Community organizations are urging Memphis Mayor Paul Young to enter a consent decree with the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) in the aftermath of the agency’s findings on the Memphis Police Department (MPD).
The Black Clergy Collaborative of Memphis, Memphis Interfaith Coalition For Action and Hope (MICAH), and Just City released a letter urging Young to sign the agreement. They said the DOJ’s findings found MPD to have consistent practices of discrimination and civil rights violations – many of which citizens had advocated against for years.
In hopes of remedying these issues, the organizations said the city should include the DOJ in its next steps with an “independent monitor.” They also noted Young’s concern for the financial risks a consent decree would impose, which is why he said the city will not enter an agreement.
“[Mayor Young] thinks the city and MPD can correct these abuses without DOJ involvement,” the letter said. “We can think of no instance when a just society allowed the abuser of others to determine how they would fix their behavior. Just societies always intervene and prescribe what the abuser must do, monitors the abuser, and decides when the correction has occurred, which is precisely what a consent decree would aim to do.”
The letter said while they support the mayor, they don’t believe he would be able to supervise officers and conduct and review incident videos while carrying out his mayoral responsibilities.
“We have no trust or confidence in leaving corrections to the people involved in the unlawful conduct, the persons who failed to supervise them, or those who stood by and said nothing while the unlawful conduct occurred. We need DOJ involvement,” the letter said.
Young reported that several cities, such as Chicago and New Orleans, have consent decrees that have cost them millions of dollars with crime rates still on the rise. Organizers said these references imply “ a connection without data or proof.”
While the letter said they don’t know how decrees are calculated or other factors contributing to these numbers, they cannot “use these numbers to compare or estimate the cost of a consent decree in Memphis.”
Organizers said under a consent decree the city must pay a monitor and their team to track their compliance with the DOJ’s plan and recommendations while also providing regular updates based on “agreed-upon metrics.” Memphis will also be required to cover any fines and fees imposed by the federal court if the MPD repeatedly fails to adhere to the consent decree.
“Memphis can limit the financial cost of the decree simply by complying with its requirements,” officials said. “Regardless of the cost, we know that protecting the lives of Memphians, especially persons with disabilities and children is priceless, too valuable not to sign the decree.”
They also referenced citizens who voiced their concern for MPD as they said they work hard with a “short staff” and they are “underpaid, outgunned on the streets, and continue to be beaten down (low morale)” as criminals are emboldened in their practice.
Organizers said there may be validity in these statements, but that doesn’t mean MPD’s behavior described in the report is justified.
“It is possible and necessary to address abusive conduct and establish lawful and effective public safety practices while acknowledging the challenging nature of the work and respecting officers who perform the job well,” they said.
In addition to urging the mayor to sign the agreement, the letter also recommends developing a peacekeeping force to aid in police reform.
“Our confidence in affecting positive, lasting, tailored change is grounded in the DOJ’s authority to secure the reforms of unconstitutional patterns and practices identified within MPD,” the letter said.
Organizers are currently asking citizens to sign a petition to urge Young to enter a decree which can be found here.
Next steps after the federal government’s report on excessive force within the Memphis Police Department (MPD) are not known, of course. But at least one big sign points to “not much,” as far as the next White House occupant is concerned.
President-elect Donald Trump’s campaign ran on “law and order” as a central theme. His campaign said ”there is no higher priority than quickly restoring law and order and public safety in America.” He even just tweeted those words in all capital letters four years ago:
However, the American Civil Liberties Group (ACLU) has said that “law and order” in a second Trump administration is a “shorthand message promising repression of the Black community.”
”Specifically, Trump’s law enforcement policies call for further protections for abusive police, including condoning the use of force against protesters, which he once described as a ’beautiful thing to watch’,” reads an ACLU analysis of Trump policies in July. “This rhetoric risks encouraging state actors to take a similarly brutal approach.”
If the ACLU is correct on the premise, this means Trump’s “brutal approach” to law enforcement could, maybe, trickle down to state and local leaders, emboldened by the President to allow tough justice to be doled out across the country without major repercussions to law enforcement officials — i.e. police officers.
To get there, Trump promised to ”strengthen qualified immunity and other protections for police officers.” Qualified immunity allows government actors (i.e. cops) to perform their jobs without the risk of civil liability. This means, basically, that if a cop breaks some laws while they are making an arrest, they can’t be sued for it in court. So, Trump would give cops extra protection against the citizens they serve even if they hurt those citizens during the course of their work.
1. Sign a record investment in hiring, retention, and training for police officers. The bill will increase vital liability protections for America’s law enforcement officers.
2. President Trump will require local law enforcement agencies receiving DOJ grants to return to proven policing measures such as stop-and-frisk, strictly enforcing existing gun laws, cracking down on the open use of illegal drugs, and cooperating with ICE to arrest and deport criminal aliens.
”…to qualify for this new funding and all other Justice Department grants, I will insist that local jurisdictions return to proven common sense policing measures, such as stop and frisk — very simple — you stop them and you frisk them….,” Trump said in a campaign video.
City leaders and President Joe Biden’s DOJ are now tussling on whether or not the two will approve a consent decree for MPD. An agreement like this would bring in federal monitors to watch over the police department on a day-to-day basis to ensure it adhered to new policies for improvement. The city’s attorney has said the city will not approve a consent decree.
First, the city argued, the investigation didn’t take long enough. These can last up to three years. The DOJ wrapped up the MPD review in 17 months. Memphis officials said, also, they need a legal avenue to question the DOJ’s investigation methods.
Leaders here, though, won’t likely have to worry with threats of a lawsuit to enact the consent decree. Only one such decree was enacted in Trump’s first term. So far, 17 have been issued under Biden. Trump also cancelled a consent decree enacted during Barrack Obama’s Adminstration against the city of Baltimore.
City leaders also argued that such a consent decree would cost too much. Memphis taxpayers would be on the hook to pay for all the federal monitors and programs to adhere to the agreement. Leaders said this could cost millions of dollars.
