Ex Memphis US police officers found not guilty in murder of Tyre Nichols
He died in hospital three days later.
The verdicts come at a pivotal moment for police reform efforts. Advocates hoped the case would show that rogue officers could be held accountable and worried that an acquittal could stall their movement. Public support for reforms sparked by the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police has waned significantly since 2020, according to the Pew Research Centre. President Donald Trump campaigned on a platform of empowering officers to aggressively 'clean up' American cities, and his Justice Department has essentially halted federal efforts to hold local police departments accountable.
The three officers were already found guilty of several federal charges, including excessive force resulting in injury, but were acquitted last year of the most serious ones, including civil rights violations resulting in death. They have not been sentenced on those charges yet.
In the federal trial, Demetrius Haley was convicted of excessive force resulting in injury, deliberate indifference resulting in injury, conspiracy to witness tamper and witness tampering. Tadarrius Bean and Justin Smith Jr. were found guilty of witness tampering.
Two other officers involved in the killing, Emmitt Martin III and Desmond Mills Jr., pleaded guilty to state and federal charges.
During a week-long state trial, prosecutors and defence attorneys dissected videos of the beating gathered from a surveillance camera and the officers' body cameras. The officers' attorneys argued that videos didn't reflect the reality of what happened and the intense pressure the officers faced. If Nichols had co-operated when police attempted to handcuff him, the encounter would have ended differently, they told jurors.
'They're doing a job that none of us have the guts to do,' Martin Zummach, who represented Smith, said of the officers. 'All Tyre Nichols had to do was say, 'Alright. You got me.' He might have spent a little time in jail … but he wouldn't be dead.'
The officers were following police policy and convicting them would handcuff the city, defence attorneys warned.
But Mills, one of the officers who already pleaded guilty, painted a different picture, telling the state jury that as he beat Nichols with the baton that night, Martin and Smith were yelling, 'Hit him'.
Prosecutors said the trial wasn't an indictment against all law enforcement, but about the actions of the three men on trial.
'Nobody is saying that it's not a dangerous job,' assistant district attorney Tanisha Johnson said. 'No one is saying that it doesn't take bravery. But because it's a dangerous job does not mean that you are immune from making criminal decisions.'
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