A former Memphis police officer has been charged in the fatal beating of Band Nichols sent his ex-girlfriend a photo of the seriously injured man the night he was beaten, kicked and struck with a police baton after a traffic stop, according to testimony at trial Wednesday.
Brittany Leake, a Memphis officer and ex-girlfriend of Demetrius Haley, testified during the criminal trial that she was on the phone with Haley when officers pulled Nichols over for a traffic stop. She said she heard a “commotion,” including verbal commands for someone to shake hands with the officers.
The conversation ended, but Haley later sent the photo via a group chat with Haley, Leake and her godmother, she testified. Prosecutors showed the photo to the jury. It showed Nichols with his eyes closed, lying on the floor with what appeared to be blood near his mouth and his hands behind his back.
Leake said that when she saw the photo, her reaction was, “Oh my God, he really needs to go to the Mediterranean.”
Med is an abbreviation for Memphis Trauma Hospital.
The deadly assault, caught on police bodycams and street surveillance cameras, has led to protests and calls for police reform. Officers said they arrested Nichols for reckless driving, but The Memphis police chief said There was no evidence to support this claim.
Haley, Tadarrius Bean and Justin Smith are on tril after pleading not guilty to charges that they deprived Nichols of his civil rights by excessive force and failure to intervene, and that they obstructed justice by coercing witnesses. Their trial started on September 9 and is expected to last three to four weeks.
George Walker IV / AP
Memphis police fired the three men, along with Emmitt Martin III and Desmond Mills Jr., after Nichols’ death. The beating was captured on police video, which was released to the public. The officers were later indicted on the federal charges. Martin and Mills have entered into plea agreements.
Leake testified Wednesday that she deleted the photo after seeing it and that sending such a photo is against police policy.
“I didn’t feel offended, but it was hard to watch,” she said.
Leake said Haley had previously sent her photos of drugs and of someone injured in a car crash.
Earlier Wednesday, Martin testified for a third day. Defense attorneys attempted to show inconsistencies between Martin’s statements to investigators and his testimony in court. Martin admitted that he lied about what happened to internal investigators for the Memphis Police Department in an attempt to cover up and “justify what I did.”
But Martin said he told FBI investigators the truth after pleading guilty in August, including statements about feeling pressure on his duty belt where his gun was during the traffic stop but not being able to see if Nichols tried to reach for his weapon. Martin has testified that he said “let go of my gun” during the traffic stop.
Martin Zummach, Justin Smith’s attorney, asked Martin if he knew of any reasons why Nichols didn’t just say, “I give up.”
“He’s not there anymore,” Martin said. “Disoriented.”
Martin testified that the situation quickly escalated when Haley pulled out his gun and forcibly pulled Nichols out of the car, using profanities and failing to tell Nichols why he had been pulled over and thrown out of the car.
“He was never given the opportunity to obey,” Martin said.
Nichols, who was black, was pepper-sprayed and stunned during the traffic stop but ran away, according to police video. The five officers, who are also black, then beat him about a block from his home as he called out for his mother.
Video footage shows the officers standing around and talking as Nichols struggled with his injuries. Nichols died on January 10, 2023, three days after the assault.
An autopsy report shows that Nichols – the father of a boy who is now 7 – died from blows to the head. The report describes brain injuries, and cuts and bruises on his head and elsewhere on his body.
Jesse Guy testified that he was working as a paramedic for the Memphis Fire Department the night of the assault. He arrived at the scene after two EMTs, Robert Long and JaMichael Sandridge, arrived.
Guy said he was not told about Nichols’ medical problems before he arrived, and that Nichols was injured, sitting on the ground and unresponsive.
Nichols had no pulse and wasn’t breathing. “It felt like he was lifeless,” Guy said.
Guy performed CPR and mechanical ventilation in the ambulance and Nichols had a pulse again when he arrived at the hospital, the emergency worker said.
Guy said Long and Sandridge did not say whether they had checked Nichols’ pulse and heart rate, and they did not say whether they had given him oxygen. When one of Bean’s lawyers asked him if that information would have been helpful in treating Nichols, Guy said yes.
Long and Sandridge were fired for violating fire department policy after Nichols died. They have not been charged.
The five officers have also been charged with second-degree murder in state court, where they have pleaded not guilty. Mills and Martin are expected to change their pleas.
Federal prosecutors have previously recommended a 40-year prison sentence for MartinNo date has yet been set in state court.
Nichols worked for FedEx and enjoyed skateboarding and photography. The city of Sacramento, where Nichols grew up, called a skate park in his honor. “Tyre fell in love with skateboarding at a young age and it didn’t take long for it to become a part of his lifestyle,” the resolution approved by the city council said. He had a tattoo of his mother’s name.
“The family of Tyre Nichols has been praying for justice and accountability since the beginning of this tragedy,” Ben Crump and Antonio Romanucci, the civil rights attorneys representing Nichols’ family, said in a statement as the trial began.