That cost would come, too, as city taxpayers face paying out a $550 million civil penalty to the family of Tyre Nichols. The beating death of Nichols at the hands of MPD officers drew the eye of the DOJ investigation in the first place.
As of Thursday afternoon, Trump did not make any statement about the DOJ on his Truth Social platform.
Reactions are pouring in after a blistering report from the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) Wednesday detailed the agency’s findings from an investigation into the Memphis Police Department. This probe was launched in the aftermath of Tyre Nichol’s death following his deadly beating after a traffic stop.
“Based on this investigation, we found that the police in Memphis use excessive force; that they stop, search, and arrest people unlawfully; that their policies have a discriminatory effect on Black people; and that they discriminate against people with behavioral health disabilities,” the DOJ said in a statement. “Furthermore, we are concerned that Memphis police officers unnecessarily escalate encounters with some of the most vulnerable members of the community — its children.”
The DOJ found that the agency used excessive force, discriminatory practices against Black people, and imposed harsh and “aggressive” tactics on children.” The agency found these to consistent practices where they “violat[ed] people’s rights.”
Career attorneys and staff from the Civil Rights Division, the United States Attorney’s Office, and “more than a dozen experts who specialize in police department management, use of force, statistics and other areas,” were consulted in what the Justice Department called a “comprehensive and exhaustive” investigation. They also interviewed police officer, city employees, community members and more.
“We received hundreds of incidents, watched hundreds of body-worn camera videos, read thousands of documents, and conducted statistical analyses of the department’s data regarding officer activities and enforcement,” the statement said.
U.S. Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke said MPD’s practices do not make Memphis safer and urged the city to intervene in terms of police reform and consent decrees. They said they are also committed to working with the city to remedy these patterns.
“Achieving meaningful constitutional policing reform costs time and resources,” Clarke said. “ But not implementing systemic reforms also imposes enormous costs — cost in terms of citizens’ rights that are trampled, personal, and financial costs in injuries and deaths due to excessive, unnecessary use of force, costs in diminished public safety, and millions of dollars in legal judgments against the city due to constitutional violations.”
During a press conference Mayor Paul Young said for those who had not read the report that it would be “difficult to read” and that some types of incidents are “not acceptable.”
“Policing in Memphis must always be ever-evolving, constantly improving, and I’m confident that our team is ready to further the work of creating ongoing change,” Young said. “We believe that adjustments we’ve already begun making must continue and that they must expand.”
In a letter addressed to Justice Department officials, Tannera Gibson, city of Memphis attorney and Chief Legal Officer, said the city will not willfully enter a consent decree based on the report. She said a legal process is required for them to question how they evaluated information, witnesses, and facts used to reach their conclusions.
“Until the city has had the opportunity to review, analyze, and challenge the specific allegations that support your forthcoming findings report, the city cannot — and will not — agree to work toward or enter into a consent decree that will likely be in place for years to come and will cost the residents of Memphis hundreds of millions of dollars,” Gibson said in a statement. “From what we understand, consent decrees remain in place for an average of more than ten years, with absolutely no controls to ensure timely completion or consideration for the financial impact to the affected community. Such a proposal is not the right solution for Memphis.”
“Confirms what activists and organizers have been saying about the police department for years.”
Cardell Orrin, executive director of Stand for Children – Tennessee, echoed these sentiments saying this is what they’ve “heard many times and has been debated, disputed, and diminished.”
“Thanks to the investigators from DOJ for validating the experiences of people in Memphis when the people’s representatives have not been willing to acknowledge and do something about it,” Orrin said in a post. “You can go back to the many CLERB (Civilian Law Enforcement Review Board) recommendations that never got addressed by MPD leadership or the city.”
This story will be continually updated as more reactions come in.
EDITOR’S NOTE: In the United States, federal trials carry a prohibition against recording by the media. In our commitment to community-centered reporting, we asked contributing artist Mikhaila Markham to help us bear witness by illustrating scenes from the frontlines of accountability.
In the most functional sense, a trial is a community event. The American criminal legal system presents courts and their due process as a way to address our collective grievances and repair what’s been harmed. The widely circulated video of Memphis police officers fatally beating Tyre Nichols laid bare where harm happened. The recently concluded federal trial against three of those officers showed that repair is much harder to see..
Last week, a federal jury of their peers found Tadarrius Bean, Justin Smith and Demetrius Haley guilty of some charges related to the death of Tyre Nichols. Bean and Smith were convicted of witness tampering, but acquitted of civil rights charges. Haley was convicted of violating Nichols’ civil rights by causing bodily harm (a lesser charge that absolves the officer from causing his death), witness tampering and conspiring to hide the officers actions. They were acquitted of more serious civil rights charges they were facing.
“Tyre should be alive today, and while nothing can bring him back, today’s guilty verdicts bring a measure of accountability for his senseless and tragic death,” said the family’s attorney Ben Crump in a statement following the verdicts. Other officials echoed the sentiment that they were grateful the officers were held partially accountable.
Cases like these offer a unique perspective on the limits of our current criminal legal system. The individual police officers in the case are being held responsible by a series of charges tailored to each one’s respective involvement on the scene.
We’ve watched how Tyre’s family, particularly his parents, respond to the expectations that accompany their visibility. They are stewards of their son’s legacy, fighting to prevent it from being erased by the system that allowed his death to happen. They are fighting to keep another life from being robbed rather than protected. They know the pain of the wounds they carry in the wake of his death and how elusive it is to find healing.
This trial’s conclusion, while holding these police officers to account, comes up short in addressing the violent systemic issues that created the circumstances that led to Tyre’s death and keep our communities under oppression. Healing requires justice, but scenes of justice in our criminal legal system are rare.
Mikhaila Markham, MLK50: Justice Through Journalism
SEPT. 20, 2024 | The three defendants — Demetrius Haley, Justin Smith and Taddarius Bean — were all seated along the left wall, facing the jury. They did not testify during the proceedings. While they were tried together, each faced individual charges and was represented by their own attorney. During the trial, the attorneys repeatedly shifted blame onto the other defendants.
