The five former Memphis police officers who pleaded not guilty to the second-degree murder of Tyre Nichols did not have “the courage to look me in my face,” his mother has said.
Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Desmond Mills Jr, Emmitt Martin III and Justin Smith pleaded not guilty to charges of second-degree murder, aggravated assault, aggravated kidnapping, official misconduct and official oppression in their first court appearance before a judge in Shelby County Criminal Court.
They were fired after an internal police investigation into the arrest of Mr Nichols in January.
Image: Clockwise from top left: Demetrius Haley, Desmond Mills Jr, Emmitt Martin III, Tadarrius Bean and Justin Smith
Image: Tyre Nichols
Speaking outside the court Mr Nichols’ mother, RowVaughn Wells, said the officers “didn’t have the courage to look me in my face” but they were “going to see me at every court date – every one – until we get justice for my son.”
She said she felt “very numb” and was waiting for “somebody to wake her up” from the nightmare.
“I know my son is gone. I know I’ll never see him again. But we have to start this process of justice right now.”
More on Tyre Nichols
Related Topics:
The five former officers are free on bond and are due back in court on 1 May.
Mr Nichols, 29, was stopped for an alleged traffic violation and pulled out of his car by officers who swore at him, with at least one brandishing a gun, records showed.
Advertisement
One officer hit Mr Nichols with a stun gun but Mr Nichols ran away towards his home, according to video footage.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
0:33
‘Why did you beat Tyre Nichols to his death?’
Scorpion unit punched, kicked and hit Nichols with a baton
Officers who were part of a crime-suppression team known as the Scorpion unit caught up with Mr Nichols and punched, kicked and hit him with a baton as he shouted for his mother.
After the beating the officers stood by and talked to one another as Mr Nichols struggled with his injuries on the ground, video showed.
Image: Family lawyer Ben Crump, Tyre Nichols’ mother, RowVaughn Wells, and stepfather, Rodney Wells. Pic: AP
Officer took photos after beating
One officer took photos of Mr Nichols as he was propped against an unmarked police car, according to video and records.
Mr Nichols was taken to hospital in an ambulance some 27 minutes after emergency medical technicians arrived, authorities said.
He died in hospital three days later.
A sixth police officer, who is white, was also fired, along with three Memphis Fire Department emergency medical technicians who arrived after Mr Nichols was beaten. Two Shelby County sheriff’s deputies who responded to the scene were suspended for five days without pay.
Anti-Trump protests took place across America on Saturday, with demonstrators decrying the administration’s immigration crackdown and mass firings at government agencies.
Events ranged from small local marches to a rally in front of the White House and a demonstration at a Massachusetts commemoration of the start of the Revolutionary War 250 years ago.
Thomas Bassford, 80, was at the battle reenactment with his two grandsons, as well as his partner and daughter.
He said: “This is a very perilous time in America for liberty. I wanted the boys to learn about the origins of this country and that sometimes we have to fight for freedom.”
At events across the country, people carried banners with slogans including “Trump fascist regime must go now!”, “No fear, no hate, no ICE in our state,” and “Fight fiercely, Harvard, fight,” referencing the university’s recent refusal to hand over much of its control to the government.
Some signs name-checked Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadorian citizen living in Maryland, who the Justice Department admits was mistakenly deported to his home country.
People waved US flags, some of them held upside down to signal distress. In San Francisco, hundreds of people spelt out “Impeach & Remove” on a beach, also with an inverted US flag.
People walked through downtown Anchorage in Alaska with handmade signs listing reasons why they were demonstrating, including one that read: “No sign is BIG enough to list ALL of the reasons I’m here!”
Image: Pic: AP
Protests also took place outside Tesla car dealerships against the role Elon Musk ahas played in downsizing the federal government as de facto head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
The protests come just two weeks after similar nationwide demonstrations.
Spreaker
This content is provided by Spreaker, which may be using cookies and other technologies.
To show you this content, we need your permission to use cookies.
You can use the buttons below to amend your preferences to enable Spreaker cookies or to allow those cookies just once.
You can change your settings at any time via the Privacy Options.
Unfortunately we have been unable to verify if you have consented to Spreaker cookies.
To view this content you can use the button below to allow Spreaker cookies for this session only.
Organisers are opposing what they call Mr Trump’s civil rights violations and constitutional violations, including efforts to deport scores of immigrants and to scale back the federal government by firing thousands of government workers and effectively shuttering entire agencies.
The Trump administration, among other things, has moved to shutter Social Security Administration field offices, cut funding for government health programs and scale back protections for transgender people.
US vice president JD Vance has met with Pope Francis.
The “quick and private” meeting took place at the Pope’s residence, Casa Santa Marta, in Vatican City, sources told Sky News.
The meeting came amid tensions between the Vatican and the Trump administration over the US president’s crackdown on migrants and cuts to international aid.
No further details have been released on the meeting between the vice president and the Pope, who has been recovering following weeks in hospital with double pneumonia.
Mr Vance, who is in Rome with his family, also met with the Vatican’s number two, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, and the foreign minister, Archbishop Paul Gallagher.
The Vatican said there had been “an exchange of opinions” over international conflicts, migrants and prisoners.
According to a statement, the two sides had “cordial talks” and the Vatican expressed satisfaction with the Trump administration’s commitment to protecting freedom of religion and conscience.
“There was an exchange of opinions on the international situation, especially regarding countries affected by war, political tensions and difficult humanitarian situations, with particular attention to migrants, refugees and prisoners,” the statement said.
Francis has previously called the Trump administration’s deportation plans a “disgrace”.
Mr Vance, who became Catholic in 2019, has cited medieval-era Catholic teaching to justify the immigration crackdown.
The pope rebutted the theological concept Mr Vance used to defend the crackdown in an unusual open letter to the US Catholic bishops about the Trump administration in February, and called Mr Trump’s plan a “major crisis” for the US.
“What is built on the basis of force, and not on the truth about the equal dignity of every human being, begins badly and will end badly,” the Pope said in the letter.
Mr Vance has acknowledged Francis’s criticism but said he would continue to defend his views. During an appearance in late February at the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast in Washington, he did not address the issue specifically but called himself a “baby Catholic” and acknowledged there were “things about the faith that I don’t know”.
While he had criticised Francis on social media in the past, recently he has posted prayers for the pontiff’s recovery.