USA in crisis after the revelation of the video of the arrest of the African-American Tire Nichols

A long nocturnal beating, with punches, kicks, batons… The video of the arrest of Tire Nichols was made public on the night of Friday, January 27 by the authorities. This African American, beaten by police after his arrest in Memphis, Tennessee, died in early January. Since then, five police officers have been charged.

The images show the violence inflicted for long moments by the five police officers, also Afro-American, after a banal road control on January 7. Tire Nichols, sprayed with tear gas and tasered with electric shocks, attempts to flee but is then caught by the officers, who break free, seemingly impervious to the motorist’s pleas.

Reacting about thirty minutes after the explosive video was released, President Joe Biden said he was “outraged” and “deeply hurt.”

“Mom, mom, mom!” Tire Nichols yells in one of the excerpts. In another, we see him on the ground, beaten for long seconds.

“They reduced him to mush”

On Friday, the first protests took place in several cities across the country, including Washington and Memphis. In New York, more than 200 people marched chanting “No justice, no peace.”

In a sign that the case is potentially explosive, Joe Biden urged the demonstrations to be “peaceful” and spoke by phone Friday afternoon with the mother and stepfather of Tire Nichols.

Because his death is reminiscent of that of the African-American George Floyd, murdered by a police officer in May 2020. Demonstrations against racism and police violence then set the country on fire, federated around the motto ‘Black Lives Matter’.

“When my husband and I got to the hospital and I saw my son, he was already dead. He had been reduced to mush. He was bruised all over, his head was swollen like a watermelon,” RowVaughn Wells said through tears. Tire Nichols’ mother, in an interview broadcast by .

Memphis Police Chief Cerelyn Davis has warned that video showing the man’s arrest for a simple traffic violation was “comparable, if not worse” to that showing the violent police arrest of Rodney King in 1991. acquittal, a year later, of the four police officers involved, unleashed unprecedented riots in Los Angeles.

Demonstrations in various cities

The authorities have been calling for calm for several days, anticipating demonstrations after the publication of a video described as “appalling” by those who saw it.

Tire Nichols’ own family has called peaceful meetings. “Please come forward, but come out safely,” said her stepfather, Rodney Wells.

In Memphis, protesters marched when the video was posted, chanting: “Say his name. Tire Nichols.”

“They didn’t want to listen to us,” proclaimed the procession in this city where Martin Luther King was assassinated in 1968.

In other parts of the country, police were bracing for possible overflows. Two Joe Biden advisers have spoken to the mayors of 16 US cities about the protests.

“Against all police violence”

Tire Nichols, hospitalized, died three days after his arrest. The five African-American police officers, since fired, were charged with murder and jailed. Four of them were later released on bail.

FBI Director Christopher Wray said he was “appalled”, and Attorney General Merrick Garland said a federal investigation had been opened.

The leader of the Democrats in the House of Representatives, Hakeem Jeffries, denounced it as an “unacceptable” murder, while left-wing Senator Bernie Sanders called for “doing everything possible to end police violence against people of color.”

While expressing their horror, the family’s lawyers as well as the young man’s parents wanted to salute the “speed” of the measures taken against the police.

The Rev. Al Sharpton, a famous civil rights figure who will deliver the funeral oration for Tire Nichols, said the fact that the police were black made “the event even more shocking.” “We are against all police brutality, not just police brutality against white people,” he said.

*Article adapted from its original in French

with AFP