Taylor Investigation

Kentucky

Louisville

U.S.

U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland on Thursday announced that a total of four officers, current and former, from the Louisville Metro Police Department have been federally charged for their involvement in the fatal raid on the apartment of Breonna Taylor.
In September 2020, Kentucky Republican Attorney General Daniel Cameron announced that no officers would be indicted for murder in Taylor&#8217;s case. The 26-year-old&#8217;s death sparked racially-charged protests and riots.
Garland announced Joshua Jaynes, Brett Hankison, Kelly Goodlett, and Kyle Meany had been slapped with charges for several alleged crimes, including lying to obtain a warrant that was used to search the home, the New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/04/us/breonna-taylor-officers-charged.html">reported</a>.
By allegedly lying, some of the officers “violated federal civil rights laws, and that those violations resulted in Ms. Taylor’s death,&#8221; Garland said.
After the feds began poking around the incident, Garland said at least three of the now-charged officers misled investigators, with two “[agreeing] to tell investigators a false story.”
Taylor was fatally shot by plainclothes officers who raided the woman&#8217;s Louisville, Kentucky, home back in March 2020.
Though the mainstream narrative surrounding Taylor’s death initially promoted the idea that she was killed when officers raided her home without knocking, media reports, testimony, and a statement from AG Cameron indicate that officers involved did knock before the raid.
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/exclusive-what-the-media-didnt-tell-you-about-breonna-taylors-shooting">Exclusive: What The Media Didn’t Tell You About Breonna Taylor’s Shooting</a>

CB1020EE-D089-40FB-A70A-72C05A4C1D35_1_201_a

Feds Slap Four Officers With Federal Charges In Breonna Taylor Raid

Feds Slaps Four Officers With Federal Charges In Breonna Taylor Raid

Merrick Garland

Police

Retired Louisville police sergeant John Mattingly, who was wounded during the Breonna Taylor raid in 2020, sat down with Tim Pool for an episode of his YouTube show, Timcast IRL, to discuss his experience and his new book, &#8220;<a href="https://www.amazon.com/12-Seconds-Dark-Officers-Firsthand/dp/1956007016">12 Seconds in the Dark: A Police Officer’s Firsthand Account of the Breonna Taylor Raid</a>,&#8221; which was published by Daily Wire Books on March 15. According to DW Books, Mattingly&#8217;s version &#8220;takes readers inside the Louisville Metro Police Department’s response to suspected criminal activity that night, debunking lie after lie about what happened.&#8221;
On Timcast, Mattingly broke down what the Catch 22 is for officers responding to riots, what he always feared most as a cop, and why the title of his book is &#8220;12 Seconds.&#8221;
As The Daily Wire previously <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/sgt-john-mattingly-the-cop-wounded-in-breonna-taylor-shooting-tells-his-story">reported</a>, in March of 2020, &#8220;Taylor lost her life as police served a narcotics warrant on the apartment where she was staying with her boyfriend Kenneth Walker. While the nation has spent two years saying her name, it has turned a blind eye to Louisville Police Sergeant John Mattingly, who nearly lost his life to a gunshot from Walker’s 9-millimeter handgun. Sgt. Mattingly says he and Taylor were both victimized by Walker in his new book “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/12-Seconds-Dark-Officers-Firsthand/dp/1956007016">12 Seconds In The Dark.&#8221; </a>
During the wide-ranging conversation which broke down the night Taylor was shot and killed by police and the aftermath, Pool predicted that law enforcement officers in the future would be &#8220;going to prison,&#8221; meaning that they will be arrested if they take certain steps to protect businesses and lives during potential future riots, like the uprisings during the summer of 2020 surrounding the deaths of George Floyd and other black Americans, like Taylor.
&#8220;And here&#8217;s the Catch 22 in that, I&#8217;ve sworn an oath to protect and to serve,&#8221; Mattingly explained. &#8220;And as a citizen, I&#8217;m looking at the cops going, &#8216;Why are you not acting when they&#8217;re burning our stuff down?'&#8221;
&#8220;Now they&#8217;re being told by command, they follow orders, unfortunately, — sometimes that&#8217;s good, sometimes that&#8217;s bad —  they&#8217;re following orders and they&#8217;re told to stand down,&#8221; Mattingly said of police. &#8220;And, a lot of them are looking at it now&#8230;going, &#8216;If I act I&#8217;m going to prison., Screw that, that building ain&#8217;t worth me going to prison.'&#8221;
&#8220;The citizens are mad at you because you&#8217;re letting stuff burn,&#8221; he continued. &#8220;The government&#8217;s mad at you if you do an act or they come at you, so it&#8217;s a no-win situation.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
.<a href="https://twitter.com/SgtMattingly?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@sgtmattingly</a> on the catch 22 cops are in when riots happen: &quot;The citizens are mad at you because you&#39;re letting stuff burn. The government&#39;s mad at you if you do act or they come at you, so it&#39;s a no win situation.&quot; <a href="https://t.co/ng4IQiMDux">pic.twitter.com/ng4IQiMDux</a>
&mdash; Daily Wire (@realDailyWire) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDailyWire/status/1508974646795948036?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 30, 2022</a></blockquote>
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Mattingly also added that his biggest fear has always been, &#8220;I don&#8217;t want to accidentally shoot or kill the wrong person. I mean that&#8217;s just a thought you&#8217;re constantly playing&#8230;because the fear is, &#8216;I only want to do the right thing, I don&#8217;t want to overstep these boundaries and in this position take somebody&#8217;s life because that&#8217;s a pretty heavy burden.&#8221;
As for why the book is titled, &#8220;12 seconds,&#8221; Mattingly said that was the amount of time it took for the raid and subsequent shooting of Taylor to occur.
&#8220;The title comes from the time that door was open until it was silent, no gunshot, the chaos stopped,&#8221; Mattingly explained. &#8220;And that was about 10-12 seconds from what we&#8217;ve tried to reenact it and see, and so much happens, so much chaos, so many things go through your mind in that 12 seconds that it&#8217;s just amazing how much damage can be done in that small amount of time and how much aftermath damage. The city, the country, the nation. From 12 seconds, and it&#8217;s just, it&#8217;s sad.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
.<a href="https://twitter.com/SgtMattingly?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@sgtmattingly</a> shares the meaning behind the title of his book, &quot;12 Seconds In The Dark&quot; published by <a href="https://twitter.com/DailyWireBooks?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@dailywirebooks</a>: &quot;It&#39;s just amazing how much damage can be done in that small amount of time and how much aftermath damage. The city, the country, the nation. From 12 seconds.&quot; <a href="https://t.co/sBszLdEDux">pic.twitter.com/sBszLdEDux</a>
&mdash; Daily Wire (@realDailyWire) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDailyWire/status/1508977014711242759?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 30, 2022</a></blockquote>
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According to the book&#8217;s Amazon page, Mattingly corrects the record on a myriad of stories that were distorted in national media, including.
<ul>
<li>The officers followed standard forced-entry protocol—and even gave the suspect more time than usual to respond before entering.</li>
<li>Taylor&#8217;s boyfriend inside the apartment most certainly knew it was the police who were at his door, despite falsely claiming the police did not announce or identify themselves.</li>
<li>Breonna should not have died that night, but her death did not happen the way the media told you.</li>
<li>In this gritty and suspenseful true story, Mattingly sets the record straight on this shocking story that gripped the nation.</li>
</ul>
The entire episode of Timcast IRL can be seen here:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="Timcast IRL - Russian Command Including Putin Reportedly Flee To Nuclear Bunkers w/John Mattingly" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/z6sGZ12nxn4?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Mattingly

