The trial of three former Memphis officers charged in the fatal beating of Tyre Nichols ended with a mixed verdict, surprising and perplexing some observers who questioned why the jury would acquit two of the officers on the most serious charges
Moments after a federal judge read the partial convictions in the federal trial of three former Memphis officers in the fatal beating of Tyre Nichols, an activist outside the courtroom could not contain his shock.
“What the (expletive)?” Hunter Demster exclaimed to a reporter.
Demster, like many others, had watched the police video of five officers punching, kicking and hitting Nichols with a baton. But it wasn’t enough for a jury to convict Tadarrius Bean and Justin Smith of the two most serious charges they faced: violating Nichols’ civil rights by using excessive force and by showing “deliberate indifference” to his serious medical needs.
“My heart sank when they read the not guilty verdicts,” Demster said Friday. “I do not feel like justice was served for Tyre.”
Nichols, who was Black, had run from a traffic stop despite being hit with pepper spray and a Taser. In all, five officers, all of them Black, were fired, then indicted, in the January 2023 beating death that sparked national protests and calls for broad changes in policing. Two of them, Desmond Mills and Emmitt Martin, pleaded guilty before the trial and testified for prosecutors.
After officers caught up to Nichols, body cameras and a security camera captured officers pummeling Nichols in a struggle just steps from his home, as he cried out for his mother. Nichols’ family, activists and others had hoped that Bean, Smith and Demetrius Haley would be convicted of the civil rights violations that carried a sentence a up to life in prison.
After a nearly monthlong trial, only Haley was convicted of the two civil rights violations, and even then, only on lesser charges of causing bodily harm, not Nichols’ death. He also was found guilty of two other charges related to conspiracy to witness tamper and obstruction of justice related to witness tampering.
