The Memphis Police Beat that Killed Tyre Nichols: More on the Investigative Investigation and the Investigation of the Jan. 7 Vortex-Induced Death

The investigation of the Memphis police beating that led to the death of 29-year-old man, and the subsequent protests over the weekend, are continuing, in spite of questions over whether additional charges are necessary.

Five former officers who were fired in January are being charged with murder. Video of the Jan. 7 incident was released Friday.

As the investigation continues, Nichols’ family attorney Ben Crump said he thinks there will be additional fallout, but “whether that’s going to lead to criminal charges, we have to see.”

When asked whether anyone new will face criminal charges now that the city’s investigation is finished, Williams told CNN on Tuesday: “Not at this time.” Mulroy’s office previously told CNN it would wait for the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation to conclude an investigation before deciding on more charges.

Mulroy said officials knew the video could be offensive. The best solution was to speed up the investigation and make the charges come first so that the video can be released.

The encounter is difficult to watch in its entirety. It starts with a traffic stop and shows officers beating him with batons and punching him and kicking him until he is restrained behind his back.

Nichols died on Jan. 10, three days after he was pulled over for what officers said was reckless driving. The body cam video showed that one of the officers, Demetrius Haley, was aggressive as he pulled Nichols out of his car, forcing him to the ground before another officer used a stun gun on him.

“All of these officers failed their oath,” Crump told CNN on Sunday. “They failed their oath to protect and serve. Was anyone trying to protect or serve Tyre Nichols in that video?

Protesters once again took to the streets over the weekend to decry police brutality after the release of video depicting the violent Memphis police beating of 29-year-old Tyre Nichols, and more gatherings and vigils are planned for Sunday.

The Memphis Police Department’s response to the tragic death of Tyre Nichols, a member of the Commission on Crimes against a Police Officer

The family remembered him as a good son and father who enjoyed skateboarding, photography and sunsets. They recalled his smile and hugs and mourned the moments they’ll never have again.

While the heinous actions of a few casts a cloud of disrespect, it’s important that the Memphis Police Department take proactive steps in the healing process of all those impacted. The Memphis Police Department is committed to serving our community and taking every measure that can be to rebuild trust that has been negatively affected by the death of Mr. Tyre Nichols.

The culture of the SCORPION unit is what we saw in that video. “So we demanded that they disbanded immediately before we see anything like this happen again.”

“I think the smart move and the mayor is correct in shutting it down. These actions are not a representation of the Memphis Police Department.

Memphis police officers are being praised for their swift investigation and transparency compared to similar cases elsewhere in the US.

“We saw a very peaceful and direct sense of protest in the city of Memphis, and I think it’s because maybe we do have faith and hope that the system is going to get it right this time,” Easter-Thomas said.

The suspects were indicted for murder, kidnapping, official oppression and assault on a police officer.

The Charged and Fired Police Officers in Memphis, Tennessee, Didn’t Show Up for a Crime against a Black Man

The attorney for one of the officers indicted said that he didn’t cross lines that other people did.

After the video of the incident was released, two sheriff’s department employees were put on leave. The two deputy sheriffs who appeared on scene after the physical confrontation between police and Tyre Nichols have concerns about them.

After the death of another black man at the hands of an officer, Ben Crump, an attorney, called for Congress to pass police reform.

According to the news release, the Congressional Black Caucus would like to meet with the president to discuss police reform.

The quick firing and arrests of police officers should be a “blueprint” for how brutality allegations will be handled in the future, said Benjamin Crump, one of the nation’s leading civil rights lawyers. He applauded Memphis Police Chief Cerelyn Davis for arresting and charging the officers within 20 days.

She didn’t like what Congress was doing by not passing bills to stop police brutality. You have control over the blood of Black America. Stand up and do something.

Tennessee Police Reform and Black People’s Rights: Two Democratic State Senators Voted to File a Motion Toward Justice for Black People by the Police

On the state level, two Democratic state lawmakers in Tennessee said Saturday that they intend to file police reform legislation ahead of the Tennessee general assembly’s Tuesday filing deadline. The bills would seek to address mental health care for law enforcement officers, hiring, training, discipline practices and other topics, said Rep. G.A. Hardaway, who represents a portion of Memphis and Shelby County.