Police Officer Shot In Breonna Taylor Raid Tells All To Tim Pool About The Night That Changed His Life

John Mattingly

Tim Pool

More than two years after Breonna Taylor&#8217;s death, a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/biden-admin-doj-looking-under-every-stone-regarding-federal-crimes-in-breonna-taylor-case-crump">federal investigation</a> grinds on. Yet retired Louisville Metro Police Department Sgt. John Mattingly, one of the officers who served the arrest warrant that night in March 2020, says he and his fellow officers have been tried in the court of public opinion and convicted on the basis of perjury. The following is an excerpt from his new book, &#8220;<a style="font-style: italic;" href="https://www.dailywire.com/shop/products/12-seconds-in-the-dark-by-sgt-john-mattingly">12 Seconds In The Dark: A Police Officer’s Firsthand Account of the Breonna Taylor Raid,</a>&#8221; available from The Daily Wire. See also my <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/exclusive-interview-sgt-john-mattingly-exposes-the-media-lies-about-breonna-taylors-shooting">exclusive interview with Mattingly</a> and my <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/sgt-john-mattingly-the-cop-wounded-in-breonna-taylor-shooting-tells-his-story">brief summary of portions of his book</a>. No complete account of the evening can omit his story from the conversation. – BJ.
When the videos of George Floyd surfaced from Minneapolis, the entire country gasped. I remember getting calls and texts. My response was that this was bad, really bad. I remember every police officer I talked to about this disagreed with the way things were handled, at least with the limited information and edited videos we saw. Being right in the middle of a situation that was perpetuated based on lies and misinformation, I was careful not to play “Monday morning quarterback,” but even with that in mind, it was hard not to accept what I saw. I knew that was NOT our policy on how to maintain control. Even if it were a tactic to gain control, I’d hope one would have enough common sense to reposition someone who was not an active aggressor or resisting. …
The common denominator between both tragedies is Benjamin Crump. He seems to sniff out the national stories that can make him a buck, get some screen time, and gain him more notoriety. He gets on TV like a televangelist and piggybacks the tragedies these families are going through. Maybe his intentions are good, but telling the truth to go along with those intentions is something he’s allergic to, evidently. You can’t say you are fighting for justice while causing injustice to others along the way.
Now we had the Breonna Taylor tragedy sandwiched between two other divisive national news stories that involved black and white in which Crump is controlling the narrative and has free reins to the media. These other cases were caught on camera, and both appeared to be injustices. The perfect storm was brewing, not only for Louisville, Kentucky, but for America and across the world. We have media and social media platforms that thrive off of divisiveness and hate. Americans will devour their own for the sake of a like or share. Americans are now WOKE, and you better be on their side or they will seek to destroy you. Myself and my coworkers were now on that radar, and the mob was out to destroy us.
On May 28 the recording of Kenneth Walker calling 911 was released to the media. In that phone call, you hear a person crying out that someone broke in and shot his girlfriend. The emotions sound real and could pull at your heartstrings if you didn’t know the entire story and the context of the call. The money-seeking attorneys that released the call knew exactly what they were doing. If they manipulated the way the evidence was released, then they would win the case in the court of public opinion. When that happens, there is a better chance of an out-of-court settlement, which means no additional discovery and depositions, which would have shed light from the other side of the story.
There are just a few problems with the narrative that was attached to the phone call and story surrounding it. This 911 call was placed over six minutes after the fatal encounter with police. The lawyers and media set up the narrative to imply that, while we were banging on the door attempting to make entry, Kenneth Walker called 911, not knowing we were the police. The facts are that we knocked and announced for so long that he had time to get dressed, obtain his firearm, and take a position in the hallway waiting for us to enter. Once the door was breached, we continued to announce ourselves as the police—all before the encounter. None of this was mentioned each time the call was shared on the news and social media. It was deflating to watch and hear one side presented while gag orders had been placed on us officers.
Let me play devil’s advocate for a minute. Let’s say Walker didn’t hear us announce and thought we were breaking into his home. Let’s say after he shot me, he still didn’t know we were the police. If that was indeed true, then why didn’t he call 911 during the minute the door was being banged on? Why didn’t he have his girlfriend hide while he addressed the perceived threat? Breonna had a phone in her hands when the tragedy happened, so why wasn’t she calling 911? Was she calling or texting someone else during the raid? That phone was locked and was never accessed to see its activity. Walker claims that, once fire was returned, after his “warning shot,” that he threw his gun under the bed in the sister’s room. Again, if he indeed did not know we were the police, then why in the world would he throw his only source of protection into another room? Walker claims he helped Breonna to the floor after she was tragically shot. Impossible. The bullet holes in the wall where he was originally standing would’ve struck him.
No. In reality, he shot his gun and dove to safety, leaving poor Breonna stranded in that narrow dark hallway. He waited over six minutes to call 911 and still claimed, implausibly, that he didn’t know who was outside. Within a few minutes of the shooting, many marked units were outside the apartment with lights and sirens. And who calls their mother before 911 if they think they’ve just been home-invaded, watched the love of their life murdered, and could still hear the people that did it outside their apartment? All the while he claimed to be holding Breonna with his door wide open. The position of her body in the hall makes the scene he’s described in his many interviews impossible. Lastly, who blames the love of their life as being the person who shot a cop so as to not incriminate himself? Who does that?? Logic and common sense combat all these lies that Kenneth Walker claimed.
There are recordings from jail just a few days after Kenneth lost the “love of his life.” He was so torn up about it all that he was trying to convince the girl on the other end to have phone sex with him. A few days later, he was recorded telling another girl that he loved her and was going to marry her. That doesn’t sound like a guy who was getting ready to propose to the love of his life. If so, he got over her pretty fast.
There are a lot of unanswered questions as to the phone calls made by Kenneth Walker before he surrendered. He was in that apartment for fifteen minutes after the initial incident. What was he doing that entire time? Was he flushing evidence? Was he staging his scene? Was he hiding an additional firearm, maybe the one he claimed Breonna shot? We’ve been accused of some outrageous claims, so I’d like to know the truth. He tells us, and phone records corroborate, that he called his mother, 911, and then Breonna’s mother before surrendering with no blood on his body or clothes. Does that sound like someone who held Breonna’s bloody body as she passed?
One very important interview that wasn’t discovered until the investigation was over was with LMPD Officer Donavis Duncan, conducted by the Public Integrity Unit in May of 2020. Officer Duncan lived in the same apartment complex as Breonna Taylor. He also went to middle and high school with Kenneth Walker and is a self-admitted friend. He knows Kenneth’s mother and came out of his apartment to the scene after the shooting. He stated that Kenneth Walker’s mother approached him on scene and said, “Kenneth called me and said they’re at the door.” She told Duncan that she replied, “Who’s at the door, baby?” She stated that Kenneth responded, “The police. I don’t know what they want.” She said, “Then he hung up.” I don’t know why this wasn’t a point of interest during the investigation or weighed in before dropping the charges on Walker since it clearly points to the fact that Kenneth Walker KNEW the police were at his door.
Minnesota had already begun to boil over from George Floyd’s death. The strategic timing in the release of the 911 call along with the manipulation of the events in the timeline caused Louisville to erupt. Ben Crump, Sam Aguiar, and Lonita Baker, all attorneys for Breonna Taylor’s family, were using the media as their mouthpiece to propagate their narrative and raise tension levels in the city.

