Nichols' death provoked widespread outrage after police video
showed officers beating and kicking Nichols, 29, as he cried out
for his mother near his family home in Tennessee. Five police
officers, all Black, have been charged with second-degree
murder.
The autopsy also found Nichols "died from blunt force trauma and
the manner of death was homicide," according to a statement from
the Nichols family attorneys, Ben Crump and Antonio Romanucci,
sent to Reuters.
The Shelby County District Attorney's Office, which is
prosecuting the five police officers, shared the report with the
family before it became public, ABC said, citing one of the
network's journalists who was in the room with the family at the
time.
Nichols' blood alcohol level was .049%, well below the .08%
legal limit in Tennessee, and he had trace amounts of marijuana
in his system, ABC reported.
Police body camera video of events after the beating captured
officers claiming Nichols was high and expressing disbelief when
no contraband was found in his car.
The video showed the first emergency medical technician to treat
Nichols first asked him, "What'd you have? We're trying to get
you straight. What'd you have?"
At the time Nichols was mortally wounded, seated against a
patrol car and with his hands cuffed behind his back. His
response was unintelligible. He died in a hospital three days
later.
Crump and Romanucci are representing Nichols' family in a $550
million federal lawsuit against the city of Memphis.
The official report is "highly consistent with our own reporting
back in January of this year. We know now what we knew then,"
the lawyers' statement said, referring to an independent medical
examiner's autopsy conducted in January.
"The official autopsy report further propels our commitment to
seeking justice for this senseless tragedy," the statement said.
The Shelby County District Attorney's Office did not immediately
respond to request for comment.
The Shelby County Medical Examiner has told reporters the
autopsy report will be available on request via U.S. Mail and
sent without any advance notice.
(Reporting by Daniel Trotta; additional reporting by Tyler
Clifford; Editing by Donna Bryson and Leslie Adler)
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