MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland released his weekly update to the city Friday afternoon, offering his condolences and remarks on the death of Tyre Nichols.
In the statement, Strickland said he was "sad and angry" for the family of Tyre, and for the Memphis Police Department.
Strickland announced the SCORPION unit, which the five officers charged in Nichols' death worked for, "has been and remains inactive" during MPD's internal investigation into the Jan. 7 traffic stop that led to Nichols' death.
Activists, former law enforcement officers and the family of Tyre Nichols were calling for immediate disbandment of the unit.
Read the full statement from Mayor Jim Strickland here:
Since learning of this tragic event, transparency and swift methodical action have been our top priorities because the family of Mr. Nichols and our citizens deserve nothing less. The actions of these officers were awful, and no one, including law enforcement, is above the law. I assure you we will do everything we can to keep this type of heinous act from happening again.
As you know, five Memphis Police officers were terminated last week and were indicted and arrested yesterday. These officers were found to be directly responsible for the physical abuse of Mr. Nichols. They were each charged with second-degree murder, aggravated assault, aggravated kidnapping, official misconduct and official oppression.
Concurrent within that investigation, other MPD officers are still under investigation for department policy violations, some infractions are less egregious than others.
As this investigation and other external investigations continue, we promise full and complete cooperation from the Memphis Police Department with the Department of Justice, the FBI, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and the Shelby County District Attorney’s Office to determine the entire scope of facts that contributed to Tyre Nichols’ death.
In this case, I want to thank Chief Davis and her team for moving quickly with the administrative procedure resulting in termination and District Attorney Mulroy for taking deliberate actions in bringing these indictments forward. We have worked to get a resolution to these matters in record time because we take them extremely seriously.
As we have said all along, we wanted to ensure the proper legal steps were followed and that the family of Mr. Nichols had the opportunity to view the video footage privately before we released it to the public. In light of those matters occurring, we will be releasing the video to the public later today after 6 p.m.
It is clear that these officers violated the department’s policies and training. I want to assure you we are doing everything we can to prevent this from happening again. We are initiating an outside, independent review of the training, policies, and operations of our specialized units. Since this event happened, the SCORPION Unit has been and remains inactive.
Lastly, I am sad and angry for the family of Tyre Nichols. I am also angry for the many good men and women of the Memphis Police Department who devote their lives to serving our citizens. We must all work to regain the public’s trust and work together to heal the wounds these events have caused.
To view my video statement, go here.
To view Chief Davis’s video statement, go here.