Readers Pass – Johnson – Exclusive- What The Media Didn’t Tell You About Breonna Taylor’s Shooting_216x9

Exclusive: What The Media Didn’t Tell You About Breonna Taylor’s Shooting

Defund The Police

Police Brutality

Readers Pass

The Biden administration’s Justice Department remains committed to looking at “every possible civil rights violation that could have happened that led to the death of Breonna Taylor,” more than two years after the controversial shooting, <a href="https://www.wbko.com/2022/03/14/breonna-taylors-mother-goes-washington-seeking-justice-daughters-death/">according to</a> famed attorney Ben Crump.
Crump and Taylor&#8217;s mother, Tamika Palmer, met with representatives of the Department of Justice on Monday, more than 700 days after Taylor died in crossfire between police officers and Taylor&#8217;s boyfriend, Kenneth Walker. “They affirm that they are looking under every stone&#8221; for possible rights violations in the case.
Rumors swirled after the March 2020 shootout, which took place as members of the Louisville Metro Police Department served a warrant at Taylor’s apartment due to her alleged connection to a suspected drug dealer. Many of those tales were spread by Crump, according to one of the officers involved in the raid, retired LMPD Sgt. John Mattingly.
Crump fits the model of a &#8220;grimy defense attorney,” who &#8220;seems to sniff out the national stories that can make him a buck, get some screen time, and gain him more notoriety,&#8221; Mattingly writes in his new book, &#8220;<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/shop/products/12-seconds-in-the-dark-by-sgt-john-mattingly">12 Seconds In The Dark: A Police Officer&#8217;s Firsthand Account of the Breonna Taylor Raid</a>.&#8221; He &#8220;gets on TV like a televangelist and piggybacks the tragedies these families are going through.&#8221; Mattingly says the Taylor case was no exception. &#8220;Crump made his usual rounds on national television making false and slanderous allegations about the events of March 13 and the officers involved.”
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<blockquote>He started the false narrative that Breonna Taylor was asleep in her bed when she was killed. He said we didn’t knock or announce and in fact he claimed we changed our story from no-knock to knock and announce to fit our narrative. He claimed they called 911 as we were busting the door down, which is an absolute lie. &#8230; He said we were in plain clothes, which is true, but it’s misguided because he leaves out the fact we were clearly identified as POLICE with raid vests. Crump claimed we were at the wrong house and the suspect we were looking for was already in custody: 100 percent lies.</blockquote>
&#8220;Crump is very good at tying tragedies and injustices together to skew the narrative and hype up a crowd,&#8221; Mattingly concluded.
Walker shot Mattingly in the leg as he opened the door. Mattingly <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/sgt-john-mattingly-the-cop-wounded-in-breonna-taylor-shooting-tells-his-story">sets the record straight in his book</a>, as well as in <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/exclusive-interview-sgt-john-mattingly-exposes-the-media-lies-about-breonna-taylors-shooting">an exclusive interview with this author</a> for The Daily Wire.
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Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron similarly blasted Crump&#8217;s sensationalist manner after the grand jury dismissed charges against every police officer involved in the shooting, except wanton endangerment charges against Brett Hankinson, on September 23, 2020.
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“This is the Ben Crump model,” Cameron said. “He goes into a city, creates a narrative, cherry-picks facts to establish, to prove that narrative, creates chaos in a community, misrepresents the facts, and then he leaves with his money, and then asks the community to pick up the pieces. It is terribly offensive on his part to push such narratives, such falsehoods.”
A jury of his peers found Hankinson <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/ex-cop-involved-in-breonna-taylor-case-found-not-guilty">not guilty</a> of wanton endangerment earlier this month, returning a verdict in<a href="https://www.wdrb.com/news/former-louisville-police-detective-brett-hankison-found-not-guilty-on-charges-from-breonna-taylor-raid/article_3e04f822-9b2d-11ec-bd77-2b6f99611706.html"> just three hours</a>. Hankinson testified that when he heard gunshots fired in the apartment, he believed Walker was <a href="https://www.wdrb.com/in-depth/ex-lmpd-detective-testifies-he-believed-officers-were-being-executed-during-raid-of-breonna-taylors/article_0110613a-9a39-11ec-9056-13483f216d1b.html">executing</a> his fellow officers.
But Crump says he has found a receptive audience in the Biden administration. “We got an affirmation that the Department of Justice is not swayed with what happens with state charges,” Crump told the media.
At a joint press conference, Tamika Palmer said, “The most important thing is to remember that Breonna didn’t deserve this.&#8221; Mattingly, who expresses deep compassion for Taylor&#8217;s family in his book, agrees that Taylor did not deserve her fate, but he blames her boyfriend, Walker, for opening fire unprovoked, then leaving his girlfriend alone as police returned fire while he dove into an adjacent bedroom like a &#8220;coward.&#8221;
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Ben Crump

Biden Admin DOJ ‘Looking Under Every Stone’ Regarding Federal Crimes In Breonna Taylor Case: Crump

Benjamin Crump

The incident on March 13, 2020 — the night Breonna Taylor was shot — was tragic. It was one of many horrific incidents I’ve seen in my long police career. Breonna Taylor was caught up in the crosshairs of her ex-boyfriend’s drug dealing and criminal record, and she did not deserve to die. My heart, as I’ve said before, goes out to her family. 
But the lies, propaganda, and falsehoods that came in the months after the incident, targeting me, my family, and my fellow cops, were not justified.  
That’s why I’m telling my story. Lies affect people. They hurt communities. And they’ve hurt my family and everyone I love and hold dear. 
The Breonna Taylor incident became national news because the facts were intentionally skewed. Before the truth was out and before a proper investigation took place, politicians, media, and celebrities spread the story that cops, the three of us by name, had murdered Breonna Taylor in her sleep. And we did it because we were racists. 
Of course — these came with other lies about the case. That we didn’t have a search warrant for her apartment; that we didn’t identify ourselves before entering; and that we were in plainclothes and didn’t have police identification. 
These claims, among many others, were false. 
But when Alicia Keys releases a video naming each officer involved and repeats those lies, without proper examination of the truth, and it garners over 2.4 million views and subsequent shares, those lies become the facts of the story. 
When the media licks their chops at another potential racial altercation involving cops, and twist the story to fit their narrative, innocent men become murderers. 
When a list of celebrities, including LeBron James, Cardi B, George Clooney, Beyoncé, Common, Kim Kardashian, Demi Lovato, Ellen DeGeneres, Amy Schumer, Diddy, Ice Cube, Snoop Dogg, and many more peddle falsehoods, communities are torn apart, like Louisville was, property is damaged, and more people needlessly die. 
When Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, President and Vice President, demand we, the cops, be indicted—it’s no longer just a narrative, the truth itself has been set for the story.
Mark Twain is credited with the phrase, “A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.” Me, my family, and the officers involved discovered that first hand. 
Even when my fellow cops and I could speak publicly on the incident, months later, there was no fixing or altering the story that had been spun. Minds had already been made up. Michael Strahan interviewed me for three hours on ABC News. The result? A 10-minute edit of the interview, portraying me and my intentions in the worst possible light. 
In the public narrative, I was a murderer and white supremacist, who had gotten off scot-free. 
In the months following the incident, $50,000 bounties were placed on the heads of the cops involved and their family members. We had to flee the city of Louisville. Cops and their families were being hunted and doxed. 
My children, to protect them and their kids, needed 24-hour security for months afterwards, and weathered a constant storm of death threats, mysterious vehicle sightings, and a general concern for their safety. 
GoFundMe shut down my page to raise funds for the money we had lost throughout the whole incident, with no company policies to back up their decision.  
 And the ramifications went beyond the personal—the lies cemented devastating consequences for city of Louisville, for legislation, and for the communities where Breonna Taylor lived and others still live. A great deal of cops will no longer do their jobs, scared of the repercussions of any action or tragedy that happens in the line of duty. All because the media, along with celebrities, politicians, and corrupt prosecutors, were unwilling to seek the truth of the story and tell the facts. 
Many have said I simply need to “stop talking.” They’ve heard enough from me. But the truth matters. I’m not a murderer, as the media would like to tell you. I’m not a white supremacist as many have openly said. I’m a father, husband, and lover of Jesus Christ, and on the night of March 13th, 2020, I was simply doing my job. 
If we aren’t willing to hear each other out, if we resort to judging each other’s stories by labels, boxes, and lies propagated by the media, how will this country continue to make positive change? How will we, as Americans, look past those biased opinions, do our own research, and stand for truth? 
This Sunday marks two years from the night that took the life of Breonna Taylor and almost took mine. The media would have you only remember one side of the story. I ask you to put aside your bias and hear mine.
Sgt. John Mattingly, author of &#8220;<a href="https://www.amazon.com/12-Seconds-Dark-Officers-Firsthand/dp/1956007016" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.amazon.com/12-Seconds-Dark-Officers-Firsthand/dp/1956007016&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1647466286974000&amp;usg=AOvVaw3GI4ntZgLNlaSsA5XFdIgZ">12 Seconds in the Dark: A Police Officer’s Firsthand Account of the Breonna Taylor Raid</a>&#8220;, served Louisville as a police officer, with 21 years of dedicated service to the community he grew up in and loves.
The views expressed in this piece are the author&#8217;s own and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Breonna Taylor And The Night That Changed My Life

