Tyre Nichols’s family sues Memphis, police, labeling officers in beating a ‘modern-day lynch mob’

Tyre Nichols’s family sued the city of Memphis, the Memphis police chief, seven individual police officers and three Memphis Fire Department officials on Wednesday, describing the fatal beating of the 29-year-old at the hands of police as a “modern-day lynch mob.” 

“Tyre’s condition in the hospital can be likened to that of Emmitt Till, who was also beaten unrecognizable by a lynch mob,” renowned civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who is representing Nichols’s family, said in a statement announcing the suit. 

“But Tyre’s lynch mob was dressed in department sweatshirts and vests, sanctioned by the entities that supplied them,” Crump added.

Nichols died three days after being brutally beaten by five officers in January. Although the original police report claimed Nichols was stopped for reckless driving, further investigations found these claims were unsubstantiated. 

All five officers involved in the beating were fired and subsequently charged with second-degree murder. 

The complaints in the suit include violations of the Fourth and 14th Amendments over the city’s custom of tolerance, the failure to train law enforcement, and the failure to supervise its officers. The suit, filed by Nichols’s mother, RowVaughn Wells, asks for a trial by jury and for $550 million compensation for the “extrajudicial killing.” 

In a press conference announcing the lawsuit, Crump said they were intentional in selecting the compensation amount in order to send a message to cities with similar policies.

“It is our mission to make it financially unsustainable for these police oppression units to unjustly kill Black people in the future,” said Crump. “We want to make it where they can’t even afford it, where they are going to train their officers differently, where they are going to get rid of these units because they’re going to say we don’t want what happened in Memphis, Tennessee, with Tyre Nichols to happen to my city.”

But Nichols’s family took time to say the suit is not meant to glamorize what they have gone through.

“We did not want this,” said Rodney Wells, Nichols’s stepfather. “People think this is glamorous, and it is not. We go home at night and we cry. We wait. Our lives have changed dramatically since this.”

The lawsuit alleges that the events of the fatal police encounter on Jan. 7 were “created and set in motion over a year prior” with the appointment of Memphis Police Chief Cerelyn Davis.

“The savage beating of Tyre Nichols was the direct and foreseeable product of the unconstitutional policies, practices, customs, and deliberate indifference of the City of Memphis and Chief Davis,” the lawsuit said.

“Far from being the result of the actions of five rogue police officers, the events of January 7, 2023 were the culmination of a Department-ordered and Department-tolerated rampage by the unqualified, untrained, and unsupervised SCORPION Unit carrying out an unconstitutional mandate on the streets of Memphis without any fear of retribution or consequence,” it continued.

The five officers charged in Nichols’s beating were all part of the Memphis Police Department’s specialized SCORPION Unit, which has since been disbanded. The lawsuit accuses the five of various Fourth Amendment violations, including unreasonable stop, excessive force and failure to intervene to prevent excessive force.

A sixth officer, who was fired but not charged in connection with Nichols’s death, faces similar allegations.

A police lieutenant who retired the day before his termination hearing is accused of intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress, as well as fraudulent misrepresentation, for allegedly lying and withholding information from Nichols’s mother.

Two emergency medical technicians and a Memphis fire lieutenant also face allegations of 14th Amendment violations for “deliberate indifference to serious medical needs.” 

Following Nichols’s brutal beating, the lawsuit noted, “Pictures would be taken, jokes would be made, and medical care would be withheld for over twenty minutes as Tyre’s body lay devastated from the beating. Indeed, he was dying and those on scene knew it.”

Attorney Antonio Romanucci, also representing Nichols’s family, said at the press conference Wednesday afternoon that he and Crump will continue to peel back the policies within the Memphis Police Department to ensure total change in the department.