Although Democrats hold the minority in the legislature, this legislation should pass both houses because it’s not partisan, said Towns.

In order for you to not do something, you would have to watch this footage of what happened to the young man. If a dog in this county was beaten like that, what the hell would happen?” Towns said something.

The official efforts to respond to the vicious beating of Tyre Nichols by Memphis police are already underway, just two days after footage of the incident was released to the public.

Protesters in Memphis and around the nation are taking to the streets again in protest against the treatment of Black people by police.

The attorneys hope that other cities will follow their example and begin to create trust in their communities by using saturation police units. “We must keep in mind that this is just the next step on this journey for justice and accountability, as clearly this misconduct is not restricted to these specialty units. It continues so much further.

How the Memphis Black Lives: Why do police officers run from the cops? What do they tell us after the first Memphis fatal encounter with a black officer?

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and the Chair of the Democratic Caucus announced their plan at a press conference on Saturday.

Police officers should receive implicit bias training, limits on officer transfers after being reprimanded or fired, and a reevaluation of low-level traffic stops are among the issues the bills aim to address, according to NBC News.

Republicans hold a sizable majority in the Tennessee General Assembly, but the Democrats said they were confident they could get bipartisan support because of the magnitude of the incident, the Memphis Commercial Appeal reported.

“Without federal police reform, I think we’re going to continue to see these hashtags proliferate so much that we can’t keep up with them,” Crump told ABC’s This Week.

The Senate failed to pass the federal law that bears George Floyds name and Congress didn’t approve the efforts to end qualified immunity.

Editor’s Note: Sonia Pruitt is a retired Montgomery County, Maryland, police captain. She started The Black Police Experience to educate law enforcement and the Black community. She is a professor of criminal justice at both Montgomery College and Howard University. The opinions expressed in this commentary are her own. CNN has more opinion.

Based on my 28 years of experience as a former police officer and captain, it was clear to me that the officers lacked supervision, showed little professional maturity and escalated a situation into what would eventually become a deadly encounter through gross negligence and a complete disregard for human life.

Black officers are embracing brutality and aligning themselves with a police culture that calls for loyalty to anyone who runs from the police, such as beating subjects who run from the police.

The association’s current stance is unusual. We have come to expect from the police unions that they will shield officers accused of misconduct from accountability and that is what they did not say when the officers were arrested.

Efforts to push for police reform were largely replaced by calls to hire more police officers in the aftermath of George Floyd’s death. Last year, President Joe Biden proposed funding for 100,000 new police officers as part of his Safer America Plan and the 2023 omnibus appropriations bill includes $324 million in funding to hire more police officers.

Chief Cerelyn “CJ” Davis created the SCORPION police unit that was dismantled after the charges against the officers were brought.

Such deaths are preventable, but training or a patchwork of local policies will not be sufficient. Transformation will look like dedication to change through federal legislation that addresses the use of no-knock warrants, duty to intervene, use of excessive force, and other dangerous policing issues; the placement of strong political change-makers in office through voting and a commitment by the criminal “justice” system to hold corrupt police officers accountable for their actions through administrative and criminal charges.

This article has been modified to accurately reflect the writer’s experience; she has 28 years of combined experience in law enforcement, not just as a captain.

The five former officers were indicted on murder and kidnapping charges. On January 8, the officials released the footage of the deadly encounter after a traffic stop.

Memphis Law Enforcement and the Case of Nichols, the 2018/19 Shooting of George Flanagan, a Charged Black Man in the Foot Chase

There have been mistakes made when handling cases of police brutality in the past, according to Ron Johnson, a former Missouri State Highway Patrol captain. A lot of things have been done the right way.

“A year ago, two years ago, we wouldn’t have seen some of the things we’re seeing here,” Johnson said of Memphis law enforcement’s handling of Nichols’ death.

The death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police in the year 2020 contrasted with the deaths of other people at the hands of police in previous years.

