Two women have come forward on social media to accuse Louisville Metro Police officer Brett Hankison of sexual assault.
Hankison is one of the officers who fired on Breonna Taylor, killing her, in March.
A spokesperson for LMPD said in an email that they “are aware of these allegations and investigators are looking into them.”
In a Facebook post, Margo Borders alleged that Hankison offered her a ride home from a St. Matthews bar in April 2018. When they got to her house, he invited himself inside and sexually assaulted her while she was unconscious, the post says.
“Brett Hankison is a predator of the worst kind,” Borders said in a statement issued through her attorney, Sam Aguiar. “He used his uniform to stalk women at local bars and sexually assault them. I was one of these women.”
Borders said in the Facebook post that she never reported Hankison because she feared retaliation from the police, and thought no one would believe her.
“This man knew his badge would keep us quiet and that his LMPD brotherhood would protect him,” the statement provided by Aguiar said.
“When I found out that Brett Hankison, whose face and presence in Louisville had haunted me for the last two years, was one of Breonna’s killers, I knew my time of being silenced by this man was over,” Borders statement said.
Aguiar is also representing Taylor’s family.
Borders alleges that Hankison assaulted several women and that LMPD ignored complaints about his behavior. Another social media post, posted around the same time as Borders’, supports that claim.
On Instagram, Emily Terry made a similar allegation that Hankison offered her a ride home when she left a bar, intoxicated, in fall 2019.
Once in the car, “he began making sexual advances towards me; rubbing my thigh, kissing my forehead, and calling me ‘baby,’” she wrote.
Terry wrote that she ran out of the car when they got to her home. According to the post, Terry’s friend reported Hankison the next day. It does not say what agency they reported Hankison to, but she said nothing came of it.
“Not all cops are bad,” Terry wrote. “But this one is.”
According to the Courier-Journal, which first reported on these allegations, this is not the first time Hankison has been accused of sexual misconduct. Hankison was twice reported to LMPD for attempting to trade sex for police favors.
In 2008, he was accused of receiving oral sex in exchange for not arresting a woman; the woman denied the claim.
In 2015, a parole officer reported that Hankison had made advances on a parolee and offered to take care of a ticket in exchange for sex. She later recanted the allegation.
In both cases, LMPD ruled in Hankison’s favor.
LMPD encourages anyone with information about the allegations made on social media to call (502) 574-7144.
Hankison is currently on paid administrative reassignment while the investigation into Taylor's death continues.
Contact Eleanor Klibanoff at eklibanoff@kycir.org.
