Memphis police use excessive force and discriminate against Black people, according to the findings of a U.S. Department of Justice investigation launched after the beating death of Tire Nichols after a traffic stop in 2023.
A report released Wednesday marked the conclusion of the investigation that began six months after Nichols was kicked, punched and hit with a police baton. as five officers tried to arrest him after he fled a traffic stop.
The report says that “Memphis police officers regularly violate the rights of the people they are sworn to serve.”
“The people of Memphis deserve a police department and a city that protects their civil and constitutional rights, builds trust, and keeps them safe,” Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division said in a statement per e-mail.
Courtesy of the Nichols family via AP
The city said in a letter released earlier Wednesday that it would not agree to negotiations for federal oversight of its police department until it could review and challenge the results of the investigation.
City officials had no immediate comment on the report but said they plan to hold a news conference Thursday after Justice Department officials hold their own news conference in Memphis Thursday morning to address the findings.
Police video showed officers pepper-sprayed Nichols and hit him with a Taser before he walked away from a traffic stop. Five officers chased Nichols and kicked, punched and hit him with a police baton just steps from his home as he shouted for his mother. The video showed the officers walking around, talking and laughing as Nichols struggled with his injuries.
Nichols died on January 10, 2023, three days after the assault. The five officers – Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Emmitt Martin, Desmond Mills Jr. and Justin Smith – were fired and charged in state court with murder. indicted by a federal grand jury on civil rights and accusations of witness tampering.
Nichols was black, like the former officers. His death sparked national protests, increased calls for police reforms in the US and led to intense scrutiny of the police department in Memphis, a predominantly black city.
The report specifically mentions the Nichols case and details the police practice of using traffic stops to address violent crime. Police have encouraged officers in specialized units, task forces and patrols to prioritize street enforcement. Officers and community members have described this approach as “saturation,” or flooding neighborhoods with traffic stops, the report said.
“This strategy involves frequent contact with the public and gives officers broad discretion, which requires close supervision and clear rules to guide officers’ activities,” the report said. “But MPD does not guarantee that officers will conduct themselves in a lawful manner.”
According to the report, prosecutors and judges have told federal investigators that officers do not understand the constitutional limits on their authority. Officers stop and detain people without adequate justification, and they conduct invasive searches of people and cars, the report said.
“Black people in Memphis disproportionately experience these violations,” the report said. “MPD has never reviewed its practices for evidence of discrimination. We found that officers treat black people more harshly than white people who engage in similar behavior.”
The study found that Memphis officers resort to force that can cause pain or injury “almost immediately in response to low-level nonviolent offenses, even when people are not being aggressive.”
The report says officers pepper-sprayed, kicked and fired a Taser at an unarmed man with a mental illness who tried to grab a $2 soda from a gas station. By the end of an encounter outside the gas station, at least nine police cars and 12 officers had responded to the incident, for which the man served two days in jail for theft and disorderly conduct.
In a letter to the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division released earlier Wednesday, Memphis City Attorney Tannera George Gibson said the city had received a request from the DOJ to enter into an agreement that would obligate it “to negotiate a consent decree aimed at the institutional police and emergency services.”
A consent decree is an agreement that requires reforms overseen by an independent monitor and approved by a federal judge. The federal oversight could continue for years, and violations could result in fines paid by the city.
It remains to be seen what will happen to efforts to reach such agreements between cities and the Justice Department once President-elect Donald Trump returns to office and installs new department leadership. The Justice Department limited the use of consent decrees under the first Trump administration, and the Republican president-elect is expected to once again radically reshape the department’s civil rights priorities.
“Until the City has had the opportunity to review, analyze and dispute the specific allegations supporting your upcoming findings report, the City cannot – and will not – agree to work on or enter into a consent decree that is likely to become effective for years to come and will cost the people of Memphis hundreds of millions of dollars,” the letter said.
The officers in the Nichols case were part of a crime-fighting team called the Scorpion Unit, which was disbanded after Nichols’ death. The team targeted drugs, illegal weapons and violent offenders, aiming to rack up arrests, while sometimes using violence against unarmed people.
According to the Justice Department report, the Memphis Police Department never implemented policies and procedures to direct the unit, despite alarms that it had minimal oversight. Some prosecutors told department investigators that there were “scandalous” inconsistencies between body camera footage and arrest reports, and that if the cases went to trial they would be “laughed out of court.” The report shows that the unit’s misconduct has led to dozens of criminal cases being dismissed.
In court proceedings over Nichols’ death, Martin and Mills pleaded guilty to the federal charges under agreements with prosecutors. The other three officers were convicted in early October of witness tampering in connection with covering up the assault. Bean and Smith were acquitted of civil rights charges of using excessive force and indifference to Nichols’ serious injuries.
Haley was acquitted of violating Nichols’ civil rights causing death, but he was convicted of two lesser charges of violating his civil rights causing bodily harm. The five men will be sentenced by a federal judge in the coming months.
Martin and Mills are also expected to change their not guilty pleas in court, according to attorneys involved in the case. Bean, Haley and Smith have also pleaded not guilty to second-degree murder charges. A trial in the state’s case is scheduled for April 28.
Justice Department investigators have focused similar probes on other cities in recent years, including Minneapolis after the killing of George Floyd, and Louisville, Kentucky, following an investigation into the fatal police shooting of Breonna Taylor.
In its letter, the city of Memphis said the DOJ’s investigation “took only 17 months, compared to an average of 2-3 years in almost all other cases, implying a rush to judgment.”