The January video of the initial stop and the beating after the foot chase is relevant in the case and the footage will be released in the coming weeks, according to the prosecutor.

Law enforcement and legal analysts are now pointing to the actions of Memphis as a way to maintain trust in the community after fatal police encounters.

“We’re in a new era of accountability,” said CNN legal analyst Joey Jackson, noting the proliferation of police body cameras and cell phone and surveillance video that capture violence by officers. There is a demand for accountability in the public because of the instances that are caught on camera.

Benjamin Crump, a family attorney, said this week that the initial results of an autopsy showed that he bled due to a severe beating.

On January 15th, Chief Davis vowed to take appropriate and immediate action after he noted the serious nature of the officers conduct during the stop. She said that the department served notice to the officers involved.

The officers were terminated because of their excessive use of force and failure to render aid, the department said in a statement.

The police department learned something from other high-profile cases when the district attorneys were not transparent, said Areva Martin, an attorney and legal affairs commentator.

They did the right thing in this case, by charging these officers with a crime and convenering a grand jury.

In a news conference Friday, the attorney called Memphis a “blueprint” for police departments, prosecutors and political leaders of future cases after the charges were filed in the wake of the fatal shooting of Freddie Gray.

The case of Walter Scott, a black man who was killed by South Carolina officers after they pulled him over for a broken brake light, reminded the CNN political analyst of the swiftness of the charges.

A murder charge was brought against the former North Charleston police officer two months after the shooting. The former officer’s 2016 state murder trial ended in a mistrial but Slager pleaded guilty to violation of civil rights by acting under the color of law in Scott’s killing. He was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison.

Watching the Memphis PD Beat a Memphis Police Officer as he walked away from the intersection of two bridges: The fatal encounter of Tyre Nichols

CNN law enforcement said that taking a high tension event and adding something that increases tension will make people not want to go to work on a Friday night.

Miller said the delayed justice allowed authorities to show the public that the justice system is working. The additional time also allowed officials to “unite the faith community in Memphis, the voice of the family and the family’s lawyers, and the key community contacts” in calling for calm.

Police departments across the country – including in Los Angeles, Atlanta, Minneapolis, Nashville and New York – said they were either monitoring events or already had plans in place in case of protests.

“We’ve watched so many of these cases over the last several years,” Martin said. Law enforcement authorities coming forward and being transparent with information to the community typically results in a peaceful response.

The protesting mostly peaceful protesters in Memphis took to the interstate Friday night, blocking both lanes of the bridge that connects the western Tennessee city to Arkansas. There were no arrests.

The video shows that the EMTs and first responders walked away from Nichols after arriving, with him falling onto his side.

The severity of the beating to the public was shown in the body camera video, and the widespread condemnation from the residents and police officials was a result. The video shook a nation long accustomed to videos of police brutality – especially against people of color – and spurred protests and vigils in Memphis and other major US cities.

Cheryl Dorsey, a retired sergeant with the Los Angeles Police Department, said the footage of Nichols’ fatal encounter has left many unanswered questions about what Memphis PD did to prevent the tragedy.

She told CNN Saturday that all of this was preventable. There are officers who are young on the job who do what they do on a regular basis. This was something that they were not used to doing.

After seeing the video that showed the shift in brutality cases, Memphis City Council Chairman Martavius Jones told CNN that there was more that needed to be done.

“To see the events unfold how they’ve unfolded, with this Tyre Nichols situation, is heartbreaking. I have a son, said Kiara Hill, who was standing near the makeshift memorial near the Memphis corner. “And Tyre, out of the officers on the scene, he was the calmest.”

We have to fight the bad players in our community and now we have to fight our own police officers. That is deplorable,” Robinson said. We will have to do something.

The head of the city’s council told CNN Saturday that it would be a mistake to shut down the unit without giving officers new training.

A GoFundMe for a Humane and Responsible Police Reform in the U.S. Sen. Cory Booker’s Office

The previously-stalled national police reform legislation was a good starting point, according to the chairman of the Senate Judiciary committee.

