Sixth Memphis Police officer is relieved of duty over brutal beating of Tyre Nichols, captured in footage of 29-year-old being pulled over, escaping then being pepper sprayed, beaten and tased – He died three days later
Memphis police officer Preston Hemphill has been suspended and is on administrative leave becoming the sixth cop affected by the demise of Tyre Nichols who was beaten to death in five minutes of savage beating on Jan 7
Footage released Friday by Memphis Police Dept. shows Nichols being pulled over, escaping then being punched, kicked and tased, as one officer shouts: ‘I’m going to baton the f*** out of you’
Nichols, 29, was stopped by officers on January 7 as he was driving home: he was wrestled out of his car, then tasered, and ran away
Memphis police caught up with him minutes later and unleashed a ferocious gang beating, holding him by his wrists as they pummeled and kicked him
Hemphill could be facing further charges after his suspension
Five officers – Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Emmitt Martin III, Desmond Mills Jr. and Justin Smith were fired on Jan 15 – all charged with second-degree murder following the incident

Memphis Metropolitan Police Department on Friday night released footage showing the events leading up to the death of 29-year-old FedEx worker Tyre Nichols, a sixth officer has been ‘relieved of duty’ by Memphis Police following the assault and death of Tyre Nichols.
Preston Hemphill was suspended and has been on administrative leave following an internal investigation on January 8, a day after the brutal assault on January 7.
Hemphill, who joined the force in 2018, could be facing further charges after his suspension.
Friday’s horrific footage showed the moments Nichols was stopped by police, him fleeing, then the vicious beating when they caught up and the lack of medical care.
Five officers involved in the January 7 incident, Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Emmitt Martin III, Desmond Mills Jr. and Justin Smith, have been fired from the force.
The five men are charged with second-degree murder.

Preceding the release of the disturbing footage Memphis police chief, Cerelyn J Davis, warned of the disquieting contents stating that she had never witnessed anything so devastating in her policing career. Meanwhile well-known civil rights attorney Benjamin Crump, who has been retained the victim’s family, in his description of the assault, said Nichols was treated like ‘a human piñata’.
Hemphill’s bodycam footage was released on Friday, showing Hemphill pulling Nichols from his car forcefully and pulling him to the ground.
The video shows Hemphill hitting Nichols him on the ground with a Taser, giving chase when Nichols escaped but lost him. He’s heard saying, ‘I hope they stomp his a**.’

Officer Preston Hemphill has been suspended and is on administrative leave, though it is currently unclear how he was involved in the January 7 arrest.
Lee Gerald, an attorney representing Hemphill, said: ‘I can confirm that I represent Memphis Police Officer Preston Hemphill who was the third officer at the initial stop of Mr. Nichols.
‘Video One is his bodycam footage. As per departmental regulations Officer Hemphill activated his bodycam.
‘He was never present at the second scene. He is cooperating with officials in this investigation.’
Memphis Police Dept. release raw video of the fatal beating of Tyre Nichols. This breakdown details the incident – from the moment he was pulled over to seeing him slumped next to a cop cruiser as EMTs look on.
Memphis police officers charged with senselessly beating 29-year-old Tyre Nichols during a traffic stop pepper-sprayed each other during his arrest, disturbing footage of the incident shows.
Police stopped Nichols for alleged reckless driving at an intersection on Jan. 7 with their guns drawn and demanded he get out of the car, body cam video of the incident shows.
The officers yelled expletive-laced commands at the confused motorist and tried to handcuff him after they forced him to the ground.

In the first of two altercations, motorist Tyre Nichols frees himself as officers deploy pepper spray and tasers, but he takes off down the street where police would later locate him and deliver another beating.
“I can’t see jack sh–t,” says one officer in footage from his body camera after unsuccessfully pursuing Nichols.
He and his partner are both out of breath and coughing from the pepper spray as they go back to the intersection. One officer said that he’d lost his glasses.
The disturbing footage released by the Memphis Police Department Friday night shows the savage beating of Nichols and cops pepper-spraying themselves while trying to subdue the 29-year-old motorist.
The four clips, three from body cameras, one from a surveillance camera attached to a post, have shocked and incensed viewers across the nation.