Mikhaila Markham, MLK50: Justice Through Journalism
SEPT. 20, 2024 | (Left) Federal judge Mark S. Norris presided over the case. (Right) Dr. Marco Ross, the chief medical examiner who wrote Tyre Nichols’ autopsy report, testified to the internal and external injuries Nichols suffered. “Nothing would have reversed it [the brain damage] other than preventing the cardiac arrest,” Ross said. “There is nothing that would have made those injuries heal any more quickly.”
Mikhaila Markham, MLK50: Justice Through Journalism
SEPT. 25, 2024 | Former Memphis police officer Desmond Mills testified for the prosecution over two days. “I made his child fatherless,” an emotional Mills said from the stand on the first day. In the cross examination, attorney John Keith Perry — representing Bean — asserted that Mills was the only officer whose hands were free, and therefore the only officer who could have prevented former officer Emmitt Martin III from beating Nichols. Mills denied this, maintaining that any one of the officers on scene could have intervened. Faced with charges of his own, Mills pleaded guilty last fall to civil rights and conspiracy charges arising from Nichols’ death.
Mikhaila Markham, MLK50: Justice Through Journalism
OCT 3. 2024 | Activists, elected officials, and friends attended court regularly alongside the Wells family to observe and offer comfort. Pictured here are (left to right) Amber Sherman, a Memphis-rooted activist; Keyana Dixon, Tyre’s older sister and Tennessee state representative Justin J. Pearson.
Mikhaila Markham, MLK50: Justice Through Journalism
SEPT. 27, 2024 | After a morning of testimony, Judge Norris dismissed the jury for a break. People in court are asked to stand and wait when that happens. Most stood facing forward. As she stood, RowVaughn Wells turned towards the aisle and paused before walking out.
Mikhaila Markham, MLK50: Justice Through Journalism
SEPT. 25, 2024 | Haley, Bean, and Smith listened to former Memphis police officer Desmond Mills testify in detail about the choices they made together to cover up their role in killing Tyre Nichols.
Mikhaila Markham, MLK50: Justice Through Journalism
OCT. 2, 2024 | (Left) Attorneys John Keith Perry, representing Bean, and (right) Martin Zummach, representing Smith, during their closing arguments. Perry used a visual aid to chart what he argued was a case against his client that did not meet a burden of proof for his guilt. According to him, Bean was following Memphis Police Department policies, broken as they are, faithfully. “Make the decision, the right decision, because you got the receipts,” Perry said. “Don’t defund the police. Refund Mr. Bean.” Zummach’s closing asked the jury to consider the key roles Martin and Mills, the two officers who already pleaded guilty, took in the beating and attempted cover-up when making a decision about Smith. He also referred to his client’s former supervisor, a retired police officer, who said: “If it was one of my kids that had done something to be arrested, I’d want Justin arresting them.”
Mikhaila Markham, MLK50: Justice Through Journalism
OCT. 2, 2024 | (Left) Attorney Stephen Leffler, representing Haley, used a large timer to illustrate to the court how much time elapsed before his client made it to the second scene of the MPD’s stop on Nichols. It was at the second scene, a few feet away from his mother’s home, where the fatal assault on Nichols took place. (Top right) RowVaughn Wells and (bottom right) Judge Norris watch.
Mikhaila Markham, MLK50: Justice Through Journalism
OCT. 3, 2024 | After the jury handed down their verdict, Tyreece Miller (right), the United States Marshal for the Western District of Tennessee, escorted the three former police officers out of the courtroom.
Mikhaila Markham is a visual artist based in Memphis. Her work can be viewed on her website: mikhailamarkham.com
Andrea Morales is the visuals director for MLK50: Justice Through Journalism. Email her at andrea.morales@mlk50.com
Emcee Otis Sanford, Buddy Chapman, and David Wayne Brown at Brooks book-reading event (Photo: Jackson Baker)
As the Greater Memphis community continues to try to sort out whether it is in the grip of a crime wave or whether, as a recent Crime Commission report indicates, crime statistics are actually on the wane, the subject continues to dominate local attention.
One matter that has remained more or less on the back burner is that of Mayor Paul Young’s proposed director of public safety, a pending position (sometimes referred to in administrative ranks, somewhat less reassuringly, as “public safety advisor”).
Young suggested the new office back in January after the city council declined to endorse his proffered reappointment of C.J. Davis as police chief, and the new mayor, in response, fell back on the expedient of keeping Davis on as interim chief.
From the beginning, it was uncertain whether the proposed directorship was to be a fundamentally new concept or a retooling of a dormant position. Compounding the confusion was the fact that, at some hard-to-pinpoint period in the administration of former Mayor Jim Strickland, the existing title of police director had somehow morphed back into that of police chief, a development making Davis’ currently impermanent position seem all the more tenuous.
But now the suggestion comes from administration sources that the task of filling the new position — however it is to be titled and whatever its scope — is in the “latter” stages and may be just around the corner, with a narrowing down of prospects by mid-June and a likely appointment by July 1st, in time for the new fiscal year.
Meanwhile, coincidentally and maybe usefully, the individual most identified in Memphis history with the erstwhile rank of police director, E. Winslow “Buddy” Chapman, has published his memoir, under the title of Call Me Director: Memoir of a Police Reformer.
Chapman’s service at the helm of city law enforcement came during the administration of former Mayor Wyeth Chandler (1972-1982), and it coincided with conditions that were not unlike those of our present moment.
Mayor Young’s apparent intention with his new directorship is to establish a wide-ranging civilian control over police authority, and that was the mission also of Chapman, who had to fight a protracted battle with the good-old-boy regime of then-Police Chief Bill Crumby to achieve, finally, a workable dominance over local law-enforcement policy.
As Chapman writes in his book, and as he related to an appreciative audience in a book-signing and reading at the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art on Monday night, the issues he had to deal with were very like our own these days.
They included instances of police brutality, racism in the MPD ranks, severe financial shortages and under-staffing, and the imperatives of federal supervision. He also had to face down and survive simultaneous police and fire strikes in the crisis year of 1978.
