Sixth Memphis Police Officer Fired for Role in Arrest of Tyre Nichols

By Staff, Agencies

A sixth Memphis officer was fired on Friday after an internal police investigation showed he violated multiple department policies in the violent arrest of Tyre Nichols, including rules surrounding the deployment of a stun gun, officials said.

Preston Hemphill had previously been suspended as he was investigated for his role in the arrest of Nichols, who died three days later. Five Memphis officers have already been fired and charged with second-degree murder in Nichols’s death.

Hemphill was the third officer at a traffic stop that preceded the violent arrest but was not present when Nichols was beaten.

On body camera footage from the initial stop, Hemphill is heard saying that he stunned Nichols.

Also Friday, a Tennessee board suspended the emergency medical technician licenses of two former Memphis fire department employees, EMT Robert Long and advanced EMT JaMichael Sandridge, for failing to render critical care.

Nichols was beaten after police stopped him for what they said was a traffic violation. Video released after pressure from Nichols’s family shows officers holding him down and repeatedly punching, kicking and striking him with a baton as he screamed for his mother.

Six of the officers involved were part of the so-called scorpion unit, which targeted violent criminals in high-crime areas. The unit has since been disbanded.

The killing led to renewed public outcry over how police forces treat Black citizens with excessive violence, regardless of the race of the police officers.

At Nichols’s funeral on Wednesday, calls for reform and justice were interwoven with grief over the loss of a man remembered as a son, a sibling, a father and a passionate photographer and skateboarder.