Daily Wire media reporter Ben Johnson held an exclusive interview with John Mattingly, who as a sergeant on the Louisville Metro Police Department was seriously wounded while serving a warrant on an address that had been linked to Breonna Taylor&#8217;s ex-boyfriend, a suspected drug dealer. Mattingly reveals the facts behind Breonna Taylor’s death in his new book, “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/12-Seconds-Dark-Officers-Firsthand/dp/1956007016">12 Seconds In The Dark</a>,”which is now available. We discuss the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/sgt-john-mattingly-the-cop-wounded-in-breonna-taylor-shooting-tells-his-story">legacy media’s deceptions</a> about the Breonna Taylor shooting, the threats his family lives under every day, and the way officials at every level of society turned their backs on a severely wounded officer in obedience to the Woke mob. This transcript has been lightly edited for grammar and clarity. — BJ.
BJ: What made you want to be a cop?
JM: Well, I grew up in a poor end of town. My dad was a pastor — still is; he&#8217;s been doing that for over 50 years — and we had a church in the inner city. People kept telling him, “Man, you’ve got to get out of the inner city to grow your church,” and he would tell them, “No, this is my calling. This is who I want to help.” I saw his heart, being willing to help other people and put aside financial gain. Everybody wants to be like their dad, so I thought I was going to follow in his footsteps. But growing up in that community, I saw the drug dealing; I saw the assaults; I saw the violence. Even as a kid, it made me mad that people would take advantage of other people, and I always just wanted to be a police officer; that&#8217;s how I wanted to help. When I was 27, I decided to go ahead and take the plunge, and I got on the department in 2000.
BJ: You recount some of your background on the force and some of the ways that you reined in Louisville’s narcotics trade in your book, “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/12-Seconds-Dark-Officers-Firsthand/dp/1956007016">12 Seconds In The Dark</a>.” You also talk about your role in serving the warrant that led to the Breonna Taylor shooting. What are the biggest lies that the legacy media told us about that night?
JM: One of the first ones they told was that we had the wrong apartment, and Breonna&#8217;s name was not on the warrant. Her name was on the warrant. Her vehicle was on the warrant, so we were at the right place. Another one, which continues to this day, is that she was asleep in her bed when she passed away. That&#8217;s not true: She was in the hallway with Kenneth Walker. There were many rumors out there that we were there to rob them or that we went back there to cover up after the fact. None of those things could be further from the truth. I mean, we were in a briefing with 50 other guys: There&#8217;s no way we leave that briefing to go to an apartment to “rob” people of their money. We were just there to assist the officers serving the warrant that night.
My department totally failed to get the truth out. The city failed to release the facts even to this day, and all that pushed the narrative that we were out here killing people in their sleep, breaking into their home, illegally going to rob them, covering up a crime — all these things that could have easily been debunked in the very beginning but weren&#8217;t. This caused a negative spiraling out of control of hate — even more hate for the police than already existed.
BJ: You describe the drama that unfolded as soon as you got there, including how you ended up receiving a life-altering injury as a result.
JM: Yeah. When we knocked and announced, we gave [Walker] about 45 seconds to a minute to come to the door. We never got a response. My boss at the time looked at me and gave me the nod to go ahead and ram the door. Once the door came open, before I could even get in the house, I was met with gunfire from Kenneth Walker from about 25-30 feet away. He and Breonna were shoulder-to-shoulder down this narrow hallway, and unfortunately, the coward in him dove out of the way and left her standing there. After he shot me, she attempted to follow him, and she was caught in the crossfire.
BJ: It’s a tragedy. One of the intriguing lines in your book — which is incredibly engaging — is that you believe Breonna Taylor might still be alive today if you had served a “no-knock” warrant, as you were charged with doing by the media. Help our readers understand why that might be.
JM: Yes. Like you said, the media still push to this day that it was a “no-knock” warrant. We had a bill passed called “Breonna&#8217;s Law,” which banned “no-knock” warrants in Kentucky. If we had only done a “no-knock,” then I believe Breonna would be alive, because we gave them so much time that they were able to get up, get dressed, get a weapon, and wait for us at the end of the hall when we came in. Had we done this as a “no-knock,” like the warrant was signed, then we would have had the advantage psychologically and in terms of time. People can&#8217;t really gather their senses in the first 10-15 seconds after you wake them up in their sleep. You come in, and you have an aggressive tone — not to be mean — but just to control the situation so that incidents like this do not happen. We were asked at the briefing to give her some extra time to open the door, because the main target of their investigation was going to another location. So, we gave it time, and I believe that was a mistake.
BJ: You believe this was an ambush?
JM: Oh, most certainly. He knew. Whether he claims he knew we were the police at the door or not, he knew someone was at the door. When they downloaded his phone, they found that Mr. Walker has a history of allegedly committing robberies: A lot of the time, the way drug dealers are robbed — at least in Louisville — is if the person robbing them can&#8217;t get them on the jump outside of a car or a club, then they go to their house. When they&#8217;re doing home invasions, they will bang on the door and yell, “Police!” And once that door is opened, they act as the police until they get in and do their business. And Kenneth Walker had talked on his text messages about how he cases places out, and he only does it if it&#8217;s a certain amount. My belief is — and in his interview, he said — he thought it was [Breonna Taylor’s] other boyfriend. But I think maybe part of his muscle memory thought, “Man, it&#8217;s coming back on me, what I&#8217;ve been doing to other people.” Whether he thought we were the police, whether he thought we were a bad guy: Yes. It was an ambush in waiting.
BJ: Obviously, everyone has “said the name” Breonna Taylor at this point, but people don&#8217;t necessarily know your name. They don&#8217;t realize that another life might have been lost. When you came through that door, bullets were flying, and one of them ended up striking your femoral artery. What happened from your perspective?
JM: I immediately knew I was shot, but even so, I was able to return fire. Then when I reached down and felt my leg, I felt a substantial amount of blood in my hand. I&#8217;ve been through first aid training for almost 20 years, so I knew a bleed like that in the leg wasn&#8217;t normal unless it hit an artery. So, my first thought was, “I&#8217;ve got to get off my feet, because if I move around, it&#8217;s going to pump more blood through my leg.” I was able to get to a point of safety between some vehicles, and I started asking for a tourniquet. Once the tourniquet went on, I knew I had a certain amount of time to get to the hospital and get this thing treated, or I was going to lose my leg due to the pressure. And I&#8217;ll tell you, being shot hurt, but the tourniquet is where the real pain came in. I wouldn&#8217;t want to go through that again in a million years.
BJ: Thank God you were able to get out alive, and you&#8217;re still walking around today on earth. But you talk about your recovery process. Even after all the bullets were fired in that house, you still faced a real threat of death for months after this, didn&#8217;t you?
JM: Oh, yeah. Getting shot was the easiest part of this whole ordeal. I’ve still got some numbness and some issues, but that was the easy part of this. The hard part came about a month-and-a-half afterward when we received word from the FBI that there were credible or verifiable threats, through separate sources, that a hit had been taken out on us officers involved. At that point, it is midnight, and I&#8217;m rounding up my entire family — my kids, their children, my parents, my sister — because we&#8217;d all been doxxed at this point. We&#8217;d all had threatening messages sent to us. And the FBI told us, “You&#8217;ve got to get out of your house. You got to find somewhere to go,” so we were able to round everybody up and get them to a safe location.
And the sad part is, the threats are still there because the investigation has been dropped by the FBI, due to the social implications and the outside pressures of this being a national media story that contains a white officer and a black individual who was killed. It was so hot in the media that they pushed this [investigation into threats against Sgt. Mattingly’s family] to the side and tried to ignore it or bury it. They weren&#8217;t even going to tell us about it.
