Tyre Nichols leaning against a car after a brutal attack by five Memphis police officers
(Picture: AP)Authorities released video footage showing Tyre Nichols being beaten by five Memphis police officers who held him down and repeatedly struck him with their fists, boots and batons as he screamed for his mother.
The 29-year-old FedEx employee and avid skater died in hospital on 10 January, leaving a four-year-old son.
A video of his arrest - which an attorney for Mr Nichols’s family said recalled the infamous police beating of motorist Rodney King in 1991 – sparked protests after its release on Friday.
The video is filled with violent moments showing the officers chasing and pummelling Nichols and leaving him on the pavement propped against a squad car as they fist-bump and celebrate their actions.
The footage emerged one day after the officers were charged with murder in Nichols’ death.
Protesters gathered for mostly peaceful demonstrations in multiple cities, including Memphis, where several dozen demonstrators blocked the Interstate 55 bridge that carries traffic over the Mississippi River toward Arkansas.
In Washington, dozens of protestors gathered in Lafayette Park, across the street from the White House and near Black Lives Matter Plaza.
The recording shows police savagely beating Nichols for three minutes while screaming profanities at him throughout the attack.
After the first officer roughly pulls Nichols out of a car, Nichols can be heard saying, “I didn’t do anything,” as a group of officers begins to wrestle him to the ground.
One officer is heard yelling, “Tase him! Tase him!”
Nichols calmly says, “OK, I’m on the ground.”
“You guys are really doing a lot right now,” Nichols says. “I’m just trying to go home.”
“Stop, I’m not doing anything,” he yells moments later.
Nichols can then be seen running as an officer fires a Taser at him. The officers then start chasing Nichols.
Other officers are called, and a search ensues before Nichols is caught at another intersection. The officers beat him with a baton, and kick and punch him.
Security camera footage shows three officers surrounding Nichols as he lies in the street cornered between police cars, with a fourth officer nearby.
Two officers hold Nichols to the ground as he moves about, and then the third appears to kick him in the head. Nichols slumps more fully onto the pavement with all three officers surrounding him. The same officer kicks him again.
The fourth officer then walks over, draws a baton and holds it up at shoulder level as two officers hold Nichols upright, as if he were sitting.
“I’m going to baton the f--- out you,” one officer can be heard saying. His body camera shows him raise his baton while at least one other officer holds Nichols. The officer strikes Nichols on the back with the baton three times in a row.
The other officers then appear to hoist Nichols to his feet, with him flopping like a doll, barely able to stay upright.
An officer then punches him in the face, as the officer with the baton continues to menace him. Nichols stumbles and turns, still held up by two officers. The officer who punched him then walks around to Nichols’ front and punches him four more times. Then Nichols collapses.
Two officers can then be seen atop Nichols on the ground, with a third nearby, for about 40 seconds. Three more officers then run up, and one can be seen kicking Nichols on the ground.
As Nichols is slumped up against a car, not one of the officers renders aid. The body camera footage shows a first-person view of one of them reaching down and tying his shoe.
It takes more than 20 minutes after Nichols is beaten and on the pavement before any sort of medical attention is provided, even though two fire department officers arrived on the scene with medical equipment within 10 minutes.
Throughout the videos, officers make claims about Nichols’ behavior that are not supported by the footage or that the district attorney and other officials have said did not happen. In one of the videos, an officer claims that during the initial traffic stop Nichols reached for his gun before fleeing and almost had his hand on the handle, which is not shown in the video.
After Nichols is in handcuffs and leaning against a police car, several officers say that he must have been high. Later an officer says no drugs were found in his car, and another officer immediately counters that Nichols must have ditched something while he was running away.
Authorities have not released an autopsy report, but they have said there appeared to be no justification for the traffic stop, and nothing of note was found in the car.
Memphis Police Director Cerelyn “CJ” Davis has said other officers are under investigation for their part in the arrest.
Davis described the five officers’ actions as “heinous, reckless and inhumane.”
During the traffic stop, the video shows the officers were “already ramped up, at about a 10,” she said. The officers were “aggressive, loud, using profane language and probably scared Mr. Nichols from the very beginning.”
“Police are trained to understand that people might flee just because they are scared,” said Geoffrey Alpert, a criminologist at the University of South Carolina who studies use of force.
Five former Memphis police officers have been charged in the case.
The five officers were each charged with second-degree murder, assault, kidnapping, official misconduct and official oppression in the death of Nichols.