It is the right starting point, and Sen. Cory Booker has been working on it for a long time. I think he and Sen. Tim Scott should sit down again to see if we can revive that effort, but that alone is not enough. He said that we need a discussion about policing in a humane and responsible way.

The 29-year-old was a father and also the baby of his family, the youngest of four children. He was a “good boy” who spent his Sundays doing laundry and getting ready for the week, his mother said.

A GoFundMe created by Nichols’ mother has raised over $1,085,600 as of Sunday afternoon. The funds will be used to help Wells and her husband with their mental health services and time off from their jobs, according to the page. It adds that the memorial skate park will be built in honor of Tyre, who loved skating and sunsets.

The officers and paramedics who were on the scene, as well as the people who filed the paperwork, are being looked at by the district attorney.

The district attorney said that prosecutors moved “extraordinarily quick” with charges against the five officers.

The Memphis City Council inferred that an EMT failed Tyre Nichols when he was beaten and injured by a police officer

“I don’t think we’ve seen the end of it. The Memphis City Council member believes there is more to this, as they go into the trial. “I don’t think we’re on top of this yet.”

“We need to make sure that we go through our police department and see where we were weak, what happened with our procedures, what happened with our oversight,” Warren said.

But Sink already announced the bottom line on Tuesday: Seven police officers were fired, three were suspended, one retired and two had their investigations dropped as result of the probes, she said.

Police identified one of the two officers as Preston Hemphill, who is White. Elder wasn’t able to say if the person was being paid.

The body cam video does not show the second site where the district attorney believes that Hemphill was beaten and suffered serious injuries.

The fire personnel terminated over their response to the encounter are emergency medical technicians Robert Long and JaMichael Sandridge and fire Lt. Michelle Whitaker, the fire department said Monday.

The fire department said that the EMTs didn’t conduct an adequate patient assessment of Mr. Nichols, based on the information they were told on the scene.

After the fire department firings were announced Monday, an attorney for Tyre Nichols’ family, Antonio Romanucci said, “everybody on that scene was complicit in this man’s death, in one way, shape, form, or another, somebody failed Tyre Nichols.”

“Some of the questions that remain will require a focus on Desmond Mills’ individual actions,” and “on whether Desmond’s actions crossed the lines that were crossed by other officers during this incident,” Ballin said.

“They either failed by using excessive force; they failed him by severely beating him; they failed him by not intervening; they failed him by not rendering aid,” the attorney told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on Monday.

The Minneapolis Police Department’s Action Against a Forgery in Progress: The Case of Dujuan Armstrong, who died in a chokehold

The attorney said that while the family still is trying to absorb the full scope of the investigation, they are also dealing with the loss of a loved one.

The press conference will take place at the Masonic Temple Church of God in Christ headquarters in Memphis where Martin Luther King Jr. gave his last speech on the day he was assassinated.

In the days since Tennessee officials released video footage of Memphis police officers brutally beating Tyre Nichols, law enforcement has faced a new wave of criticism.

Headley, the Georgetown professor, said police have a number of reasons for issuing vague statements early on in use-of-force investigations, including the possibility that the authors of the statements may not have all the facts.

On May 25, 2020, the Minneapolis Police Department said officers responded to a forgery in progress and arrested a suspect. The suspect was taken into custody after officers noticed he was unwell, according to a press release. “They called for an ambulance.”

The bystander who captured the video of the incident captured Floyd pleading “I can’t breathe,” as Chauvin knelt on his neck for more than nine minutes. Floyd died on that day.

But video shot by a bystander showed former NYPD officer Daniel Pantaleo putting Garner in a chokehold until he went unconscious. It was determined by the New York City’s Office of the Chief Medical Examiner that the death was a homicide.

The Santa Rita Jail in Dublin, Calif. was the location where 22-year-old Dujuan Armstrong was found unresponsive and later died from a drug overdose. Body-camera footage shows that officers put a restraining jacket on the man before he became unresponsive. An autopsy found that Armstrong died of asphyxiation due to the restraints.