Fortunately, I&#8217;ve got a pretty good attorney, and we kept digging and digging. We found out that they had been lying, and the case was closed. But the uncertainty of always having to look over your shoulder — I can handle it, but I hate it for my family.
BJ: And of course, one of the things that came up is how quickly the FBI closed their case. How fast was it closed?
JM: It was about 10 days, to the best of our knowledge. From the intel we got from inside and from what my attorney was able to dig up, the FBI closed the case in about 10 days. And if anybody knows anything about the FBI, they do not close a case in 10 days. As a matter of fact, we&#8217;re still going through the process with the FBI and DOJ over the shooting itself almost two years later. So, why they would close a case that&#8217;s parallel to this one, that involves this one, is beyond me.
BJ: Certainly, your family’s stress still remains to this day, as well. You mentioned in your book that people like Oprah Winfrey and Alicia Keys and others commented on your case. Several people have said that you&#8217;re “privileged,” because you&#8217;re a police officer; you&#8217;re from the area; you&#8217;re white; you have certain relationships with law enforcement that give you a certain structural power, according to them. How privileged did you feel when the FBI opened and closed that investigation in 10 days?
JM: Yeah, there&#8217;s not much privilege. The only privilege I have is that, fortunately, I&#8217;ve been saved, and I know where I&#8217;m going if I do die. That&#8217;s the privilege I have. But as far as being white, being a cop — that did nothing. The department totally distanced itself from me. And the FBI works as a political machine. I knew that, but I was still disappointed because I still thought, being a cop for 20 years and working with these guys over at the FBI (I had FBI clearance at the time), you would think that they would be more concerned about it. But when politics come into play, all that goes out the door. There&#8217;s no such thing as privilege. There&#8217;s political privilege, but there&#8217;s no white privilege.
BJ: You mentioned several politicians in your book, but most of them are acting in an ignoble manner. We might say the one shining exception is Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron, who steps forward and tells the truth. How refreshing is it for someone who is literally in the crosshairs, when a politician disregards the Woke mob and just speaks the truth?
JM: Well, I had faith going in, because Cameron speaks about his faith and about what guides him morally, and his integrity. I was hoping that holds true, because you hear a lot of politicians talk about that, and when the pressure&#8217;s on, they just cave. But I held out hope. I prayed that Attorney General Cameron would just go by the facts and, if he found the facts to be against us, then so be it. But I wanted him to go by the law, the facts, and the letter of the law. And that&#8217;s what he did.
And he caught criticism. He caught heat. Everybody was saying, “Well, they should have at least gone to trial and let the jury figure it out” — but that&#8217;s not how the system works. Everybody&#8217;s confused on how grand juries work. People think every charge goes before a grand jury, regardless of whether it has any merit or any depth to it, and the grand jury is just going to indict and let a jury take it, but that&#8217;s not how it works. There have been many cases I&#8217;ve taken to the Commonwealth attorney or the district attorney and said, “Can we prosecute this?” and they look at the facts, they look at the evidence, and they say, “It doesn&#8217;t meet the elements of the charge, so we can&#8217;t even present it to a grand jury.” And that&#8217;s what happened here. Cameron did exactly what his position has authority to do. This was a rare example of that.
BJ: You literally close your book with a prayer. You write that you were shot, you were lied about, and your family faced potentially being hunted down by multiple criminal gangs. How important was your faith in getting you through all these stressful events in your life?
JM: Oh, it was the anchor. While I&#8217;m a Christian, and I have a relationship with God, I don&#8217;t go to church three times a week. But my faith in God has been grounded there. It was embedded in me since I was a child. And if I didn&#8217;t have that to fall back on, I&#8217;m not sure what I would have done. My encouragement to other people is simply: Find your faith. Have a relationship with God, because in all these trying times that we&#8217;re coming up on — I mean, look at our nation right now in the world; we’re in some scary times — if you don&#8217;t have something to believe in and ground yourself in, then you&#8217;ll be all over the place.
That&#8217;s my hope for the future of our country, too — that we can just come together and realize that most of us have the same common goals:” We want to be left alone. We want our freedom. We want to be able to choose for our families what we think is right. And I don&#8217;t want an overreaching government, especially on police departments, because there, there is a fine line where we can abuse authority. I mean, you saw what happened in Canada. You&#8217;ve seen what&#8217;s happened enforcing some of these vaccine mandates. And I think that&#8217;s overreach. I think you&#8217;re sworn to uphold the Constitution. And if you go outside those lines, then people shouldn&#8217;t respect you. People shouldn&#8217;t just “back the blue” blindly. I think we back the blue when they&#8217;re doing the right thing, and when they&#8217;re wrong, we call them out. When you do that, that gives you more credibility.
BJ: Of course, in your book, you also mention how you can too far in the opposite direction by being too soft on crime. You write about how, even before this particular incident, city officials would bow to the Woke constituency and enact soft-on-crime policies. What ends up happening when police do that?
JM: Two things happen: First, these guys realize there&#8217;s no punishment for what they do. There&#8217;s no accountability, so they&#8217;re going to roll the dice. It&#8217;s a lifestyle, whether they&#8217;re selling drugs or robbing people, the lifestyle is easier for them than going out and having a job, waking up early, and working hard. So, they often become repeat offenders, and that hurts society. These judges are letting people who get a 10-year sentence for manslaughter out in a year-and-a-half, two years. And all they do is they jump right back into the game. Society is getting demolished by this.
The second part of that is that we are dealing with the same people over and over, and they become emboldened. They get let out and realize, “They&#8217;re not going to do anything to me.” And they hear all this rhetoric from the Left and from the progressives about how the police are bad, the police are at fault. They know there&#8217;s not going to be much done to them, so we’ve seen the courthouses were attacked and the police officers were attacked. And there&#8217;s no accountability for that. And when police have to deal with these violent repeat offenders over and over again, that&#8217;s when you start to see the use of force rise. That&#8217;s when you see a lot of these incidents where the police have to subdue someone forcefully, and someone dies. Then, that blows up in the media. Most of the time those guys should have already been in prison. They should have never been out to have contact with the police. And they&#8217;re a menace to society. Until we start holding them accountable, we&#8217;re going to just keep seeing a cycle of crime — and we&#8217;re definitely in the middle of that cycle.
BJ: Last question for you: If a young man came to you today and said he wanted to be a police officer, with LMPD or any other unit, what would you tell him?
JM: I would tell him to proceed with caution. I do believe we need good police officers, so I would never deter someone from the calling that they believe God wants them to do. If my boys came to me, I&#8217;d say, “Man, I&#8217;ll support you, but we’re in scary times.” But I want good cops, so I would encourage anybody who&#8217;s got that desire, that drive to do it for the right reasons.
BJ: And tell the politicians to let them do their jobs, right?
JM: Oh, exactly. I wish the politicians would do their own job first.
Related:
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/sgt-john-mattingly-the-cop-wounded-in-breonna-taylor-shooting-tells-his-story"> John Mattingly, The Cop Wounded In Breonna Taylor Shooting, Tells His Story</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/deeply-corrupt-and-a-congenital-liar-an-exclusive-interview-with-the-woman-who-reviewed-hunter-bidens-laptop-firsthand">‘Deeply Corrupt And A Congenital Liar’: An Exclusive Interview With The Woman Who Reviewed Hunter Biden’s Laptop Firsthand</a></li>
</ul>
The views expressed in this opinion piece are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Exclusive Interview: Sgt. John Mattingly Exposes The Media Lies About Breonna Taylor’s Shooting

