Up to 20 hours of additional footage from the deadly beating of Tyre Nichols by a group of Memphis Police Department officers has yet to be released, according to a law enforcement official in Tennessee.
Unreleased footage from the attack on 7 January includes audio of what was said among emergency responders and officers in the aftermath of the beating and after Nichols was moved to a local hospital, Shelby County prosecutor Steven Mulroy told CNN.
Nichols died in hospital on 10 January, three days after the attack.
It will be up to Memphis officials to determine whether to publicly release any additional footage, following the release of roughly one hour of footage from four separate videos on 27 January.
That footage from officers’ body-worn cameras and a police surveillance camera pole constitute “the relevant parts” of the initial traffic stop and the beating at a second location, according to Mr Mulroy.
The footage also contradicts initial police reports that were filed after officers had beaten Nichols; a spokesperson for Mr Mulroy’s office told CNN that the office is weighing additional charges of “false reporting” against the five officers who have since been fired from the department and indicted for second-degree murder.
“The incident report that has gone public does not match up on all fours with what one sees when one looks at the video that’s already been released,” Mr Mulroy said.
The report, written two hours after the incident on 7 January, claimed that the 29-year-old Black man was “irate” and refused to cooperate with police, tried to start a fight with officers, and tried to take officer’s gun, but video evidence shows the officers swarming his car and dragging him out, shouting contradictory commands and using pepper spray and a taser while he was trying to comply.
Two other officers have been suspended, and the department has dissolved the controversial SCORPION street-level unit to which the officers belonged. Three Memphis Fire Department personnel were also fired, and two sheriff’s deputies were put on leave.
The release of the footage prompted widespread protests against police violence with renewed demands for reform nearly three years after the murder of George Floyd and killing of Breonna Taylor galvanised an international movement to hold police accountable for the deaths of Black Americans.
Hundreds of people gathered at Mississippi Boulevard Christian Church in Memphis on Wednesday for Nichols’ funeral, where Vice President Kamala Harris, members of Congress and civil rights leaders were in attendance. The Rev Al Sharpton delivered a eulogy, and civil rights attorney Ben Crump – who is representing the family – demanded “swift and equal justice” in the wake of yet another high-profile act of police violence.