What he strove to impose as an alternative to established practices was a form of what we would call today community policing. And, as he ended his tenure and resumed civilian status, he founded the local CrimeStoppers organization, which he ran as director until recently when he turned the reins over to David Wayne Brown, the co-author and collaborator of his memoir.
The book grapples with the conundrum of finding the right balance between carrot and stick in law enforcement — same as Mayor Young and his soon-to-be public safety director will shortly face — and is well worth their reading and ours.
The Shelby County District Attorney Office has confirmed that fallen Memphis Police Department (MPD) Officer Joseph McKinney was killed by friendly fire.
In a statement released on Wednesday, the DA’s office said they have decided to drop the murder charges against the 17-year-old involved in the Friday, April 12th, shooting.
“We have not proceeded with a murder charge at this time because current information indicates that Officer McKinney was killed by friendly fire,” the DA’s office said in a statement.
McKinney was killed during a police-involved shoot-out in Whitehaven on April 12th. Two suspects opened fire on police after three officers investigated a suspicious vehicle around 2 a.m. near Horn Lake Road and Charter Road. This resulted in McKinney being killed, with one officer being taken to Regional One Health, and another being grazed by a bullet and treated on scene.
The 18-year-old suspect died at the hospital, while the 17-year-old was admitted under critical condition on Friday morning.
While the DA’s office came to this conclusion from their “current information,” they said the 17-year-old’s “reprehensible actions” are still to blame for McKinney’s death.
“Should a legal avenue open up for additional prosecution, be assured we will pursue it,” the DA’s office added.
Chief C.J. Davis of MPD released a statement shortly after this information was released saying that they “continue to mourn the death of Officer Joseph McKinney.”
“The facts remain that our officers responded to a very violent encounter that tragically resulted in Officer McKinney being fatally shot,” the statement read.
The statement showed support McKinney’s family and the Memphis Police Department “in honor of his valor.” The department will conduct a “Sea of Blue” on Sunday, April 21st, in McKinney’s honor.
Reactions of grief, sympathy, and anger mounted Friday morning as new details emerged about a shootout early Friday morning that left one officer and one suspect dead, and three others injured.
Memphis Police Department (MPD) officer Joseph McKinney was killed in the event in Whitehaven. He died at Regional One Health Friday morning. He had been assigned to the Raines Road station.
Three officers investigated a suspicious vehicle around 2 a.m. near Horn Lake and Charter Roads. Two suspects opened fire as police approached the vehicle.
McKinney was shot and killed. Another officer was shot and taken to Regional One and is now in non-ciritcal condition. The third officer was grazed by a bullet, treated on the scene, and is in stable condition.
Both suspects, 18 and 17, sustained gunfire and both were taken to Regional One. The 18-year-old suspect died at the hospital. The other was in critical condition as of Friday morning. MPD did not release the names of the suspects.
The 18-year old-suspect was arrested by MPD in March 2024, according to police chief Cerelyn Davis. He was in a stolen vehicle and carried an illegal modified semi-automatic weapon with a Glock switch attached. The switch converted the weapon to a fully automatic machine gun. He was also charged at that time for two stolen vehicles and having a programming device commonly used to steal cars, Davis said. The suspect was released at that time without bond.
Reactions from leaders have poured out online:
Maria & I are deeply saddened by the death of Memphis Police Officer Joseph McKinney while serving in the line of duty.
Our prayers are with Officer McKinney’s family, the recovering officers & the Memphis law enforcement community.
Please join me in praying for the family of Officer Joseph McKinney, who was murdered in the line of duty last night in Memphis. Please also join me in prayer for the other officers and their families who were wounded.
— Representative John Gillespie (@repgillespie) April 12, 2024
“I was deeply grieved upon hearing the news that Memphis police officer Joseph McKinney lost his life during a shooting incident this morning in south Memphis. On behalf of all the men and women of the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office, I offer our prayers and deepest condolences to… pic.twitter.com/uXWYR8A6Mc
Our prayers are with the family, friends, and colleagues of fallen Memphis Police Officer Joseph McKinney as well as the officers injured in the line of fire last night.
Our office stands with our law enforcement community and the City of Memphis, and we pray for a swift… pic.twitter.com/XzuAu2fIwj
I am heartbroken to hear the news of the death of Memphis Police Officer Joseph McKinney. Chrissy and I are praying for his family and loved ones during this difficult time. https://t.co/TS2O9aPy9b
Roberta and I are deeply saddened to hear about the passing of MPD Officer Joseph McKinney. Please join us in praying for the swift recovery of the two additional officers who were shot in the line of duty this morning.
During this time, Officer McKinney’s family and the entire…
“This morning MPD Officer Joseph McKinney was killed by gunfire that also injured two of his colleagues,” Akbari said. “Additionally, an 18-year-old is dead and a 17-year-old is in the hospital. Our community is hurting again after another act of senseless gun violence. In this moment, we need to lift up the MPD and the families who are grieving and then come together in finding ways to stop the next tragedy.”
Congressman Steve Cohen (TN-9) issued the following statement:
“I am deeply saddened to hear of the death of Officer McKinney, shot in the line of duty this morning,” he said. “Police officers protect society and put their lives in jeopardy every day. Police officers have difficult, often dangerous jobs. We need to keep working to provide them with the resources they need to work as safely as possible.
“I want to express my condolences to Officer McKinney’s family and friends, and my sorrow to the families of the officers injured in this terrible incident.”
Many local leaders are hailing the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) investigation into the Memphis Police Department (MPD) as “the right course of action” to address “systemic issues” within the department.
DOJ officials announced Thursday they are opening a civil rights investigation into the city of Memphis and the MPD.
Kristen Clarke, assistant attorney general for the civil rights division of the DOJ’s local office said that this investigation will determine “whether there is a pattern or practice of conduct that violates the Constitution or our federal civil rights law.”
Clarke said the move is not in response to a single incident or event, nor is it “confined to a specific unit or type of unit within the MPD.
