On Friday, September 30th the Louisville NAACP called on Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron to resign over his steadfast defense of law enforcement in the fatal 2020 police shooting of Breonna Taylor. The NAACP stated, “The recent federal indictments of four Louisville Metro Police officers involved in the Breonna Taylor killing has highlighted, demonstrated, and proven the insufficiency of the state investigation led by the Attorney General of the Commonwealth and an absence of an understanding of the Commonwealth’s criminal laws,”.If he declines to step down, the civil rights organization will urge state legislators to impeach him. Under Cameron’s investigation, which the civil rights organization said favored the police, no one was charged with a crime. But a federal probe had a different result.
On March 13, 2020, LMPD officers forced themselves into Breonna Taylor’s apartment during a botched raid, killing the 26-year-old African American woman who worked as an emergency room technician. Her death sparked outrage across the country. “I’m proud of the work I’ve done on behalf of every Kentuckian, and I am honored to serve the citizens of the Commonwealth as Kentucky’s 51st Attorney General, Cameron, a Black Republican running for governor in 2023, said in a statement, according to the newspaper. In a media release, the NAACP said the federal indictments, “highlighted, demonstrated, and proven the insufficiency of the state investigation led by the Attorney General of the Commonwealth and an absence of an understanding of the Commonwealth’s criminal laws.”
Cameron responded to the DOJ’s charges on Twitter in August 2022, saying:
Today, President Biden’s Department of Justice brought federal civil rights charges against four individuals in connection with the death of Ms. Breonna Taylor. As in every prosecution, our office supports the impartial administration of justice, but it is important that people not conflate what happened today with the state law investigation undertaken by our office. Our primary task was to investigate whether the officers who executed the search warrant were criminally responsible for Ms. Taylor’s death under state law. At the conclusion of our investigation, our prosecutors submitted the information to a state grand jury, which ultimately resulted in criminal charges being brought against Mr. Brett Hankison for wanton endangerment. I’m proud of the work of our investigators & prosecutors. This case and the loss of Ms. Taylor’s life have generated national attention. People across the country have grieved, and there isn’t a person I’ve spoken to across our 120 counties that isn’t saddened by her loss. There are those, however, who want to use this moment to divide Kentuckians, misrepresent the facts of the state investigation, and broadly impugn the character of our law enforcement community. I won’t participate in that sort of rancor. It’s not productive. Instead, I’ll continue to speak with the love and respect that is consistent with our values as Kentuckians.”