For example, John Elder was the Minneapolis Police Department’s public information director in 2020 and wrote the initial statement about Floyd’s death. He told the Los Angeles Times that he got his information from sergeants and computer-aided dispatch, and that he hadn’t seen any video footage of the encounter before writing the press release.

The intention was not to deceive or be dishonest. Had we known that this [situation] was what we saw on the video, that statement would have been completely different,” Elder told the newspaper.

“But I think really where the conflict comes in is when there are discrepancies in the report or in the statements that are put out that don’t match the evidence when it comes out. And when the language that is used is particularly one that tries to abdicate responsibility,” she said.

She said that one agency she worked with brought in community leaders for an explanation of an incident before discussing it with the media. She said departments can acknowledge if they haven’t reviewed any video evidence yet and if they are still looking into what happened.

The two discipline cases about the use of force focused on whether the officers filed the required reports about the incidents and did not appear to examine if the officers’ used of force was warranted.

Haley made a mistake in estimating the amount of force needed to fill out the form. His lieutenant said Haley was a “hard-working officer” who “routinely makes good decisions” and “he was sure that this was a limited event.” Haley was given a written reprimand.

The hearing officer wrote that “Officer Haley took full ownership for the accident and was very humble during the hearing” and the violation was dismissed.

The Memphis Police Department: The Case of Mr. Mills in 2017, his First Infraction and a Complaint against a Domestic Abuse Result

Mills began at the Memphis Police Department in March 2017 after completing a degree in criminal justice from West Virginia State University.

Mills dropped his digital assistant into the street when he entered his squad car. A car ran over the device.

It was Mills’ first infraction, and he immediately reported the incident to his union representative, so he received a written reprimand, according to department records.

Later that month, Mills failed to file a response to resistance form when he used physical force to take a woman down to the ground so she could be handcuffed and arrested. Mills was reprimanded twice in August of 2021, once for using the form and again because he didn’t realize his actions necessitated it.

A handgun was found in the back of a squad car used by Martin and his partner. Martin only inspected the car from the outside and didn’t do a proper inspection before and after his shift. During his shift that day, he and his partner conducted two traffic stops, in which the suspects were placed in the backseat where the gun was found. The protocol was that the officers didn’t inspect after the suspects left the vehicle. There was a three-day suspension without pay for Martin.

Martin mishandled a domestic abuse complaint in September 2020 when one of the sisters asked for a report. Martin did not take the report and said he did not believe one was necessary, reasoning that the parties involved were intoxicated and the man’s wife – the alleged victim of abuse – did not want the report. According to department records, the responding officers threatened the involved parties that if they had to take a report they would be arrested.

“Memphis Police Officers are directed by department policy and state law to make a complete report on the scene of Domestic abuse calls,” the hearing officer wrote. “Officer[s] cannot base their decision to arrest based [on] the victim’s consent or on the perception of the victim’s willingness to cooperate with prosecution.”

“Officer Martin is respectful when dealing with other humans regardless of their sex, race, age, or rank,” the evaluation stated. “He approaches his calls with a positive attitude and is well received when dealing with the public. He is continually a top leader in arrests and calls, and not one person he has arrested has complained.”

Smith began at the department in March 2018. He crashed into the other vehicle after passing it, causing it to spin and crash into a third vehicle with 2 people inside. All parties were sent to the hospital in non-critical condition.

Smith said the driver of the second vehicle took a right and left his lane suddenly. He admitted to speeding, but said his memory was somewhat unclear due to his minor head injury from the airbag, according to a summary from the disciplinary hearing.

Comments on the Memphis Violation of a Law Enforcement Officer Charged with an Injured Black Person During the January 1st Tyre Nichols Shootout

Officials in Memphis are expected Wednesday to release about 20 more hours of video relating to January’s deadly police beating of Tyre Nichols – as well as some records of the city’s now-finished internal probe into 13 police officers and four fire department personnel, a Memphis official said.

Mulroy did not provide further details on what could be heard in the video, but said it will be up to the city of Memphis and Memphis police.

Mulroy said the relevant parts of the initial stop and the beating were shown in the body-camera and security footage released last week. The other footage could be used as a key part of the investigation.