Two years ago this week, Breonna Taylor lost her life as police served a narcotics warrant on the apartment where she was staying with her boyfriend Kenneth Walker. While the nation has spent two years saying her name, it has turned a blind eye to Louisville Police Sergeant John Mattingly, who nearly lost his life to a gunshot from Walker&#8217;s 9-millimeter handgun. Sgt. Mattingly says he and Taylor were both victimized by Walker in his new book “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/12-Seconds-Dark-Officers-Firsthand/dp/1956007016">12 Seconds In The Dark</a>,” which The Daily Wire released this week. Mattingly exposes how his own heart broke for Taylor; how “grimy” attorneys and activists lied about the police’s actions that night, and how a compliant legacy media repeated those lies. Mattingly reveals he and his family have had to flee their home repeatedly while plagued by the fear of death threats which has yet to abate two years later. Perhaps most jarringly, until now, the Mattingly family’s peril has been rendered invisible by an ideologically driven media more interested in advancing a political agenda than helping victims of injustice.
Wounded by lies
The narrative around Breonna Taylor’s shooting claimed that plain-clothes police officers armed with a “no-knock” warrant busted into the apartment in the dead of night; that Breonna Taylor’s name was not on their warrant; that the officers never considered announcing themselves before barging in and gunning down Taylor in her sleep; that the cops killed an innocent person with negligence or malice; and that they dodged any serious legal consequences.
Many erroneous tropes emanated from Benjamin Crump, “Walker’s grimy defense attorney,” whom Mattingly says chases money and notoriety for his own gain. A separate allegation surfaced from a U.S. postal inspector, who claimed no suspicious packages had been delivered to Taylor’s address. Mattingly delves into the bureaucratic feud between police and USPS investigators that makes up part of the backstory before relying on his years in law enforcement to dispute the charge. “[M]ost illegal packages are not sent in the intended receiver’s name. For instance, if I wanted something illegal sent to me, I would have the package sent to a fictitious name and to an address that didn’t belong to me,” Mattingly explains. “This gives the receiver of the parcel plausible deniability, and if a search query for a suspect’s name is run for parcels, it’s not red-flagged because it’s not in their name.” Mattingly’s mixture of expertise and experience pervades every page of this page-turner.
For instance, Mattingly contests the most prevalent charge — that police served a “no-knock” warrant — by saying that he providentially snapped a picture of the officers’ pre-raid instructions. “Later that picture was used to show that the warrant had been changed to a ‘knock and announce’ warrant unlike the narrative that the attorneys and media have pushed,” Mattingly remembers. “We were asked to give Taylor more time than normal to answer the door.” (Emphasis in original.)
While the police did not wear their uniforms, Mattingly notes, “We were all wearing black tactical vests that were issued by our department for this purpose with ‘POLICE’ clearly stated on the front and back of our vests.” Those who have seen reporters in war-torn Ukraine wearing vests emblazoned with the word “MEDIA” may get a sense of how clear the lettering was. Yet legacy and social media outlets reported on the officers “as if we were breaking into this apartment in plain clothes to avoid being identified as police.”
Mattingly says his men knocked in loud bursts, five separate times, each time clearly announcing they were “police” before entering the apartment — something he claims gave Kenneth Walker time to prepare his assault. “By this time, we had been knocking and announcing for forty-five seconds to a minute,” he writes. “This seems like an eternity when you are on the other side of an unknown threat.”
Mattingly’s description of what happens as he entered the apartment varies greatly from the story told by the media. He indelibly remembers seeing two people in the dimly lit hallway:
<blockquote>The two figures were standing side by side at the end of the hallway, so close to each other that they could have been one, but I could see that one of the individuals was considerably taller than the other. That was the only defining difference in that millisecond. I couldn’t tell if they were black or white, male or female. The taller figure, on the right, was stretched out in an ‘Isosceles Stance’—feet shoulder-width apart and both arms ex- tended. My eyes fixated on the barrel of the 9mm semi-auto handgun that the man I now know was Kenneth Walker had outstretched. By the time my mind registered it was a gun, I saw the flash, heard the bang, and felt the smash to my thigh simultaneously. The bullet had ripped through the wallet in my front pocket and penetrated my thigh. It was like a piercing hot rod going through my leg.</blockquote>
He crawled back out of the apartment, blood gushing out of his wounded artery, and eventually received medical treatment. As his lieutenant tightened the tourniquet around his leg “so hard I thought I saw Jesus,” he writes, “I could hear the sirens and commotion in the background as officers were attempting to set up a perimeter and call the occupants of the apartment out. There’s no way at this point, a few minutes after the initial incident, that Kenneth Walker didn’t know it was the police outside, yet he chose to stay inside the apartment for fifteen minutes before exiting, claiming he didn’t know who we were.”
For someone who nearly lost his physical life, and whose family’s lives now exist under a constant threat of violence, Mattingly shows remarkable respect for Taylor. “Breonna DID NOT deserve to die on March 13, 2020. Therefore, I have no problem with people saying her name,” he writes. He says that he simply wants those who mourn Taylor’s death to understand the ways her boyfriend imperiled her:
<blockquote>As I lay in the hospital bed thinking about the events that had taken place, I remember telling my wife I wish I could ask Kenneth Walker some questions. I would ask him why Breonna was standing right there next to him. Why so close? Why put her in harm’s way if you truly thought we were intruders? Why leave her in the hallway while you jumped to safety after you fired the shot that hit me? The WHY is what has plagued my mind. None of it made sense in that moment, and none of it makes sense now. 
No one had to die that night. No one had to get injured. We went above and beyond to get someone, anyone, to answer that door. We went against our training and logic and gave those inside the opportunity to formulate a plan, believing our job is to preserve life, not take it. &#8230; Police are not in the business of murder.</blockquote>
Mattingly wants Breonna Taylor remembered, but he wants her mourners to know that “Breonna’s tragedy is NOT one of racist police violence.”
As he pondered Taylor’s unjust death and his own life-altering suffering, the mayor and one of the city’s assistant police chiefs visited a severely wounded Mattingly in his hospital room. The sergeant says the contrast between this respectful visit and their later silence or acquiescence to the social justice warriors taught him a lesson: “As long as the media and woke mob aren’t hounding you, you have politicians’ support, but as soon as the tide turns and it’s not in their best interest, they disappear never to be heard from again.” The full force of the cancel culture would soon set itself against him.
Canceled by lies
The Breonna Taylor shooting fit the legacy media’s template of “systemic racism” too well to be fact-checked. “I’ve been around this business long enough to know how narratives get twisted. I knew the fact that I am a white police officer and Breonna Taylor was an unarmed black female gave this tragedy all the dynamics to explode into something it wasn’t, something race-driven,” he writes. “In today’s society, there’s nothing the media salivates over more than a good black/white narrative. It pushes ratings and increases their bottom line.”
The rest of “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/12-Seconds-Dark-Officers-Firsthand/dp/1956007016">12 Seconds In The Dark</a>” reveals a society turned upside-down by lies. Mattingly claims that the city refused to refute the media’s lies, even after he notes that a Black Lives Matter activist posted the names and contact information of himself and his fellow officers online. He notes with pain and distress the way his family had to flee their home on multiple occasions due to credible threats that someone — or in some cases, multiple gangs — would assassinate one or all of his loved ones in revenge. He notes how after the sale of his home, people continued to threaten the new owners, an Indian-American couple. The constant threat of harassment or death turned the most mundane of affairs into a pressure cooker. “Going to the grocery store was now more of a protection detail than a family chore,” he writes.
Yet Mattingly claims that officials refused to pursue charges against the suspected perpetrators of any of these actions, nor against Walker, on the basis of “optics.” Politicians cut deals with community organizers and enacted soft-on-crime policies that saw neighborhoods erupt with riots and the most vulnerable get victimized by rampant crime. “It’s sad how the good guys are demonized, and criminals are canonized,” he writes.
Of course, optics are the opposite of justice: Lady justice’s blindfold bars judges from taking note of the media narrative, the defendants’ race, or any other factor outside how the weight of the evidence tips her scales. “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/12-Seconds-Dark-Officers-Firsthand/dp/1956007016">12 Seconds In The Dark</a>” tracks how often public officials denied Mattingly and his family this cornerstone of society. “I too had been shot, but I was ignored as a victim by the FBI, lost my career, lost money, had to sell my house, lost privacy, lost my freedom and my sense of security, lost sleep, been stressed, worried for my family’s safety, been forced to leave town. All for doing the job that was asked of me that night,” he writes.
Politicians did not cower in fear alone: Mattingly says that the corporate and professional world also shut him out. Mattingly found himself struggling to find an attorney who would take him as a client. “Only one lawyer out of the group had the guts to tell me what I already knew. He told me that, due to his clientele base, taking me on would destroy his business,” he wrote. “No one wanted to be canceled, and from a logical standpoint I can’t say I blame them.” But becoming the shunned outcast of a twisted media narrative “did start to open my eyes to things,” he wrote: American culture awards privilege based, not on race, but on the acceptance of Woke politics. “Suddenly, the privileges afforded some were not being afforded to others due to race and profession. So, I guess Oprah” Winfrey, who had inserted herself into the issue, “was wrong. My whiteness didn’t give me that unfair advantage or even a fair playing field. I’m simply a white guy in a WOKE world.”
Mattingly even found himself unable to raise funds to help his family survive after his long legal and physical ordeal. He writes that when he reluctantly agreed to have a friend open a GoFundMe page on his behalf, the platform shut it down within seven hours. “The bias against police and the immense pressure put on by these celebrities even extended to crowd funding organizations,” wrote Mattingly. “The low blows just seemed to keep coming. I’ve asked myself on many occasions, ‘Do the good guys ever win?’”
The question must still haunt him, as he and his family continue to hide for their own safety. When police find themselves reduced to the level of fugitives, taking their family on the lam because they served the justice system, every corner of American society should find itself haunted.
But first, his story has to be told.

