A jury in the United States has acquitted three former police officers in the controversial beating death of Tyre Nichols, a 29-year-old father who was killed after a traffic stop in Memphis, Tennessee.
On Wednesday, former officers Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley and Justin Smith were found not guilty in a state-level case that included charges of second-degree murder, aggravated assault, aggravated kidnapping, official misconduct and official oppression.
This was their second criminal trial, after facing federal charges for Nichols’s death as well.
In that case, the three officers were also acquitted of the most serious charges they faced, though they were found guilty of witness tampering for allegedly attempting to cover up the beating.
There were five police officers in total involved in the Nichols killing, which took place on January 7, 2023. As video of the beating spread online, Nichols’s death reignited the debate over law enforcement violence and the over-policing of Black communities.
In the wake of the verdict, Memphis District Attorney Steve Mulroy told reporters that Nichols’s family was “devastated” and “outraged”.
“We can understand why they would be outraged, given the evidence,” Mulroy said.
“Was I surprised that there wasn’t a single guilty verdict on any of the counts or any of the lesser-included offences, given the overwhelming evidence that we presented? Yes, I was surprised,” he added. “Do I have an explanation for it? No.”
All five police officers involved in the beating were members of the Memphis Police Department’s SCORPION unit, a now-defunct squad that focused on alleged crime hotspots in the city. The outcry after Nichols’s death led to it being disbanded.
On the day of his killing, Nichols was pulled over for allegedly driving recklessly, though prosecutors have cast doubt on that motive, pointing out that police body cameras show no evidence of wrongdoing.
Officers pulled Nichols from his car and tased him while he was on the ground. Nichols then attempted to flee. He ran into a residential neighbourhood not far from where his mother lived, where the five police officers wrestled him to the ground and proceeded to kick, punch and beat him with a baton.
Cameras captured Nichols crying out to his mother for help. He died three days later in hospital. An autopsy identified his cause of death as blunt force trauma to the head.
Two of the police officers involved – Desmond Mills Jr and Emmitt Martin – had avoided trial by striking deals with federal prosecutors in exchange for guilty pleas. The two reportedly took plea deals related to the state charges as well.
Wednesday’s verdict was the culmination of a nine-day-long trial for the other three officers.
The defence team for the three sought to shift the blame to the other officers for the bulk of the violence. It also accused Nichols of resisting arrest and not complying with police orders, leaving the officers fearful for their safety.
“This is Emmitt Martin’s and Tyre Nichols’s doing,” said Martin Zummach, a defence lawyer for Smith, one of the three officers.
Zummach also alleged that credit and debit cards not belonging to Nichols were found in his car after his beating. That, he told the jury, could explain Nichols’s decision to flee the scene.
But prosecutors in the case argued that Nichols fled out of fear for his life. They also said the officers had a responsibility to stop the beating, which caused tears and bleeding in Nichols’s brain.
Video of the beating was also shown to the jury from different angles, as the prosecutors tried to convey the violence of Nichols’s final moments.
The trial, which saw seven days of hearings and two days of jury deliberations, took place in Hamilton County, a majority white area in Tennessee. A judge had previously ordered the court proceedings be moved away from Shelby County, where Memphis is located, for fear of that the public scrutiny could bias the jury pool.
Civil rights lawyer Ben Crump, who represented the Nichols family, released a statement after Wednesday’s decision denouncing the outcome.
“Today’s verdicts are a devastating miscarriage of justice,” the statement reads. “The world watched as Tyre Nichols was beaten to death by those sworn to protect and serve.”