According to Mulroy, the incident report does not match up with what one sees when viewing the video that has already been released.

Such comments are an indication that this is the latest example of the arrest of a Black person in which the version of events given by authorities does not match up with video or witness accounts. George Floyd, Ronald Greene and Walter Scott have all had charges filed against law enforcement officers.

A celebration of a young mans life, but also recognition of other families of other Black people killed, and a call for police reform were some of the things that came out of his funeral.

While authorities have not released the police report, a photo of a police report was posted by a controversial Memphis radio talk show host. The police report account was first reported by The New York Times.

A tribute to Rowvaughn Wells, the father of a son, and the George Floyd justice in police misconduct act: The case against Tyre Nichols

Mulroy requested the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation to speed its investigation and said that the people involved in the encounter are being scrutinized as prosecutors consider additional charges.

RowVaughn Wells, Nichols’ mother, remembered her son as “a beautiful person” and echoed others in calling for passage of the George Floyd Policing Act.

That legislation twice cleared the House It didn’t go anywhere in the Senate. If passed, the act would set up a national registry of police misconduct to stop officers from evading consequences by moving to another jurisdiction.

The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act needs to be passed. Because then you have to think twice before you beat Tyre Nichols. You think twice before you shoot at someone unarmed,” Sharpton said.

“There’s nothing more insulting and offensive to those of us that fight to open doors, that you walked through those doors and act like the folks we had to fight for to get you through them doors. You didn’t get on the police department by yourself,” Sharpton said. “The police chief didn’t get there by herself. People had to march and go to jail and some lost their lives to open the doors for you and how dare you act like that sacrifice was for nothing.”

“This is a continuous fight that we have to fight for. We have to fight for justice. We cannot continue to let these people brutalize our kids,” Wells said.

“The only thing that’s keeping me going is the fact that I really, truly believe that my son was sent here on an assignment from God,” she said tearfully at Wednesday’s funeral.

The Tennessee Peace Officers Standards and Training Commission and an Interfering Officer’s View of a Young Officer with an Unprofessional Attitude

According to a document released by the Tennessee Peace Officers Standards and Training Commission, at some point during the incident, Haley sent photographs of Nichols to other officers and a female friend.

Haley’s lawyer declined to comment, and lawyers for the other four officers either declined to comment or did not respond to requests from The Associated Press.

Haley, who was driving an unmarked car and wore a black sweatshirt hoodie over his head, forced Nichols from his car using loud profanity, then sprayed him directly in the eyes with a chemical irritant spray, according to the statement.

“You and other officers were captured on body worn camera making multiple unprofessional comments, laughing, bragging about your involvement,” the decertification charges against Mills said.

They said that Mills failed to give the correct account of what happened, and that he did not provide immediate medical aid and walk away after exposure to chemical irritant spray.

A hearing officer wrote about the case of Justin Smith where he admitted to hitting an unnamed person with a closed fist in the face because he couldn’t handcuff him. You sprayed the subject with your chemical irritant spray and also held the individual’s arm while other officers kicked, punched and pepper sprayed him several times.”

The Shelby County District Attorney’s Office confirmed in an email to NPR that it will review closed and pending cases connected to Demetrius Haley, Desmond Mills Jr., Emmitt Martin III, Justin Smith and Tadarrius Bean, who have all been fired and charged with second-degree murder.

NPR’s Martin Kaste told All Things Considered that the documents, which pertain to the department’s internal review, “paint a picture of officers with a very unprofessional attitude.”

Police officials whose names are on a list of people accused of being dishonest or facing criminal charges are given another chance to have their cases reviewed.

That classification could prompt prosecutors to drop any cases involving their testimony, the New York Times reports, adding that some defense attorneys are compiling a roster of all officers who served in the SCORPION unit, “which could imperil hundreds of cases across the city.”

Brandon Hall told the Commercial Appeal he was in court when a prosecutor dropped a case involving some of the officers, but expects the same outcome in other cases.

Another defense attorney and former Shelby County prosecutor, Josh Corman, told the newspaper that prosecutors have been reviewing cases connected to the five officers and that he thinks “it would be a nightmare for any prosecutor to use them as a witness.”