Sgt. John Mattingly, The Cop Wounded In Breonna Taylor Shooting, Tells His Story

During a podcast on Monday, Megyn Kelly called out celebrities who she said &#8220;stoked the fires&#8221; against Louisville Metro Police Department Sgt. John Mattingly and his family over his involvement in the Breonna Taylor raid.
Mattingly, author of &#8220;<a href="https://www.amazon.com/12-Seconds-Dark-Officers-Firsthand/dp/1956007016/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2VA12HVC79HHW&amp;keywords=12+seconds+in+the+dark+mattingly&amp;qid=1647308240&amp;sprefix=12+Seconds%2Caps%2C166&amp;sr=8-1">12 Seconds in the Dark: A Police Officer&#8217;s Firsthand Account of the Breonna Taylor Raid,</a>&#8221; told Kelly about what he called the &#8220;false narrative&#8221;  — driven by legacy media and celebrities like Oprah Winfrey, George Clooney, and even then- Vice Presidential nominee Kamala Harris — that took over the case. Mattingly, who was part of the raid, was shot by Taylor&#8217;s boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, the night Taylor was killed.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/megyn-kelly-levels-jussie-smollett-in-post-sentencing-rant-i-dont-feel-sorry-for-him-at-all">Kelly</a> said Taylor&#8217;s death was &#8220;awful&#8221; and that no &#8220;one thinks it was justified.&#8221;
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Kelly shared an Oprah tweet, which said, &#8220;that Louisville police entered her [Taylor&#8217;s] apartment unannounced.&#8221; The host noted that Mattingly calls this claim &#8220;false&#8221; in his book. &#8220;Alicia Keys is the one who tweeted out &#8216;say her name,'&#8221; Kelly added. &#8220;Millions and millions of shares. Tens of millions of people saw it.&#8221;
&#8220;And even the now Vice President of the United States, she was running for office then, Kamala Harris, tweeted out &#8216;there are two systems of justice when peaceful protestors are arrested and the police who murdered Breonna Taylor almost three months ago still roam free,'&#8221; Kelly continued.
The former NBC host said it wasn&#8217;t just Harris, but George Clooney and rapper Snoop Dogg, too.
&#8220;As if Snoop Dogg knows absolutely anything about this case or any other,&#8221; Kelly explained, as she pointed out stars like LeBron James and Ice Cube who talked about the case.
&#8220;It was stoked by all these celebrities with tens of millions of dollars,&#8221; the former TV host shared. &#8220;I imagine you with 21 years of service under your belt do not have tens of millions of dollars. Or your kids&#8230;who were also getting death threats as all these extremely famous people stoked the fires against your family.&#8221;
At one point in the show, Kelly said she understood the book was to be picked up by Simon &amp; Schuster, who she said &#8220;had agreed to publish&#8221; it, and then they got &#8220;too afraid&#8221; and they pulled it.
&#8220;And the Daily Wire picked it up and is publishing it. Is that correct?&#8221; the host asked as Mattingly confirmed it was true.
Kelly said &#8220;thank god for Ben and Jeremy Boreing and the guys at Daily Wire.&#8221;
&#8220;And what cowards at Simon &amp; Schuster,&#8221; the TV host said. &#8220;What cowards&#8230; The climate on policing has changed considerably since their cowardice. People are realizing how important police are. What happens after you unfairly demonize them city after city and defund them.&#8221;
Kelly said that defunding the police was something the &#8220;black community was never in favor of,&#8221; and it was only the Black Lives Matter organization and &#8220;white upper side liberals&#8221; who pushed it.
&#8220;The book&#8217;s not by Simon &amp; Schuster, it&#8217;s by the Daily Wire,&#8221; she added. &#8220;Support John, support the Daily Wire, buy the book.&#8221;
Enter for the chance to hang out with Gina Carano at the premiere of her new Daily Wire movie, Terror on the Prairie! Two lucky Daily Wire members will be given the complete red carpet treatment – free airfare, hotel, premiere car service, and exclusive merch. Daily Wire members can click <a href="http://www.dailywire.com/redcarpet">here</a> to enter for a chance to win. If you’re not a Daily Wire member yet, click <a href="http://dailywire.com/subscribe">here</a> to join us so you can win this once-in-a-lifetime experience.

