As Memphis mourns Tyre Nichols, city seeks police accountability

Just three weeks ago, Tyre Nichols’ death appeared to match a pattern of police brutality: a young Black man beaten by officers during a traffic stop. But the response by authorities in Memphis, Tennessee, is where that pattern ended. 

After past allegations of officer brutality, police departments or local prosecutors have often dithered in response, provoking outrage from the community when more details are released. In Memphis, the officers involved have already all been fired and charged.

The body camera footage allowed the Memphis Police Department and the district attorney to hasten their investigations. Yesterday, a grand jury returned indictments – including second-degree murder, kidnapping, and assault – against the five officers, all of whom are Black. Tonight, after 6 p.m. Eastern time, footage of the incident will be publicly released.

In a recorded statement, Memphis Police Department Chief Cerelyn “C.J.” Davis promised “absolute accountability for those responsible for Tyre’s death.”

“This is a failing of basic humanity toward another individual,” she said. 

The police chief, district attorney, and head of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigations (TBI) have united in condemning the violence. The United States Department of Justice has opened its own civil rights investigation.

Accountability seems to be moving faster than usual. Almost three years after the murder of George Floyd, some analysts say Memphis might be a sign that reforms adopted by many police departments are working – and perhaps affirming public confidence. 

“The very quick action, the firing and the charging, will have a positive effect on the community,” says Sam Walker, an emeritus professor at the University of Nebraska who studies police accountability. 

But Memphis also shows the limits of after-the-fact accountability and the need for deeper change in police departments. 

“We are here to pursue truth and justice, realizing that we should not be here,” said David B. Rausch, director of the TBI and a 30-year police officer, at a Thursday press conference. “Simply put, this shouldn’t have happened.”

What happened

The incident began with a traffic stop. 

On Jan. 7, officers with the Memphis Police Department’s elite SCORPION unit (Street Crimes Operation To Restore Peace in Our Neighborhoods) pulled over Mr. Nichols on suspicion of reckless driving, according to Shelby County District Attorney Steven Mulroy. There was an “initial altercation” between the officers and Mr. Nichols, he said, during which they used pepper spray. Mr. Nichols then fled, leading to a second altercation, reportedly just 100 yards from his parents’ home. This is when most of the violence occurred, Mr. Mulroy said.

A lawyer representing the Nichols family said Mr. Nichols was beaten for three minutes, tased, and restrained. An ambulance later transported him to the hospital, after “some period of time of waiting around afterward” by the officers, said Mr. Mulroy. 

The Nichols family shared a photo of their son in the hospital before his death, appearing swollen, bruised, and unconscious. The family has seen the police video and compares the treatment of their son to the 1991 beating of Rodney King.

The Department of Justice’s investigation is in partnership with the local FBI field office and joins existing inquiries from the district attorney and Memphis Police Department. The department fired the five officers for violating standards regarding excessive force, duty to render aid, and duty to intervene. The standard of duty to intervene was adopted by the Memphis Police Department after the death of Mr. Floyd to ensure officers are accountable to stop infractions by other officers.

Memphis’ quick response

Chief Davis has said other officers are also under investigation. 

“It’s striking how quickly they moved and how serious their actions were, both police chief and prosecution,” says Professor Walker.

He contrasts the response in Memphis to the response in Louisville, Kentucky, after the 2020 police killing of Breonna Taylor. There, none of the officers wore body cameras and no officers were fired for three months.

Until 2020, a common response to complaints of police brutality was for police departments and unions to protect their officers, a practice commonly referred to as “circling the wagons.” 

“The pattern that I would see is, at most, officers being put on administrative leave for a very long time, often with pay until an investigation was completed,” says Christy Lopez, a professor at Georgetown University Law Center. “The idea that they would be terminated very quickly is, in my experience, unusual.” 

At this point, it’s not clear whether the speed is a sign of stiffer accountability, a less aggressive police union, or just the incident’s sheer brutality, says Professor Lopez, who led the investigation into the police department in Ferguson, Missouri, after the 2014 killing of Michael Brown. 

In a case of police brutality, the first month is not always representative. 

The four officers who beat Mr. King were charged with felony assault within two weeks but acquitted a year later – though two were convicted on federal charges the next year. The acquittal so outraged the public that it sparked the Los Angeles riots, in which more than 60 people were killed and more than 2,000 injured.

“This case still has to go to trial,” says Tracie Keesee, president and co-founder of the Center for Policing Equity. “So you still have a ways on this one.”

Clearly, though, authorities have tried to signal that there will be consequences. TBI Director Rausch has already described the incident as “criminal.” Having the FBI involved so early is also powerful, says Ms. Keesee. Thirty years ago, she says, it would’ve taken months, if not longer. 

The speed may be a reflection of public demand. “This is really an indication of how much more sophisticated communities have become,” says Professor Lopez. “They want [the body camera footage], and they’re not afraid to ask for it.”

And the city appears to be keenly aware of the potential for unrest when the video is released tonight. Firing and charging the officers before it was made public could be an attempt to quell potential violence.

Officials from Chief Davis to President Joe Biden have repeated that plea for peace. “Violence is destructive and against the law,” the president wrote. “It has no place in peaceful protests seeking justice.”

The challenge ahead

Chief Davis has climbed to the top of the Memphis Police Department as a reformer, but this case may test how deeply her department has changed.

Body cameras are intended to prevent something like this from happening by recording clear evidence of the incident. But the death of Mr. Nichols suggests that was not enough in this case.

“That real-time accountability should be delivered by your own colleagues,” says Professor Lopez. “That’s just another layer to this tragedy: that it could have been prevented if officers there on the scene had stepped in.”

Policing reforms often take more than a couple of years to implement – an effort complicated by a nationwide increase in violent crime since the pandemic. Violent crime in Memphis has risen significantly since 2016, though it fell some last year. 

The city’s SCORPION units patrol high-crime areas as a more aggressive police response. Such units, says Professor Walker, have a legacy of problematic behavior, often developing their own culture separate from the rest of the department.

“Accountability after the fact is what you’re seeing right now,” says Ms. Keesee.

It’ll take longer to figure out what could’ve stopped the atrocity from ever happening.

“We won’t know until we get further into this and probably ready for trial: What were [the officers] trained on? Have they been in trouble before, and if so, what was the outcome?”