Memphis fire department fires three employees in Tyre Nichols case
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[January 31, 2023]
By Alyssa Pointer
MEMPHIS, Tenn. (Reuters) - Three members of the Memphis Fire Department
who responded to the fatal police confrontation with Tyre Nichols were
dismissed on Monday after investigators found he was beaten and left
handcuffed on the ground without medical attention for nearly 15
minutes.
According to a fire department statement, emergency medical technicians
Robert Long and JaMichael Sandridge failed to assess Nichols' condition
when they arrived, while fire Lieutenant Michelle Whitaker, who drove
them to the scene, remained in her vehicle.
An internal review of their conduct found that all three fire department
employees "violated numerous (fire department) policies and protocols,"
the agency said in a statement issued by Fire Chief Gina Sweat.
The terminations came as the Memphis Police Department disclosed that
seven of its officers had been relieved of duty for their roles in the
confrontation that led to the Jan. 10 death of Nichols, a 29-year-old
Black man. That tally included five officers who were dismissed from the
force and charged last week with murder.
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The five officers charged in the case are Black. Lawyers for Nichols'
family have cast the beating as the latest instance of an African
American brutalized as a result of racially biased policing practices
that profile people of color - even when the officers involved are
non-white.
A sixth officer - identified as Preston Hemphill - was suspended with
pay pending a hearing, and a seventh officer who was not immediately
identified was also relieved of duty without pay, the police department
said. No criminal charges have been filed against Hemphill, 26, who
joined the force in 2018, or against the seventh, unnamed officer.
A police department spokesperson declined to comment on why those
suspensions were not announced earlier.
Police Chief Cerelyn Davis has said an unspecified number of officers
besides the five initially implicated remained under investigation for
policy infractions stemming from the arrest of Nichols during a Jan. 7
traffic stop.
The five officers dismissed on Jan. 20 - Justin Smith, Desmond Mills
Jr., Emmitt Martin III, Demetrius Haley and Tadarrius Bean - were
charged Thursday with second-degree murder, assault, kidnapping,
official misconduct and oppression in the fatal beating of Nichols.
Hemphill, who is white, wore the body-camera that captured the first of
four videos released by authorities on Friday of the traffic stop and
violent confrontation that followed, according to the officer's
attorney, Lee Gerald.
In the video, it is Hemphill who appears to fire a stun gun at Nichols
after Nichols is dragged from his car, forced to the ground and doused
with pepper spray before he breaks free and runs away with the officers
chasing him.
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![](../images/013123PIX/news_e67.jpg)
A view shows a memorial for Tyre Nichols
at the intersection of Castlegate Lane and Bear Creek Cove in
Memphis, Tennessee, U.S., January 30, 2023. This memorial marks the
area where Tyre Nichols was beaten during a traffic stop by Memphis
police officers. He later died from his injuries. REUTERS/Alyssa
Pointer
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2017/Jul/22/images/ads/current/rohlfs_lda_072017.png)
TIME LAPSE?
Police caught up to Nichols a short distance away, where additional
video clips show officers repeatedly pummeling him with punches,
kicks and baton blows before Nichols is finally handcuffed and
propped up against the side of a police vehicle. He died three days
later while hospitalized from his injuries.
According to a fire department timeline of its response to an
incident originally dispatched as "a person pepper sprayed," Long
and Sandridge "failed to conduct an adequate patient assessment"
when they reached Nichols at 8:41 p.m., minutes after the beating.
Instead, after an initial "interaction" with Nichols, the two EMTs
called for an ambulance team, who arrived on the scene at 8:55 p.m.
and "initiated patient care," the fire department said in its
statement. Nichols was transported to a hospital a short time later.
The "actions or inactions" of Long, Sandridge and Whitaker "on the
scene that night to not meet the expectations of the Memphis Fire
Department," Sweat said.
In addition to the seven police officers and three fire department
personnel implicated in the Nichols encounter, two Shelby County
Sheriff's deputies have also been relieved of duty pending an
internal review, Sheriff Floyd Bonner said last Friday, after the
video was released.
The Shelby County district attorney's investigation is examining the
roles played by all individuals involved in the Nichols traffic stop
and its immediate aftermath, including Hemphill Memphis Fire
Department personnel and "those responsible for documenting the
incident," the office said in a statement.
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The specialized Scorpion police unit that included the five Memphis
officers charged with murder in the case was disbanded on Saturday
by the city. It was not immediately clear whether the sixth and
seventh officers under investigation belonged to that unit.
Davis has said investigators have not substantiate Nichols was
driving recklessly when he was pulled over, as some of the officers
involved asserted at the time.
(Reporting by Alyssa Pointer in Memphis, Brendan O'Brien in Chicago
and Tyler Clifford and Jonathan Allen in New York; Writing by Steve
Gorman; Editing by Cynthia Osterman, Rosalba O'Brien and Lincoln
Feast.)
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