'I'm hacked off.' Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland sounds off on mass shooting, TN gun laws

Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland's response to an early Sunday morning shooting that left eight people injured was simple: "I'm hacked off."

The Downtown Memphis shooting was one of two incidents that happened within hours of each other this weekend just a block away from Beale Street.

The first took place just after 12:30 a.m. Sunday when police said they were trying to clear out a group of people from an intersection. A Memphis Police Department supervisor was on scene and "was assaulted by an unknown male and sustained minor injuries."

Two hours later, multiple gunshots rang out and eight people were hit by gunfire. All were taken to various hospitals in non-critical condition and no arrests or suspect information was provided by MPD.

"I know there are people out there who know who these criminals are," Strickland told The Commercial Appeal Monday afternoon. "I know there are people who've seen those videos and know who did these actions in both. I hope they call CrimeStoppers because we need to bring these individuals to justice as soon as we can."

In the aftermath of the shooting, Strickland said city officials and MPD have been working to prevent other shootings and will re-implement a traffic plan to limit access around Beale Street. A similar plan was put in place last year, he said, but was recently repealed.

"What we're focused on now, over the last 24 hours or so, is how we prevent these from happening coming into next weekend," he said. "MPD instituted a traffic plan, I think last year, around the Beale Street area that limited access on certain roads to stop the cars that just cruise around over and over again. That kept them away from Beale Street. That plan was reversed in the last 30 to 60 days, and I did not know that until yesterday. But it was reversed because some of the businesses on Beale wanted it to be more open, and we need to reinstitute that plan."

MPD in May said it would be increasing its visibility to counter a multitude of crimes — including gun crimes, vehicle theft and thefts from vehicles — in areas where many of these crimes have been previously reported, which the department called "hot spots," but it is not clear if Downtown Memphis was among those locations.

Though the traffic plan is still in the works Strickland said it will also involve adding more officers to the Beale Street area, and that the officers will be seen in multiple intersections.

Strickland has, in recent months, taken aim at Shelby County's criminal justice system, pointing at prosecutors and judges as part of the reason for Memphis' rising crime rate. He has called for stiffer penalties to be enforced for people who shoot at other people, and said the bail amounts set for people who are charged with gun crimes have been too low.

'It's directly correlated'

Monday, however, the Memphis mayor also pointed to Tennessee's state legislature weakening gun regulations as another aspect of the rise in gun violence. In 2010, Tennessee allowed guns to be brought into bars, the state allowed guns to be kept in cars in 2013 and, in 2021, Tennessee became a permitless carry state.

"It is a completely different world than it was 10 or 20 years ago with respect to the number of guns on American streets," he said. "As the United States, and as Tennessee in particular, have loosened restrictions on guns, there are, as a result, more guns on the streets and more shootings and more gun deaths. It's directly correlated."

In linking state law to rising crime, Strickland pointed to the 2013 law that was passed allowing people to keep guns in their vehicles so long as they are secured. However, many vehicle break-ins, according to Strickland and the MPD, have been traced to people looking for guns stored in cars.

"When the state allowed guns in cars, the theft of guns from cars skyrocketed," he said. "In talking to police officers, that's the number one reason these people are breaking into cars. It's to steal guns. I think each of the last few years there have been over 2,000 guns per year stolen from Memphis cars. Those are being used to perform illegal acts. They're not going hunting with those guns. I think [state legislation] is a major contributor to gun violence in Memphis."

He also pointed to the increased use of gun switches, which turn semi-automatic handguns into automatic ones. U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Tennessee Kevin Ritz in early July said the Department of Justice would be taking a hardline stance on prosecuting people who have switches in their possession.

"One pull of the trigger, instead of shooting one bullet, can shoot up to 40 bullets at one time," Strickland said. "That needs to be taken very seriously. But we also need to strengthen laws, either federal or state, to limit access to guns and require that guns in cars be secured so that they're not so easily stolen."

More: MPD: Three of five deadliest intersections so far this year are in South Memphis

A special session for the Tennessee General Assembly will take place Aug. 21. However, gun-related topics will be limited to allowing lawmakers to create incentives for safe storage, but not punishments, and proposals to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people.

An expansion of other security measures, like the expanding the perimeter of the much-maligned Beale Street Bucks program — which requires patrons to pay a security fee when entering the street and sometimes includes searches for weapons at the entryways to the famous strip — are not in the works, Strickland said. However, he did say he would like to see businesses in the area close earlier.

"I don't have the legal authority to enforce this, but I really wish the businesses would close at midnight," he said. "I think Bo Schembechler, and every coach that ever lived, said, 'Nothing good happens after midnight.' I've argued this before, but we're going to make a real push on it. I don't have the legal authority to enforce it, but these institutions need to close at midnight for the safety of our city because both of these incidents happened after midnight."

Strickland added that he hopes Sunday's shooting will not impact tourism numbers for Memphis and said the rise in gun crime that has happened in Memphis, and around the country, does not seem to have damaged the number of people visiting.

"It's my understanding that our tourism numbers have exceeded the pre-pandemic numbers from 2019," he said. "I hope the measures that we will announce here shortly give people some comfort to be able to spend some time out. We need to do all of these things together. We need some common sense gun regulation. We need this new traffic plan. We need these establishments to close at midnight. And we need to aggressively prosecute anyone who illegally uses a gun in Memphis."

Lucas Finton is a criminal justice reporter with The Commercial Appeal. He can be reached at Lucas.Finton@commercialappeal.com and followed on Twitter @LucasFinton.

This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: Why Mayor Strickland wants Beale Street businesses to close by midnight