It comes after District Attorney for Memphis has said they cannot rule out filing more charges against officers at the scene of Nichols’ brutal beating.
Shelby County District Attorney Steve Mulroy confirmed charges against five officers in the death of Nichols, 29, last week before releasing horrifying bodycam footage of the assault.
The affected former officers – Emmit Martin III, Justin Smith, Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, and Desmond Mills were all seen beating and kicking the FedEx driver as he lay on the floor – after they pepper sprayed him in the face.
Around 8:20pm on January 7, Nichols, a transplant from Sacramento was driving home from a suburban park in Memphis, where he had taken photos of the sunset.
He was driving along East Raines Road in south eastern Memphis when he encountered the police. One officer said he was ‘cutting through traffic’.
‘So we just try to get him to stop. He don’t stop,’ an officer told his colleagues, in the body camera footage. ‘Hit the siren. Stop stop stop.
‘Then he drove around, swerved like he gonna hit my car. ‘So then I’m like – goddamn.
‘He pull up to the red light. Stop at the red light. He put his turning signal on. ‘So we jump out the car. ‘S*** went from there.’
Four minutes later, two officers are seen confronting Nichols in the driving seat of his car, at the intersection between East Raines Road and Ross Road.

One officer barks at Nichols: ‘Get the f*** out of the f****** car,’ and wrestles him out.
Nichols can he heard protesting, telling the officer: ‘Damn, I didn’t do anything. Hey, I didn’t.’ The officer tells him: ‘Turn your a** around.’
The officers attempt to push Nichols, father of a four-year-old son, to the ground.
Nichols can be seen objecting, but, when one officer threatens to ‘taser your a**,’ Nichols replies: ‘Alright, I’m on the ground – I’m on the ground.’
He is sitting, and the officer instructs him: ‘Lay down. Get on the f****** ground. I’m going to tase you. ‘I’m going to break your s***.’
Nichols has the Taser prodded into his left thigh, and is told: ‘B****, put your hands behind your back.’ In the frame Nichols can be seen wrestling with the two officers, who demand he lies down.
The officers attempt to put him in handcuffs, telling him: ‘I’m going to knock your hands the f*** out.’
Nichols replies: ‘OK, you guys are doing a lot right now.’ He tells them: ‘I’m just trying to go home.’
Nichols lived with his mother, RowVaughn Wells, and stepfather Rodney Wells. He worked for FedEx, and was a passionate skateboarder.
The officers continue trying to push him to lie down. Nichols replies, with growing frustration: ‘I am on the ground!’
‘On your stomach!’ an officer replies.
As Nichols protests ‘I can’t breathe,’ there is a commotion, and officers pepper spray the subject.
‘What the f* man?’ says one of the officers as Nichols scrambles to his feet and starts fleeing.
One of the police officer yells: ‘Taser, taser!’ Nichols continues running, taking his t-shirt partially off as he runs. ‘Oh s*,’ says one officer, and they both begin running after him, with pepper spray in their eyes.
That is when one cop radios for help: ‘2938, we’re at Raines and Ross. Taser was deployed. ‘Suspect is running down Ross.’


The two officers both have pepper spay in their faces – one in both eyes, the other missing his eyes but getting in his eyebrows. They do not chase Nichols for long.
The body camera footage shows the pair of them walking back to their two patrol cars, with one having to guide the other, who is having trouble seeing.
He fetches water from his colleague’s patrol car, and begins pouring water into his eyes while he stands with his head tilted upwards, hands in his pockets.
The officer wearing the body camera tells him the taser shot caught Nichols. ‘One of the prongs hit the b******,’ he said.
The officer searches for his glasses, which have got knocked off in the chaos.

As they continue to catch their breath, and the officer repeatedly pours water into his colleague’s eyes, another officer drives up in an unmarked car.
The driver rolls down his window and asks: ‘Which way’d he run?’ ‘That way,’ he replies, and points.
The driver switches on his sirens, floors the accelerator and roars off.
The officer proceeds to find his glasses, then wind in his taser wires, while his colleague recovers, and pours more water in his face.
half an hour from the commencement of the traffic stop, around 8:31pm, a sheriff’s deputy pulls up in a patrol car with the lights flashing. ‘That way,’ the officer tells him. ‘Thin male, black, blue jeans and a plaid jacket.’
The sheriff drives off at speed, with his sirens blaring and minutes later the officer announces to his colleague: ‘They found him.’
He repeats to his colleague: ‘They got him.’ The body camera officer tells his colleague: ‘Martin and all them are over there chasing him.’
He appears to be referencing Emmitt Martin III, one of the five indicted officers. His colleague exclaims: ‘I sprayed myself.’
‘You sprayed me too! Luckily it didn’t get in my eyes, just on my eyebrow.’
He adds: ‘I hope they stomp his a**. I hope they stomp his a**. Smith has called for other cars because him and Martin are chasing him.’
Smith would appear to be Justin Smith, another of the five.

