Jurors deliberated about 8 1/2 hours before finding Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley and Justin Smith not guilty of murder, aggravated assault, aggravated kidnapping, official misconduct and official oppression.
Nichols, 29, an aspiring photographer, avid skateboarder and father of a young son, was severely beaten by police officers on January 7, 2023, following a traffic stop near his home, and died in a hospital three days later.
Police video footage of the encounter showed five Black officers, who were members of the since disbanded Scorpion street crimes detective unit, kicking, punching, pepper-spraying and striking Nichols with a baton as he cried out for his mother.
“We are obviously disappointed by today’s verdict,” said Shelby County District Attorney Steve Mulroy, whose office prosecuted the case. “We respect the jury’s decision, but we obviously disagree with it.”
Civil rights lawyer Ben Crump, representing Nichols’ family, called Thursday’s verdict “a devastating miscarriage of justice.”
“That brutal, inhumane assault was captured on video, yet the officers responsible were acquitted,” Crump said on social media.
Defence lawyers argued in court that their clients pulled Nichols over for driving dangerously and suggested he provoked violence by breaking free and trying to run away, saying a police officer must make split-second decisions based on a subject’s actions.
The incident sparked nationwide protests and renewed calls for reform of the US criminal justice system, one of a series of high-profile cases of officers accused of using excessive force in the deaths of Black people and other minorities, including George Floyd in 2020.
In December, during President Joe Biden’s term, the US Justice Department concluded a 17-month civil rights investigation, finding that the Memphis Police Department routinely used excessive force and discriminated against Black people.
The three men acquitted on state criminal charges on Thursday drew a mixed verdict when they stood trial in federal court last year. They were convicted of witness tampering in the case but cleared of charges that carried the potential for a life prison sentence.
However, one of them, Haley, was found guilty on two counts of the lesser charge of deprivation of rights resulting in bodily injury, punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
Two other former officers involved in the beating pleaded guilty to federal charges and testified against their former colleagues in federal court, saying Nichols posed no threat to police during their encounter.
None of the officers has been sentenced in the federal case. All were fired from the Memphis Police Department. (Reuters)
