The so-called “SCORPION” unit was tasked with patrolling “high crime spots” in the city of Memphis, Tennessee. The announcement of its dismantling was welcomed by the family of Tire Nichols.
Memphis police announced on Saturday the dismantling of the special unit involved in the fatal beating in early January of Tyre Nichols, a young African-American, whose video shocked the United States.
On Saturday, police in Memphis, Tennessee, a city in the southern United States, said in a statement that “it is in everyone’s interest to permanently dismantle the SCORPION unit.”
“The police officers currently assigned to the unit have given their consent,” the statement added.
The SCORPION (for Operation Street Crime to Bring Peace to Our Neighborhoods) unit, launched in 2021, was tasked with patrolling Memphis’ ‘crime hotspots’, according to ABC News.
A decision hailed by the family of Tire Nichols
The family of Tyre Nichols welcomed this 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 the citizens of Memphis”.
The shocking images of the fatal arrest of Tire Nichols, 29, by five black police officers have aroused horror and incomprehension in the United States, without yet causing the social explosion similar to that of summer 2020 feared by the authorities. .
Since his death in early January, his family has repeatedly called for calm. And ahead of the early Friday evening release of the video, which was picked up live and uncut by major television stations, President Joe Biden called out his mother and stepfather and urged peaceful protests.
Shocking footage of his beating
The video released by the police shows an unbearable beating after a banal traffic stop on January 7 in Memphis. With their fists, feet and truncheons, the police attacked the young man, sprayed him with tear gas and aimed at him with a Taser electric shock gun. Tire Nichols died three days later in a Memphis hospital.
The five police officers were fired, charged with murder and imprisoned. Four of them were later released on bail.
On Friday, while saying they were horrified, the family said they were “satisfied” with the charges brought against the five police officers and praised the “speed” of the measures taken against them.
Rallies ranging from a few dozen to a few hundred people were held Friday night in several cities, including Memphis, New York and Washington.