Local leaders began sharing their thoughts about the investigation after a press conference on the matter Thursday afternoon.
Shelby County District Attorney Steve Mulroy
“I’m pleased the DOJ is investigating civil rights practices within the MPD. While I’m sure most officers are people of good faith, we have systemic issues we need to address. The Tyre Nichols incident was not a one-off, but suggests wider problems of culture.
Only an outside investigation can restore the public confidence we need to get the community cooperating with law enforcement, which is the most important thing to bend the curve on crime. And only DOJ can provide the kind of thorough investigation into systemic practices that we need to restore public confidence.”
Memphis mayoral candidate Michelle McKissack
“This independent investigation is the right course of action. We need transparency and truth surrounding the tragic death of Tyre Nichols and patterns of misconduct within MPD.
Our community must have trust and faith in the Memphis Police Department. As mayor, I would be committed to fully cooperating with the investigation because it will leave us with a stronger department and a safer city.”
Attorneys Ben Crump and Antonio Romanucci (legal counsel for the family of Tyre Nichols)
“The family of Tyre Nichols is grateful that the Department of Justice heard their cries for accountability and are opening this investigation.
Actions such as this will continue to show that the federal government will not let corruption within police departments take the lives of innocent Americans.
It is our hope that the investigation by the DOJ, under the leadership of Attorney General Garland and Assistant Attorney General Clarke, will provide a transparent account of the abuses of power we have seen and continue to see in Memphis.”
Sen. Raumesh Akbari (D-Memphis)
“My hope is that city and police officials embrace the Department of Justice’s civil rights investigation as an opportunity for systemic change.
Our families are sick and tired of crime and they need our police department to succeed. But well-meaning officers cannot build trust if the department does not holistically address the failures it has made in the past.”
Former Shelby County Commissioner Tami Sawyer
“Let’s not forget that the last time DOJ investigated Memphis, it found that Black youth were treated unfairly in Juvenile Court, the detention center, and by MPD and SCSO. Mayors [Jim] Strickland and [then Shelby County Mayor Mark Lutrell] successfully lobbied the Trump administration to remove those DOJ monitors.”
Just City
“Just City is pleased and encouraged that the Department of Justice has answered our community’s call for a pattern or practice investigation into the city of Memphis and the Memphis Police Department. We proudly added our voice to those of lawmakers, pastors, and advocates leading this demand and provided data analysis as evidence of their claims.
Today’s announcement is evidence of the power of our collective efforts since the tragic killing of Tyre Nichols, but we are also grateful for those who have advocated for more accountability and transparency for years. The opening of this investigation is validation of a long-held understanding by many in our community that our police department is rooted in a culture of violence, racial discrimination, and resistance to accountability.
We hope that our city’s next mayor will take this evidence and investigation seriously and move toward creating meaningful accountability for police officers and enact plans to reduce the over-policing of Black communities. This is a pivotal opportunity, and we hope this investigation results in renewed trust and public safety in a community desperate for both.”
Democratic State House Minority Leader and Memphis mayoral candidate Rep. Karen Camper
“The announcement of the Department of Justice investigation into the patterns and practices of the Memphis Police Department brings us one step closer to putting an end to a culture of racism, violence and violation that has been systemic in the department.
This investigation is focused on what we know must be fixed right now, but I believe it will be a catalyst for reform so that we do not have to have to fix it again in the future.
The work to create a more just and equitable Memphis continues and I promise you that I will always be in the fight with you.”
Rev. Al Sharpton
“When I delivered the eulogy for Tyre [Nichols] this February, I made a clear call for the Justice Department to look at the policies and procedures that led to his death.
“You cannot allow a police department to continue business as usual when there’s clear video of multiple officers ripping him from his car, shoving him to the pavement, and senselessly beating him to death.”
What happened to government transparency? (Photo: Phartisan | Dreamstime.com)
For two and a half years, the City of Memphis has sent journalist Marc Perrusquia perfunctory communications that it is still reviewing and considering his records request, each time pushing the date for its response down the road. Perrusquia asked for the audits and evaluations of a Memphis police program that provides non-disciplinary intervention when police officers exhibit behavior and performance problems. The city’s policy and procedure manual requires an audit of the program every six months to evaluate the outcomes of supervisory interventions and the quality of reviews. Quarterly reports are also required.
Perrusquia, a journalist in Memphis for more than 30 years, asked for five years of the audits and evaluations on December 6, 2020. If an audit is done every six months in compliance with the city’s policy, that’s 10 audits. However, the city stonewalled his request, contacting him 41 times extending the “time necessary” to complete it. One time, the city told him that the responsive documents were with the city attorney for review. Then the next month, the city said it had not yet determined that records responsive to his request existed. Now Perrusquia has filed a lawsuit against the city over the delays, saying they amount to a constructive denial of his public records request. His attorney is Paul McAdoo with the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press and represents journalists in Tennessee as part of the Reporters Committee Local Legal Initiative.
The Tennessee Public Records Act (TPRA) outlines how government entities are required to respond to a public records request in T.C.A. § 10-7-503 (a)(2)(B):
“The custodian of a public record or the custodian’s designee shall promptly make available for inspection any public record not specifically exempt from disclosure. In the event it is not practicable for the record to be promptly available for inspection, the custodian shall, within seven (7) business days: (i) Make the public record requested available to the requestor; (ii) Deny the request in writing or by completing a records request response form developed by the office of open records counsel. The response shall include the basis for the denial; or (iii) Furnish the requester in writing, or by completing a records request response form developed by the office of open records counsel, the time reasonably necessary to produce the record or information.”
Perrusquia’s lawsuit says the city’s “chronic delay is a violation of the TPRA’s requirement that non-exempt public records be made ‘promptly’ available to the requester.” He also takes aim with the city’s multiple extensions of “the time reasonably necessary to produce the record or information.” “Mr. Perrusquia’s attempts to obtain these public records without filing a petition with this Court have been unsuccessful. It is therefore necessary to bring this action for access and judicial review,” the lawsuit says.