The officer washing out his eyes decides his okay, putting his body armor back on as he his colleague asks ‘Are you sure?’
He gets into the driving seat, telling the bodycam wearer: ‘Stay right with the car.’ ‘OK, I gotcha,’ he replies, as he drivers off to catch join the Nichols chase.
Then the other officers tell the Memphis Police dispatch that they are catching up with Nichols: ‘2930 we can see him. We’re on foot pursuit southbound on Ross and Castlegate Lane.’
As the he comes round the corner, behind a parked car, two officers can be seen kneeling over Nichols, who appears to be on the floor.
‘I didn’t do anything!’ Nichols yells. The officer tells him: ‘Shut the f*** up. Give me your hands.’ The body camera officer says: ‘You wanna get sprayed again?’
At this point in the footage Nichols is on the floor, with at least three officers now pinning him down.
At the mention of the pepper spray, one officer exclaims: ‘Woah, woah, woah!’
Nichols screams as pepper spray gets in his eyes, and writhes, trying to get away.
The officer walks away, after the pepper spray is deployed as the cops are forced to wash out their own eyes.
One officer pushes him onto his back, yelling: ‘Get on your knees.’ Nichols is lying on his side, and yells: ‘Mom!’ The home he shares with his mother is nearby.
‘Give me your hands. Give me your f hands,’ the officer commands, and Nichols replies: ‘Alright, alright.’

Another officer runs into sight, and someone says: ‘Watch out. Spray’ Pepper spray is deployed again, getting into the face of at least one officer.
‘Ah, s***,’ he says, walking away. ‘Ah, s***.’ The other officers can be heard yelling at Nichols to give them his hands. Nichols yells for his mother as the savage beat down commences.
Two officers are now trying to get Nichols’ hands behind his back. Nichols tries to push himself up on his right arm, leaning on his right side.
A third officer walks over, and, pausing to get full force, brings his right leg back and kicks him in the top half of his body. Nichols is now lying on his back.
The officer who kicked moves to the top of Nichols’s body, and again kicks him with his right leg, this time in the head.

A third officer walks over, and, pausing to get full force, brings his right leg back and kicks him in the top half of his body. Nichols is now lying on his back, as one officer is heard commanding: ‘Give me your hands! Turn around! Lay back!’
The officer with the body camera returns to the tussling men and Nichols, and pulls his baton out of its holder, clasping it in his right hand.
‘Watch out – I’m going to baton the f*** out of you,’ he tells Nichols. He beats him, then walks away, baton still in his right hand.

The officer with the body camera returns to the tussling men and Nichols, and pulls his baton out of its holder, clasping it in his right hand and the cops proceed to rain blows on Nichols.
A fourth officer is now seen arriving, with his right arm raised. Nichols is still pinned to the floor by three officers, struggling and kicking.
The officer with the raised arm careful, deliberately and powerfully punches Nichols in the head, taking his time to get enough force.

Again Nichols is punched by the same officer and then dragged to his feet.
Appearing wobbly, cops have to hold up Nichols with his wrists twisted behind his back. at this point one cop takes a huge swing, and punches the shackled man whose is being held up, arms at his back.
The pummeled man is rocked, reeling on his feet, but unsteady, and being held by the officers.
An officer drives a punch into Nichols’ solar plexus, again and again – Making it the sixth pile driver into the hapless subject. Nichols slumps to the floor, right leg outstretched, left leg bent at the knee.
Three officers converge the kneeling man. A minute later, another officer runs into view, aims a kick into the ribs, for a count of three kicks, to go with the six sucker punches.

The officers then seem to lose interest in Nichols who is now s handcuffed, dragged and propped up to sit up against the patrol car, his legs straight ahead of him.
Shattered, Nichols is unable to sit. He writhes and twitches, but the officers are uninterested. They seem pleased with themselves.
At 8:39pm, two of the officers fist-bump each other, by the hood of the patrol car.



A different set of officers appear in the recordings. They’re seen exchanging congratulatory fist-bumps, as Nichols thrashes around – at times on the floor, at times propped up, writhing and flailing his legs.
The officers ignore the injured man, focused on retrieving equipment lost during the tussle: ‘What the f*** is wrong with my radio, man?’ asks one. ‘You seen my flashlight?’ another asks.
At this point, the dozen officers on the scene all seem relaxed, with one lighting a cigarette.
The officers, many of them wearing the uniform of the Scorpions unit,- stand around and chat while the mortally injured man moans

A few minutes later, still milling around, they stop to swap stories. The animated group can be heard chuckling while in conversation, sometimes laughing.
Recapping the arrest one cop is heard telling his colleague: ‘You was running. You looking like Stevie Wonder, man.’ Occasionally one of the cops would venture near Nichols who can be heard moaning in the background.
first responders arrived within five minutes of the beating, however EMTs do not attend to the stricken man. Two seen standing nearby, with bags of equipment, chat among themselves, paying little attention to Nichols.
The officers dismiss Nichols, repeatedly, as ‘high as a kite’. The EMTs do not seem concerned with investigating further.
Twenty four minutes after the police beating stopped, an ambulance finally arrives at 9pm precisely.
Nichols is put on a stretcher and taken to hospital. He will die three days later.

