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LOUISVILLE, Ky.—Former Louisville Metro Police detective Brett Hankison’s (shown above) effort to keep the public and news media from watching juror questioning in his criminal case has been denied.
Circuit Judge Ann Bailey Smith has ordered that individual jury questioning will remain open, but no one watching proceedings can take photos or videos inside the courtroom.
Smith said the “extensive media coverage this case has generated” has necessitated this “narrowly tailored limitation.”
“Jurors will individually take the witness stand and submit to questioning by counsel, a process that is inherently intimidating to a lay person,” she wrote in the Thursday order. “The court finds that jurors will be likely to be less intimidated by this process, and therefore more likely to be candid in their responses, if they know there is no possibility that the general public and the media present at the proceeding have the ability to broadcast or otherwise record their testimony.”
Hankison faces three counts of first-degree wanton endangerment, a class D felony, for the shooting at unfolded at Breonna Taylor’s apartment just before 1 a.m. on March 13, 2020. Read more.
