DOJ Opens Investigation Into Memphis Police After Tyre Nichols Killing

The Justice Department announced Thursday that it has opened a civil rights investigation into the Memphis Police Department and the city of Memphis, seven months after Tyre Nichols' death at the hands of police following a traffic stop stunned the city and the country.

The new pattern or practice investigation announced Thursday will work to determine whether Memphis police systematically violated the constitution or federal law. Federal officials will pay close attention to law enforcement's "use of force and its stops, searches and arrests, as well as whether it engages in discriminatory policing," according to a Justice Department statement.

While law enforcement in Memphis gained attention following the Jan. 7 police killing of Nichols, the latest probe, which also includes the city of Memphis, is separate from a continuing federal criminal civil rights investigation of the five Memphis police officers involved in Nichols' death.

“The tragic death of Tyre Nichols created enormous pain in the Memphis community and across the country,” said Attorney General Merrick B. Garland in a statement Thursday. “The Justice Department is launching this investigation to examine serious allegations that the City of Memphis and the Memphis Police Department engage in a pattern or practice of unconstitutional conduct and discriminatory policing based on race, including a dangerously aggressive approach to traffic enforcement.”

But DOJ did not open this investigation just because of Nichols. The investigation is “not based on a single incident or event, nor is it confined to a specific unit or type of unit within the Memphis Police Department,” Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke said Thursday.

Clarke said the agency has received “multiple reports of officers escalating encounters with community members, resulting in excessive force.” Sometimes such force is used in response to “behavior they perceive to be insolent” or those “already restrained or in custody.” At times, it has resulted in serious physical injuries.

Law enforcement’s more routine police activity could be racially discriminatory, too, DOJ suggests. “Even in a majority Black city, MPD’s traffic enforcement may focus disproportionately on the Black community,” said Clarke. That’s especially true when it comes to violations related to tinted windows or broken tail lights, she added.

Ben Crump and Antonio Romanucci, attorneys for Nichols' family, released a statement following the DOJ announcement, applauding the decision to open an investigation. "Actions such as this will continue to show that the federal government will not let corruption within police departments take the lives of innocent Americans," they said. "It is our hope that the investigation by the DOJ, under the leadership of Attorney General Garland and Assistant Attorney General Clarke, will provide a transparent account of the abuses of power we have seen and continue to see in Memphis."

Five police officers were fired and charged with various felonies, including second-degree murder, after Nichols’ death; all five of them pleaded not guilty. Nichols was beaten for about three minutes on Jan. 7 after a traffic stop. Body camera and surveillance camera video showed Nichols trying to catch his breath and repeatedly calling out for his mother.

Rodney Wells, Nichols’ stepfather, told the Associated Press that the new DOJ investigation was a sign that “we’re moving in the right direction, trying to get some justice.”

After Nichols’ death, the city’s SCORPION police unit came under fire from Nichols’ family and criminal justice advocates. SCORPION stands for Street Crimes Operation to Restore Peace In Our Neighborhoods and was created in November 2021 to focus on “violent crime reduction.” It was permanently disbanded earlier this year; all five officers involved in Nichols’ death were part of the special unit.

A DOJ pattern-or-practice investigation involves assessing whether there is a systemic pattern or practice of unlawful conduct in a law enforcement agency. That could relate to excessive use of force, racially-biased policing, and discriminatory stops and searches. The investigation is typically followed by a public report that details whether systemic violations were found and federal oversight. The investigations can take years to complete.

This Justice Department probe marks the ninth such investigation into law enforcement by the Justice Department started under the Biden Administration. Ongoing investigations include those into the Phoenix Police Department, the Louisiana State Police, and the New York City Police Department’s Special Victims Division.

Similar federal investigations in Minneapolis and Louisville started after the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, respectively, uncovered civil rights violations.