We knew it was going to happen.
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Yet despite having months to mentally prepare ourselves for the inevitable, it still rattled almost every last one of us to our core: there would be no justice for Breonna Taylor.
As previously reported at The Root:
On Wednesday, a grand jury indicted former Louisville Metro police officer Brett Hankison on three counts of wanton endangerment. According to CNN, no charges were announced for Det. Myles Cosgrove or Sgt. John Mattinglyโwho recently sent an email to his colleagues denouncing the investigation and claiming he and his fellow officers did the โlegal, moral and ethical thing that night.โโthe other two officers involved in the fatal shooting that began with the botched serving of a drug warrant.
In the time since the verdict was announced, Iโve failed miserably at trying to comprehend how you can be charged for potentially killing someone after actually doing so. Then I remembered I live in America, the same country I once fought for as a member of the United States Air Force, and it all made sense:
โWay to really rub it in,โ Sam Aguiar, a Louisville, Ky., based injury lawyer, posted on Facebook. โThree counts for the shots into the apartment of the white neighbors, but no counts for the shots into the apartment of the black neighbors upstairs above Breonnaโs. Let alone everything else you got wrong.โ
This white supremacist nation doesnโt see us as human beings, and their laws and those entrusted to enforce them are a direct reflection of that. Period.
โTo be honest, I wasnโt surprised by the verdict,โ Celtics guard Jaylen Brown told reporters on Wednesday. โThis society, the way it was built, the intentions were never to protect and serve people of color.โ
Brown wasnโt the only sports figure to speak out in response to Wednesdayโs verdict, as plenty more took to social media to air out their frustrations and dismay at this gross miscarriage of justice.
โIโve been lost for words today!โ LeBron James tweeted. โIโm devastated, hurt, sad, mad! We want Justice for Breonna yet justice was met for her neighborsโ apartment walls and not her beautiful life.โ
โThis is insulting and devastating news regarding Breonna Taylorโs MURDERERS,โ soccer star Megan Rapinoe posted on Instagram. โI am at a loss for words, but please [register] to vote, so we can replace every single one of the evil people.โ
โThe white supremacist institution of policing that stole Breonna Taylorโs life from us must be abolished for the safety and well being of our people,โ Colin Kaepernick tweeted.
And as time went on, more and more sports figures expressed their sadness and frustration.
โThis is why police need to be defunded and ultimately abolished!โ WNBA star Layshia Clarendon tweeted. โWe time and time again hope for a sliver of justice but why would we get that when the system is designed to protect the very folks that are murdering and terrorizing us. This isnโt a bad apple, itโs a rotten tree.โ
A rotten tree whose branches have only grown more emboldened and corrupt under the current administration.
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