While people continue to express their outrage over the killing of Breonna Taylor, comedian Trevor Noah is using his platform to amplify the voices of demonstrators.
The Daily Show host dedicated a segment of Thursday’s show to the 26-year-old EMS worker who was killed by police in her Louisville home in March.
Noah said it was more than a mistake that led to Taylor's death.
“Every step of the way this investigation ran, the police screwed up. They made a million mistakes, which is a million more than any Black person is ever allowed to make,” the South Africa native said. “And honestly, with the amount of mistakes that the police made throughout the entire process, I don’t even know if it’s fair to call them mistakes at this point."
As the comedian noted, "a mistake is something you do by accident."
"But these cops blatantly ignored so many protocols and so much information, at some point, it moves from a mistake to just actively not giving a f**k,” he said.
Sam Aguiar, an attorney representing Taylor's family, said the young woman was killed during a botched raid, as Blavity previously reported.
“Something went terribly wrong,” Aguiar told WDRB. “This was clearly a botched execution of a warrant.”
Police said the raid was part of a narcotics investigation. But the man they were looking for wasn't at Taylor's home, and no drugs were found. Instead, an innocent woman lost her life, and her boyfriend was arrested for exchanging shots with police during the raid.
"The cops should have never been in that house in the first place," Noah said on Thursday's show. "They came in guns blazing even though they knew she wasn't a threat."
Taylor's case has been a popular topic of conversation on social media in the past four months. But Noah reminded viewers she was a person, not a “slogan or a post on your social media feed.”
“Breonna Taylor was a friend, a daughter, an EMT worker working to help save people’s lives, and apparently one hell of a TikTok dancer,” he said.
To visually reflect his sentiment, the comedian showed a montage of Taylor’s life. The video included clips of the Louisville woman dancing, singing and buying her dream car.
"For 26 years, Breonna Taylor lived her life to the fullest," Noah said. "But then on a random night out of nowhere, the Louisville Police Department, turned her into a statistic."
The Daily Show host also addressed people who are criticizing Kenneth Walker for trying to protect his girlfriend by firing back at the people who he believed were breaking into the home.
"If America tells people to get a gun to defend themselves from intruders, but the cops are the intruders breaking down the door without knocking, what are you supposed to do?" he said. "To an innocent person, there is zero difference between a no-knock raid and a home invasion. If some bursts down your door in the middle of the night, you're gonna think they're intruders."
Walker spent two weeks in jail after he was accused of shooting Sgt. Jon Mattingly in the leg, as Blavity previously reported.
“It was incredible that Mrs. Taylor was the only one killed,” Defense Attorney Rob Eggert told WDRB. “Had Breonna Taylor been killed by anyone except police, the person or persons responsible for her death would have been charged with a homicide.”
Taylor's family filed a lawsuit, saying she was alive for up to six minutes after being shot but did not get medical attention. Noah responded to the family's concern during his show.
"It's one thing to shoot somebody accidentally eight times, but leaving her on the floor without any medical attention isn't an accident," he said. "That's just a blatant disregard for Black life."
The Louisville Metro Police Department released the incident report in June, but the report omitted details about Taylor's injuries.
"The cops submitted a mostly blank incident report. You really couldn't think of anything you could write on that report? Not even 'Oh, we f**ked up'?" Noah said.
Mattingly and officers Brett Hankison and Myles Cosgrove are still free after contributing to Taylor's death, as Blavity previously reported. Only Hankison has been fired since the incident.