Shelby County’s District Attorney’s office in Tennessee is reviewing all cases previously handled by the five Memphis police officers charged in Tyre Nichols’ death.
The probe comes as police records describe allegedly false comments given by Preston Hemphill — the sixth officer to be fired after Nichols’ death. Hemphill was terminated from the Memphis Police Department last week for breaking several departmental rules, including honesty and personal conduct, CNN reported.
Authorities have charged Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Emmitt Martin III, Justin Smith and Desmond Mills Jr. with second-degree murder, kidnapping, official misconduct and official oppression for their roles in Nichols’ death, according to NBC News. The 29-year-old FedEx worker passed away on Jan. 10, three days after the officers brutally beat him.
Hemphill claimed, in his statement that was part of a decertification form Memphis Police sent to the Tennessee Peace Officer Standards and Training Commission, that Nichols tried to grab his police partner’s weapon.
The document notes, “There is no video footage to corroborate that statement,” and cites how Hemphill gave a conflicting account to investigators, asserting the now-former officer “did not see the subject grab your partner’s gun.” Hemphill also maintained that Nichols was pulled over after “driving recklessly at a high rate of speed,” but then acknowledged later, the document says, he “did not witness the subject driving in such a manner.”
District Attorney Steve Mulroy said Shelby County’s roster of law enforcement officials whose credibility has been questioned now includes the other five former officers.
The men belonged to the Scorpion elite crime-fighting unit, which was disbanded soon after the officers assaulted Nichols in a violent encounter captured in body camera footage. Mayor Jim Strickland noted in a speech last year that the squad made hundreds of arrests in the first few months of its establishment in 2021.
Despite the unit’s responsibility to tackle violent crime, some locals claim that Scorpion officers have stopped them for insignificant, nonviolent violations. Memphis resident Monterrious Harris, 22, filed a federal lawsuit Thursday, alleging that Scorpion officers assaulted him just days before Nichols’ attack.
Records show that earlier this week, letters of decertification for the five officers charged indicated that their testimonies were “not consistent with each other and are not consistent with the publicly known injuries and death of Mr. Nichols,” according to CNN.
Mulroy’s office did not specify the number of cases his office would examine, only that it would cover both closed and open inquiries.
“This is just the beginning,” spokeswoman Erica Williams, told CNN. “This involves any criminal case that [the officers] were involved in. It is any case where there were criminal charges that were brought by the DA anytime since they became officers.”
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