The lawsuit aims at a problem that confounds many journalists and others in Tennessee who request public records: A government entity that gives an estimate on when records will be available, then keeps extending the time over and over. Or, as in Perrusquia’s case: A government that never gives a time estimate and just keeps sending a pro forma letter that it is still reviewing the request and it will let you know later.
In my work as executive director of Tennessee Coalition for Open Government, I’ve often seen denial letters to journalists and citizens with this phrase: “The office is still in the process of retrieving, reviewing, and/or redacting the requested records,” with a note that the requester will hear back in another 30 days. The 30 days come, and the journalist gets the same response. Or they get no response, as if someone forgot to send out the letter again. On the outside, it feels like nothing is being done on your request for records and that maybe no one has even looked at it.
The problem with delays has been acute in Memphis for years. In August 2019, the Memphis Business Journal produced an investigative report about the city’s responses to public records requests. It documented a request it made on December 6, 2017. It was fulfilled a year later, but only after the editor of the newspaper was meeting with a high-level staffer about another matter and mentioned the delayed request. After he did, the staffer promised to look into it, and within three days the city fulfilled the request.
The city responded in the story, saying they initially thought they might have a staffing issue, either needing more people or more training of people. But later they told the newspaper they had a better handle on the situation and had updated its policy from a first-in/first-out to a rolling request system. “Under the new process, rather than letting one request hold up the queue just because it was received first, custodians will try to fill the easy requests quickly and fill large requests in sections.” That was 2019.
No matter the processes employed by government entities, Perrusquia’s lawsuit may be the first in Tennessee that has taken aim at unusual and inexplicable delays. It’s notable that he is asking for records that go to the heart of questions about police oversight in Memphis. His request was made in December 2020. In January 2023, Tyre Nichols was pulled over by police for what they said was reckless driving, then beat to such a pulp that he later died. Much of it was caught on body camera and a street camera. The police officers directly involved have been relieved of duty.
The audits of the city’s police program that seeks to intervene in behavior problems of police should have been released quickly, back in 2021. What do they show? Perhaps this lawsuit will shake them loose and, at the same time, push back on the pattern of delays that undermine transparency in government.
The case has been assigned to Shelby County Chancellor Melanie Taylor Jefferson.
Deborah Fisher is executive director of Tennessee Coalition for Open Government. Previously she spent 25 years in the news industry as a journalist.
If you commit a crime in Memphis, odds are you’re going to get away with it.
The “clearance rate” is a standard measure of police effectiveness used by the FBI. It measures the ratio of crimes reported to arrests made. Crimes cleared by “exceptional means,” such as when the perpetrator is known to police but died before they could be arrested, are also included.
In 2021, the most recent year for which numbers are available from the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation’s Crime Statistics Unit, the Memphis Police Department’s clearance rate for all reported crimes was 22 percent — less than half the national average of 54 percent. For murder, the MPD’s clearance rate was 38 percent. For forcible rape, it was 17.8 percent. For theft from motor vehicles, the rate was 3 percent.
“I think it’s important to point out that, compared to the national average, and compared to cities of comparable size, it is abysmal,” says Shelby County District Attorney Steve Mulroy.
Mulroy emphasized that he was not “throwing shade” on MPD, which he called under-resourced. Nor did he blame Police Chief C.J. Davis. “It takes more than a year and a half to change the culture of an organization that size.” Nonetheless, the below average clearance rates were, in his view, a big problem.
Josh Spickler (Photo: Courtesy Josh Spickler)
“They don’t clear cases,” says Josh Spickler, Executive Director of Just City, a nonprofit devoted to reforming Memphis’ criminal justice system. “That’s the one thing we have to talk about — they don’t solve crime.”
As of press time, the Memphis Police Department did not respond to emailed questions about the department’s clearance rates.
Most police officers, Spickler says, “do the best job they can, even though it’s an impossible job we’ve asked them to do … This is not a critique of the individuals. They’re not put in a position to solve crime. It’s just a disaster. No one is getting justice: Victims are not getting justice, you and I are not getting justice, the taxpayers who are paying for all this are not getting justice. I think something must be done. Something real, something big, something bold and courageous.”
Indeed, the three major national news stories from Memphis in the last year (which did not involve the Memphis Grizzlies) all contained elements of police failure.
The first was the kidnapping and murder of Eliza Fletcher on September 2, 2022, which caused a national media frenzy. The alleged perpetrator, Cleotha Abston-Henderson, was accused of rape in September 2021 by Alicia Franklin, who provided police with his name, phone number, and dating app profile. She submitted to a rape kit examination, but could not conclusively identify Abston-Henderson from an old photo police showed her, and no arrest was made. The case remained one of the 273 uncleared rape reports from 2021 until the rape kit was finally processed in the wake of the Fletcher murder, and Abston-Henderson was charged for both crimes. Franklin sued the city for failing to properly investigate the rape, but the lawsuit was recently dismissed. “They had more than enough evidence that night when they interviewed me to get him off the streets, but they didn’t,” Franklin told ABC News.
The second crime was the mass shooting perpetrated by Ezekiel Kelly on September 7, 2022. Kelly killed his first victim, Dewayne Tunstall, at 12:33 a.m. The murder was immediately reported, and first responders arrived promptly. But Kelly remained at large for another 15 hours before killing his second victim, Richard Clark, at 4:35 p.m. It wasn’t until after 6 p.m., when a 911 caller tipped police to the fact that Kelly was live-streaming his mobile murder spree on Facebook, that police knew Kelly had become a mass shooter. He was finally captured at 9:15 p.m.
Then came the police murder of Tyre Nichols.
Tyre’s Legacy
On January 7, 2023, Tyre Nichols was driving to have dinner at his parents’ house in Hickory Hill when he was stopped by two unmarked police cars. As Demetrius Haley and Emmet Martin III, plainclothes officers from the MPD’s SCORPION unit, were pulling Nichols from his vehicle, a third unmarked police car, driven by Preston Hemphill, arrived at the scene. As seen on Hemphill’s body cam video, Nichols offered no resistance, and tried to de-escalate the confrontation with officers, who yelled conflicting orders at him while they pinned him to the ground. One officer attempted to pepper spray Nichols, but instead sprayed the other officers, obscuring their vision. Seeing his chance to escape the assault, Nichols ran. When police caught up to him they took turns kicking and beating him as he cried out for his mother.