Vickie Terry, the Executive Director of the NAACP’s Memphis Branch, told Memphis TV station WREG that her office received several police-related complaints after Nichols’ death (though she didn’t specify whether they were about those specific officers or the SCORPION unit).

She said she was afraid that other people had been treated this way. “If they go back and find out somebody might have been convicted for something that they did not do, you’re definitely going to have to reopen cases.”

All five men were free on bond and appeared together only for a short moment on Friday as their lawyers entered pleas. The parents of Tyre Nichols sat in the courtroom gallery beside their attorney, Ben Crump.

Nichols’ mother, RowVaughn Wells, called Friday’s arraignment “the beginning of the process of justice,” and said she and her family were determined to see it through to the end.

The defendants did not have the courage to look at her after what they had done to her son. “So they’re going to see me at every court date, every one, until we get justice for my son.”

The Charges of Nichols and he’s not a Black Man, but a Lady in a Courtroom in America

John Keith Perry, the attorney for Tadarrius Bean, signaled after Friday’s hearing that his strategy is likely to rely on convincing a jury that not all five former officers shared equal culpability in Nichols’ beating and death.

“You look at the involvement of each individual defendant, and in that particular case, he was doing his job, no more, no less,” Perry said. “He never struck anybody. He didn’t do anything other than his job.

“Let’s not forget that my client is a Black man in a courtroom in America,” he said. “I will work tirelessly to make sure the system does not fail Mr. Mills, and that a fair outcome is achieved.”

The second-degree murder charge the five officers face carries a sentence of 15 to 60 years. Shelby County Criminal Court judge James Jones Jr. set the next court date for May 1.

The City Council approved six measures to reform the police department last week, one of which would prohibit officers from making traffic stops in cars like the ones they used to stop Nichols. The council voted to strengthen the civilian review board that investigate complaints of police abuse.

Source: https://www.npr.org/2023/02/17/1157756023/memphis-tyre-nichols-police-officers-court-charges

Memphis Police Chief Legal Officer Eric Sink reveals the shooting death of a police officer by a fugitive in December 2015: A 20-hour investigation via Vimeo

In recent years, Memphis officials have undertaken an aggressive push to hire hundreds of new police officers amid stubbornly high rates of violent crime.

But as the department has struggled to fill its ranks, it has lowered hiring criteria, even seeking permission to recruit officers with criminal records. Critics have warned those moves could mean more enlisted police officers unfit to serve and more likely to abuse their authority.

The city is ready to give the public additional information from the scene of the fatal shooting of a police officer by a fugitive, according to the chief legal officer.

Both the city’s police and fire departments have been conducting administrative investigations to determine whether any employees involved in the incident violated department policies, according to Sink.

The 20 hours of new video and audio will be released by the Director of Communications via Vimeo, as the previous body camera footage was released to the public in late January, Sink said.

The city will release documents related to the charges against those involved in Nichols’ death, according to Sink.

During the hearing, a committee member asked whether any officers who struck Nichols were still employed by the department. One of the suspended officers put his hands on the legs of Nichols.

Potential charges of “false reporting” related to the initial police report were being investigated, Erica Williams, a spokesperson for Mulroy’s office, told CNN around the same time.

She did not give a timetable but said that the investigative files needed to be redacted and that they will be posted online when that is done.

That was the first time the city announced a seventh officer was fired. That person’s name, and details about what the officer is accused of doing, weren’t immediately released.

The investigation of the second-degree murder in Tennessee carries a class A felony punishable by up to 60 years in prison and two deputies were suspended without pay

Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Justin Smith, Emmitt Martin III and Desmond Mills Jr. each face charges of second-degree murder, aggravated assault, aggravated kidnapping, official misconduct and official oppression. Second-degree murder in Tennessee is considered a Class A felony punishable by 15 to 60 years in prison.

In addition, two Shelby County Sheriff’s Office deputies who were at the scene were suspended for five days each without pay for their parts in the case, according to a sheriff’s office news release obtained by CNN affiliate WHBQ.