After observing two paramedics stand by for 20 minutes before rendering aid Tyre Nichols’ stepfather Rodney Wells, has called for criminal charges against the paramedics who appeared to stand by after he was savagely beaten by police, while two deputies who responded after the altercation also face investigation.
Released on Friday, video of the January 7 incident in Memphis shows nearly a dozen men from the Memphis police department as well as two paramedics from the City’s fire department milling about casually for nearly 25 minutes as Nichols lies on the ground critically injured.
He victim would die in hospital three days later having suffered a cardiac arrest and kidney failure from the brutal treatment.

‘Everyone — the fire department, paramedics that came out that stood around and didn’t do anything — they’re just as guilty,’ Nichols’ stepfather Rodney Wells told ABC News following the release of the video.
‘Everyone that was active in the whole scene, the whole video, should be charged,’ he added. Five Memphis cops have already been charged with second-degree murder.
Meanwhile, the sheriff of Shelby County, which includes Memphis, said that after viewing the video, he is suspending two deputies who responded to the scene following the beating, which began with a traffic stop.

Sheriff Floyd Bonner Jr. said in a statement: ‘Having watched the videotape for the first time tonight, I have concerns about two deputies who arrived on the scene following the physical confrontation between police and Tyre Nichols.’
Bonner said he had launched an internal investigation into the two deputies, adding that they had been relieved of duty pending the outcome of the probe.
The video raises disturbing questions about the apparent lack of action from first responders to treat Nichols after he was kicked and punched in the head, struck three times with a metal baton, and twice sprayed with pepper spray in the face.
Paramedics arrived on the scene about five minutes after the assault on Nichols concluded, at which point he was handcuffed and slumped against the side of a car.

The video shows a paramedic leaning over Nichols asking: ‘What’d you have? We’re trying to get you straight, what’d you have?’
Nichols is heard making a gurgling noise, but appears unable to speak, although he had been heard speaking clearly and relatively calmly before the assault.
Officers at the scene were heard remarking that Nichols was ‘on something’ and ‘high as a kite’ as they wisecracked after the assault.
Cops may have advised the paramedics that Nichols was on drugs, though no evidence that he was has emerged in the weeks following the assault.

Aside from these inquiries about drugs, paramedics appeared to offer little aid as Nichols sprawled unresponsive on the pavement, unable to sit up on his own, and unable to speak.
The video does not appear to show the paramedics checking vital signs such as blood pressure, and as they left Nichols flopping on the pavement, his head struck the hubcap of the car at least once.
Finally, about 20 minutes after the assault concluded, and about 15 minutes after they first arrived on the scene, the paramedics can be seen removing some kind of equipment from their kits and leaning over Nichols to treat him.
About five later, an ambulance pulled up and removed a stretcher to transport Nichols.
Nichols died in intensive care on January 10 after suffering cardiac arrest and kidney failure as a result of his injuries.
In addition to the paramedics, sworn police officers have a duty to render aid, and the five officers charged in the incident were fired from the Memphis police department for their failure to do so.

Finally, about 20 minutes after the assault concluded, and about 15 minutes after they first arrived on the scene, the paramedics can be seen removing some kind of equipment from their kits and leaning over Nichols to treat him.
Finally at 9pm, an ambulance pulled up and removed a stretcher to transport Nichols

The five cops who were fired and charged are Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Emmitt Martin III, Desmond Mills Jr, and Justin Smith. They are charged with second-degree murder, assault, aggravated kidnapping, official misconduct and official oppression.
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.’
The video released on Friday night shows Nichols, 29, crying out for his mother multiple times during the brutal January 7 assault, which took place just a few blocks from his home.
‘Mom! Mom!’ screams Nichols as he is pinned to the ground by multiple officers, pepper sprayed in the face, kicked and punched in the head, and struck with a metal baton.
The video shows police rained at least nine blows down on the helpless FedEx worker while screaming profanities throughout the nearly four-minute altercation.
Throughout the videos, officers make claims about Nichols that are not supported by the footage, or what the district attorney or other officials have said about the case.

In one of the videos, an officer claims that during the initial traffic stop Nichols wrestled for his gun before fleeing. The video does not depict such an incident.
After Nichols is in handcuffs and leaning against a police car, several officers claimed 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.
The footage has been widely condemned by police departments and unions across the country.
The national president of the Fraternal Order of Police issued a scathing statement in response to the video of police beating Nichols.
Patrick Yoes said the officers’ physical confrontation with Nichols ‘does not constitute legitimate police work or a traffic stop gone wrong.’ Instead, Yoes called it a ‘criminal assault under the pretext of law.’
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