Amber Sherman (Photo: Brandon Dill)
Before Nichols died in the hospital on January 10, 2023, photographs of his bruised and broken body were already circulating in Memphis. “When I saw those pictures of him, I was like, this is Emmett Till-level. This is someone beaten so viciously as to be completely unrecognizable. When you look at the picture of how he looked before that incident and afterwards in the hospital, it’s two totally different people,” says Amber Sherman, community organizer and activist behind The Law According to Amber podcast.
On January 27, 2023, the day the body cam and SkyCop videos of Nichols’ murder were released to the public, Sherman led the protests that shut down the I-55 bridge. They demanded the SCORPION unit be immediately disbanded. As excerpts from the videos played on national television, Sherman spoke to Mayor Jim Strickland on the phone. “I know you have the sole authority as the mayor to shut this down,” she told him. “So if you don’t want to use that power, cool. We’ll stay on the bridge.”
The police presence at the protest was minimal. “Of course they weren’t gonna show up, because people are watching y’all literally beat somebody to death on TV right now,” Sherman says. “Within 12 hours of us doing that protest, they shut down the [SCORPION] unit.”
Violent rioting had been predicted by some media and law enforcement. “I expected folks to hit the streets and make those calls for justice,” says Sherman. “What we expected to happen, happened. I think there were folks being upset that there wasn’t a riot or something like that. I always remind people that most protests that happen are pretty peaceful. That’s how they go. They don’t get violent until the cops come.”
Steve Mulroy (Photo: Steve Mulroy | Facebook)
DA Mulroy says he was not expecting violence, either. Two days before the videos were released, he announced charges of second degree murder, aggravated kidnapping, official oppression, aggravated assault, and official misconduct against officers Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Emmitt Martin III, Desmond Mills Jr., and Justin Smith, all of whom had beaten Nichols at the second crime scene. It was three weeks since the initial traffic stop, a remarkably short period in these matters. “That was always in my mind: Let’s get the video out as soon as possible. But then we started to realize the video is gonna be really incendiary and could provoke a violent response. So ideally, if we could announce charges before release of the video, that would go a long way towards calming everybody down,” he says.
“I think the primary reason we didn’t see unrest in Memphis — and really, because of that, around the world — was because the wheels of formal justice and accountability had already begun to spin with those indictments,” says Spickler.
Besides, Mulroy trusted the activists. “We have a proud tradition in Memphis, going back decades, of public protests on these issues that were non-violent. In 2016, they took over the bridge, no real violence. In 2020, the summer of George Floyd, there were all kinds of marches and sit-ins and protests. Memphis activists always kept the peace.”
Mulroy was elected in 2022 on a platform that promised reform of the criminal justice system. He says he prioritized transparency in the case not just out of a sense of fairness, but also practicality. “I had campaigned all along on the [premise that] the public lacked confidence in the fairness of our justice system, particularly in the Black community. We needed reform not only for reform’s sake — which is sufficient reason in and of itself — but also as a means to the end of restoring public confidence, so that the community would start cooperating with law enforcement again in a way that they haven’t in recent years. That would be the key thing to bend the curve on violent crime.”
The Nichols killing was a prime example of why the community doesn’t trust the police, Mulroy says. “You had a specialized unit that was supposed to be, and was billed as, focusing on violent crime, that instead tried to get some easy collars and went to regular traffic stops to try to rack up some points. But they still took that violent crime warrior mentality with them, and it led to over-aggressive policing. I think probably the evidence will indicate that young Black males were targeted. As we’ve seen over and over again when we have these specialized units, they tend to be over aggressive. They tend to target young Black males. You had a culture develop — or maybe it had already been in in place, but was put on overdrive. You had a lack of supervision, inadequate training. That perfect storm led to that [incident]. I think we can surmise from the video that this wasn’t an isolated incident. It wasn’t just five bad apples. There is a cultural problem here that needs to be addressed.”
Mulroy declined to press charges against Preston Hemphill, the officer who had been at the initial traffic stop but couldn’t keep up with the fleeing Nichols and so never made it to the second scene where Nichols was fatally beaten. Hemphill is white, and the five officers who were charged were all Black. Mulroy says he concluded that the video evidence against Hemphill was too ambiguous to obtain a conviction. “It’s possible to act in a way that brings dishonor to the uniform and rightfully results in termination from the police department and rightfully results in revocation of the person’s eligibility to ever serve in the law enforcement capacity — it’s possible to do all those things without actually violating the criminal statutes of Tennessee.”
Nichols’ family’s attorney Ben Crump supported the decision not to charge Hemphill, given that he is cooperating with the investigation. But Mulroy’s reasoning rings hollow to Sherman. “The fact that those [charged] were all Black officers, I think they wanted to remind them that, at the end of the day, you’re Black first and we’re gonna treat you just like we treat other Black folks in the street when we overcharge them or when we target and prosecute them. We’re gonna treat you the same exact way. They don’t get any special class or special privilege they thought that they would have as police officers.”
The Community Rises
The officers on the scene said they pulled Tyre Nichols over for reckless driving. On January 27th, as the videos of the stop and beating were being released, Police Chief C.J. Davis admitted there was no proof that Nichols had broken any laws. It was a pretextual traffic stop, says Chelsea Glass of Decarcerate Memphis. “A pretextual traffic stop is like a non-moving violation; for example, a brake light is out, your windshield is cracked, your bumper is missing. Another common one now is if you have drive-out tags. Even if your drive-out tags are totally legal, you’re at risk of being stopped because they’re trying to find out if the car is stolen or not. That’s what they say because the whole thing about a pretextual traffic stop is, it’s a pretext to look for other violations.”