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Megyn Kelly Calls Out Celebs Who ‘Stoked The Fires’ Against Officer Involved In Breonna Taylor Raid

Former Louisville Metro Police detective Brett Hankison was found not guilty in charges related to the raid that ended in Breonna Taylor’s death.
“The wanton endangerment trial of Hankison, 45, was sent to a jury of eight men and four women just before noon Thursday after five days of witness testimony and a morning of closing arguments,” the <a href="https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/local/breonna-taylor/2022/03/03/jury-verdict-in-brett-hankison-breonna-taylor-shooting-trial/6976351001/">Louisville Courier Journal</a> reported. “It didn&#8217;t take them long to make a decision that brought protesters back out onto downtown Louisville&#8217;s streets.”
Ben Crump — the attorney representing Taylor’s family — condemned the verdict. “The lack of accountability showcased in every aspect of Breonna’s killing speaks to how much more work there is to be done before we can say our justice system is fair and our system of policing is protective of people of color,&#8221; said Crump, who formerly represented the the families of Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, and George Floyd.
In the summer of 2020, the Breonna Taylor case <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/breaking-multiple-police-officers-shot-in-louisville-as-anti-police-riots-hit-city">gained</a> national attention as protesters and rioters took to the streets. Alongside the death of George Floyd, the death of Taylor provoked calls for police reform ahead of the general election, from which President Joe Biden emerged victorious.
However, the mainstream media narrative of the incident was often embroiled in political narratives and far from forthright.
In a new book due for release on March 15 from The Daily Wire, Sergeant John Mattingly — the lead officer on the scene — details the true account of the tragic night. In <a href="https://www.amazon.com/12-Seconds-Dark-Officers-Firsthand/dp/1956007016">12 Seconds in the Dark: A Police Officer’s Firsthand Account of the Breonna Taylor Raid</a>, Mattingly “takes readers inside the Louisville Metro Police Department’s response to suspected criminal activity that night, debunking lie after lie about what happened.”
Contrary to the media’s narrative, Mattingly writes that his team followed standard forced-entry protocol and explicitly identified themselves — even allotting the suspect more time than usual to respond.
Indeed, several family members of African Americans who died during encounters with police — including the mother of Breonna Taylor — have taken <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/benefitting-off-the-blood-of-our-loved-ones-mothers-of-tamir-rice-breonna-taylor-slam-patrisse-cullors-black-lives-matter">aim</a> at the national Black Lives Matter organization and its former co-founder, Patrisse Cullors, for profiting off the deaths of their loved ones. Last year, Cullors <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/breaking-blm-co-founder-patrisse-cullors-resigns-amid-controversy?itm_source=parsely-api%3Futm_content%3Dnews&amp;_hsmi=130234787&amp;_hsenc=p2ANqtz-_bPMdXg3MZDYypvmyRXKNy_2TEFwcVtT7EKD6AssAxzhezN7Q6JrjTST1xg7jAjy3Uv3o1-TYolu_O5fjQYAEcvvEYBA">resigned</a> from the controversial activist organization following revelations of her multimillion-dollar home buying spree.
“We never hired them to be the representatives in the fight for justice for our dead loved ones murdered by the police,” said mothers Samaria Rice and Lisa Simpson in a statement. “The ‘activists’ have events in our cities and have not given us anything substantial for using our loved ones’ images and names on their flyers. We don’t want or need y’all parading in the streets accumulating donations, platforms, movie deals, etc. off the death of our loved ones, while the families and communities are left clueless and broken.”
Tamika Palmer, Breonna Taylor’s mother, echoed the pair in a social media post of her own: “I have never personally dealt with BLM Louisville and personally have found them to be fraud.”

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Ex-Cop Involved In Breonna Taylor Case Found Not Guilty

Mothers of black men and women killed in several high-profile police-involved shootings are taking aim at the national Black Lives Matter organization and its outgoing co-founder, Patrisse Cullors, for profiting off the deaths of their loved ones and then ducking accountability.
The mothers of Tamir Rice, Breonna Taylor, and others are lashing out just as Cullors steps down, accusing both BLM and Cullors of using their children&#8217;s deaths to raise money but failing to pass the money on to black families in need.
“I don’t believe she is going anywhere,” said Samaria Rice, the mother of 12-year-old Rice, who was shot by Cleveland, Ohio, police who mistook his toy gun for a real weapon, <a href="https://nypost.com/2021/05/29/mothers-criticize-blm-activists-for-profiting-off-their-dead-sons/">told the New York Post.</a> “It’s all a facade. She’s only saying that to get the heat off her right now.”
Lisa Simpson, whose son was shot in Los Angeles, California, added. “Now she doesn’t have to show her accountability. She can just take the money and run.”
Cullors <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/breaking-blm-co-founder-patrisse-cullors-resigns-amid-controversy">announced that she was stepping down from her position</a> at the helm of the Black Lives Matter movement on Friday, following news that she engaged in a &#8220;real estate binge&#8221; that saw the BLM co-founder splash out more than $3 million on four private residences.
The <a href="https://dailycaller.com/2021/05/06/patrisse-cullors-damon-turner-black-lives-matter-contract-payments/">Daily Caller also reported</a> that Cullors &#8220;had used her position as the charity’s leader to funnel business to an art company led by the father of her only child. Charity experts said BLM’s arrangement with the art company, Trap Heals, amounts to self-dealing and raises ethical and legal questions.&#8221;
Cullors, though, claims her resignation is not the result of these controversies, telling media that the allegations &#8220;were right-wing attacks that tried to discredit my character, and I don’t operate off of what the right thinks about me.”
Rice and Simpson, though, told the Post that Cullors has problems with more than just the right. Rice told the Post that &#8220;she first sought out Cullors to enlist the group’s help in re-opening a federal investigation into her son’s 2014 death. She said she exchanged a few emails with Cullors over the years, but had never managed a face-to-face meeting.&#8221; Simpson said that Black Lives Matter raised $5000 for her son&#8217;s funeral but never delivered the check.
In a statement posted in March, the two women lashed out at BLM for leaving them &#8220;clueless and broken.&#8221;
“We never hired them to be the representatives in the fight for justice for our dead loved ones murdered by the police,” the pair said. “The ‘activists’ have events in our cities and have not given us anything substantial for using our loved ones’ images and names on their flyers. We don’t want or need y’all parading in the streets accumulating donations, platforms, movie deals, etc. off the death of our loved ones, while the families and communities are left clueless and broken.”
Last month, Tamika Palmer, Breonna Taylor&#8217;s mother, echoed the pair in a social media post of her own.
&#8220;I have never personally dealt with BLM Louisville and personally have found them to be fraud (sic),” Palmer wrote.

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