Arrest of Tire Nichols: the police unit responsible for his death dismantled

BET À DAY

Memphis police on Saturday dismantled the unit of five officers accused of causing the death of a 29-year-old African American after a long beating, the video of which sparked a new horror and misunderstanding in the United States.

The fatal arrest of Tire Nichols has reignited the debate on police violence in the United States where the memory of George Floyd, killed in 2020 by a white policeman, remains vivacious, with the feeling that the large demonstrations which had followed did not settle anything.

The five black police officers were from the Memphis Scorpion Unit, which came into existence in November 2021 with the aim of reducing the number of illegal activities in sensitive neighborhoods by deploying more police there.

>

On Saturday, Memphis police said in a statement that “it is in everyone’s interest to permanently dismantle the SCORPION unit.”

“Police officers currently assigned to the unit have given their unreserved consent,” the statement added.

Tyre Nichols' family welcomed the decision via a statement from his lawyers, deeming it “both appropriate and proportionate to the tragic death of Tyre Nichols, but also “decent and fair for all citizens of Memphis”.

>

“We hope that other cities will take similar steps with their (tough neighborhood) police units in the near future to begin to generate greater trust in their communities,” the family added.< /p>

Previously, police chief Cerelyn Davis, who created this unit, reported that Scorpion had had early successes, particularly the drop in crime in 2022 after a record 345 homicides the previous year, which caused “an outcry,” she said.

Scorpion, which stands for Street Crimes Operation to Restore Peace in Our Neighborhoods, was intended to “reducing gun violence, being visible in communities and impacting rising crime,” she said on CNN.

Two years on the death of African-American George Floyd, the number of people who died during interactions with the police has yet broken a record, with 1,186 dead for the year 2022, the highest in ten years, according to the site “Mapping Police Violence”.

The five police officers involved in the death of Tire Nichols have been fired, charged with murder and wheels. Four of them were later released on bail.