Five former Memphis police officers are out on bond after a grand jury indicted the fired cops for the murder of Tyre Nichols.
Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Emmitt Martin III, Desmond Mills Jr. and Justin Smith were charged with one count of second-degree murder. Their additional charges include one count of aggravated assault-acting in concert, two counts of aggravated kidnapping, two counts of official misconduct and one count of official oppression.
Haley and Martin each posted a $350,000 bond. Bean, Mills and Smith’s bonds were set at $250,000.
All five officers, who are Black, were fired for their roles in the death of Nichols. Cops brutalized the 29-year-old Black man in a violent arrest that left him in critical condition on January 7. Nichols was hospitalized and died a few days later on January 10.
“This was wrong,” Tennessee Bureau of Investigation Director David Rausch said. “This was criminal.”
The city of Memphis will release the Nichols arrest video on Friday (January 27). His family viewed the footage earlier this week.
“This young man lost his life in a particularly disgusting manner that points to the desperate need for change and reform to ensure this violence stops occurring during low-threat procedures, like in this case, a traffic stop,” the family’s attorney Ben Crump said in a statement on Thursday (January 26). “This tragedy meets the absolute definition of a needless and unnecessary death.”
A funeral for Nichols is scheduled to be held on February 1. The cops involved in his death will be arraigned on February 17.