Decarcerate Memphis’s 2022 report “Driving While BIPOC” analyzed data from 10 years of traffic stops. “We found that Black and brown communities were disproportionately overrepresented in the data. So while Memphis is a predominantly Black city, we still found that they were overrepresented out of proportion with their population.
“This is something that we’ve been working on for years,” she continues. “We’ve talked to hundreds of people across Memphis. To be quite honest with you, the campaign itself took very little education. People know what the police are doing and why they’re doing it. I think the people who are less affected by these issues are the ones that are a little bit more easily confused by what’s really at stake and what’s really happening.”
LJ Abraham (Photo: Courtesy LJ Abraham)
After the initial burst of public protests, activists like Sherman, Glass, and West Tennessee Regional Organizing Director for the Equity Alliance LJ Abraham concentrated their efforts on the City Council. “I actually think the momentum is a lot higher right now, because we’ve been able to pass some of the ordinances through City Council,” Abraham says. “That’s just a general basis of beginning actual police reform in Memphis, like ending pretextual stops, ending the use of unmarked police cars, doing data transparency, and just making sure that there is accountability on the side of police. … I think the situation around Tyre Nichols has kind of catapulted the fight for actual reform a little bit higher based on the manner in which he was killed.”
The fight has been emotional and bruising for everyone. Sherman was banned from City Council meetings (illegally, she says). “ I don’t care if they like me,” she says. “I care about being effective in getting policies put in place to keep people safer.
“I think we’ve changed public opinion on pretextual traffic stops,” Sherman continues. “I think public opinion around unmarked cars was always that they were not okay. A lot of folks are really appreciative of that, because they don’t agree with using unmarked cars for traffic enforcement.”
The pretextual traffic stop ordinance which passed the council is narrower than what Decarcerate Memphis wanted, says Glass. “It’s still considered a win, but it’s not entirely what we asked for. Ultimately, we’re pleased with the items that did pass.”
Can We Fix It?
The word that comes up over and over again when discussing police reform is “culture.” Many police, the argument goes, see the public as an enemy, and act like an army occupying a hostile land. “When I was younger, we got along with the cops,” says Abraham, who is 42. “I used to hang out with the cops, sit out on my porch and laugh and joke with them. But growing up and seeing the direction that policing has actually gone is probably one of the most disgusting things I’ve ever seen in my life. It can’t be this way. I think the police officers we hire, they’re really terrified; just scared for themselves, and not scared for anything else. But how can you take that job where you’re supposed to exhibit some level of bravery?”
The so-called “elite” units, like the SCORPION unit Chief Davis founded with a promise to “take the gloves off,” are a product of the “warrior cop” mindset. “I do believe there are people that we need to take care of us, to guard us, to protect us,” says Spickler. “That’s the mission of a police officer. It is not [to be] out there to wage war, not to battle, fight, and all these words we use when we talk about crime. But that’s what it’s become.
“We were told we’re gonna do whatever it takes to make sure there’s no repeats,” he continues. “But then, we had this battle at City Council where the community was very organized and very clear on what it wanted in these ordinances about traffic stops. The mayor’s administration comes in and says, ‘We can’t do that. Here’s the reason why.’ That’s as clear evidence as you need that they’re not serious. They’re not ready to do the things that need to be done.”
Crime and policing has become the central issue in this year’s mayoral election. Defenders of the status quo maintain that insufficient incarceration is what is driving the city’s crime rate. Cleotha Abston-Henderson served 20 years of a 24-year sentence for kidnapping. Ezekiel Kelly was convicted of aggravated assault when he was 16, and tried as an adult. He was released from prison early during the pandemic. On May 12th, Mayor Jim Strickland, who is not up for re-election because of term limits, led his weekly email newsletter with the image of a Monopoly “get out of jail free” card. “Someone is giving these out,” the newsletter read. “It’s not the Memphis City Government. It is not the Memphis Police Department or the Shelby County Sheriff’s Department. It appears that it is multiple people within the criminal court system at 201 Poplar and the Juvenile Court. And what’s worse — the bad guys know it, and they are encouraged to keep committing crimes.”
DA Mulroy says, “The narrative you hear from critics of reform is, one, the cops are doing a great job bringing everybody in, but two, the liberal DA and judges are letting them right back out. Three, they immediately re-offend, and four, that’s why we’re having a high crime rate. Every one of those assertions, one through four, is false. The clearance rates indicate that they’re not bringing them in. The DA doesn’t set bail. The supposedly liberal judges are not letting them out the way the public thinks. Although I may have disagreed with some of the individual, controversial bail decisions, nonetheless, the narrative that it is just a revolving door is false. They are not re-offending when they do get out. Less than one in four re-offend at all while they’re on bail — and less than 4 percent re-offend violently. And then finally, that’s not what’s driving crime. Because if you added up all the cases in which people who were let out on bail re-offended while they were out on bail, it would be less than one eighth of the total crimes in any given year. Even if we decided to violate the constitution and deny everyone bail, we would still have an unacceptably high crime rate. So we are focused on the wrong thing.”
Simply hiring more police to enact the same policies won’t work, says Spickler. “It’s the old hammer and nail metaphor. When you’re a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Sometimes you need a hammer. Sometimes that’s the right tool for the job — but not all the time.”
“The tough-on-crime approach is not working,” says Glass. “If it did work, we would see the fruits of that labor. We need a leader that is interested in investing in the communities and healing the city. People are really suffering in Memphis, suffering from trauma, suffering from poverty. There are real issues that need to be addressed, and by addressing some of those issues, like education or the housing crisis or low-wage jobs, naturally the outcome is that crime will be addressed. As long as we are able and capable of meeting people’s needs, the other stuff takes care of itself. Nobody believes that there are communities of people that are inherently bad or inherently violent. There are communities that are oppressed, and that oppression, it’s like an illness, the trauma, the sickness. Let’s start treating poverty like a public health crisis instead of treating communities like they’re just irredeemable and only worthy of punishment and punitive measures.”
*The online version of this story has been modified slightly to clarify several quotations.
