On Thursday, Shelby County District Attorney Steve Mulroy announced that the grand jury had indicted five former Memphis police officers in the death of Tyre Nichols, who died three days after he was severely beaten during a traffic stop. The charges include second-degree murder, aggravated assault and aggravated kidnapping. Nichols died Jan. 10. The indictment came surprisingly quickly.
Contemplating what the officers must have done to cause such serious injury is shocking and appalling.
Or, perhaps, not. Because the beating, which resulted in the prompt firing of all the officers involved, was captured on body camera footage. Preliminary findings from an autopsy released by the Nichols family show the 29-year-old suffered “extensive bleeding caused by a severe beating” before his death. Contemplating what the officers must have done to cause such serious injury is shocking and appalling.
The family and the community are bracing to relive the attack, because at least some of the body camera footage will be released Friday. We are likely to see all of it if there is a trial.
Americans have already seen far too many of these videos. They are unspeakably painful to watch. But they are essential, because they stand as testimony to the excessive force used by some police officers, who do not deserve to wear the badge.
The lead charge in the state’s case is second-degree murder, which carries a sentence of 15 to 60 years in custody. But a state murder charge does not vindicate federal civil rights interests, and federal charges can include a sentence up to life imprisonment or imposition of the death penalty. (Remember that the federal government brought charges after the state convictions of George Floyd’s killers in Minnesota and Ahmaud Arbery’s killers in Georgia.)
And indeed on Wednesday, the U.S. attorney in Memphis, Kevin Ritz, announced a federal investigation into Nichols’ death. In a vitally important press conference, the Justice Department made…
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