Shelby County DA drops '30 to 40' cases worked by officers charged in Tyre Nichols beating

The Shelby County District Attorney's office has dismissed between 30 and 40 criminal cases the five now-former Memphis police officers that have been criminally charged for beating Tyre Nichols were primary witnesses in, Shelby County District Attorney Steve Mulroy said Thursday.

Following the indictments of the officers, Mulroy said his office would be reviewing active cases the officers had been involved in. In total, Mulroy said, the DA's office has reviewed about 100 criminal cases.

In addition to dismissing between 30% and 40% of those cases, Mulroy said about 10 of those cases had charges lowered and three or four were referred to the United States Attorney for the Western District of Tennessee due to allegations of excessive force.

Mulroy said he was unsure if the cases referred to the U.S. Attorney included victims in civil cases that were filed in federal court following Nichols' death.

What happened in the case of Tyre Nichols?

Nichols was pulled over in the evening hours of Jan. 7 by officers from the Memphis Police Department. Officers could be seen in body camera footage being immediately aggressive with the 29-year-old skateboarder, pulling him from the car to the ground and yelling profanities at him.

Eventually, Nichols got up from the ground and ran away from the officers. He was caught by the officers after a foot chase. He was punched, kicked, pepper sprayed and hit with a baton as officers held him by his arms. Almost a half hour after being handcuffed and leaned against an unmarked police car, he was taken to St. Francis Hospital in critical condition. He died three days later.

Five officers — Tadarrius Bean, Desmond Mills, Emmitt Martin, Justin Smith and Demetrius Haley — were criminally indicted for his death and face charges that include second-degree murder, aggravated assault, official oppression, two counts of aggravated kidnapping and two counts of official misconduct.

Why were the cases dismissed?

The cases involving those officers that were dismissed, or had charges lowered, included a variety of violent and non-violent offenses. According to Mulroy, the reason for dismissing so many cases came to the credibility the officers would have.

"It's hard to generalize [why they were dismissed] because each case is going to be different," he told The Commercial Appeal. "I think the overall theme is fear that the officers would lack credibility on the witness stand, and they weren't going to be either available to testify or, if they testify, their testimony would not be credited. If without that testimony, the case starts to fall apart, then we've got no choice but to either dismiss. In some cases, when it's a closer call, maybe we reduce the charges."

Although believing the testimony from those five former officers would lack credibility, Mulroy said he did not believe the Department of Justice's pattern or practice investigation into MPD, which was announced in late July, would throw further doubt upon police testimony as his office continues to prosecute cases.

"I think the Tyre Nichols case harmed MPD's credibility," he said. "I think the DOJ investigation is going to help with that. Either they're going to find problems and then they'll give solutions to them, or they don't find problems and that'll be good. I don't see the existence of the DOJ investigation as being a threat to the credibility that potential jurors would give to MPD testimony. If anything, I see it as a cure for any such problem."

More: The death of Tyre Nichols in Memphis: What to Know

The review of the cases was spread around the DA's office and was not explicitly done by the Justice Review Unit that Mulroy established soon after taking office. Though Mulroy said he was not sure how to answer if the attorneys were surprised by their findings when looking at cases following Nichols' beating, and later death, by the officers, he said he hopes the review can be a lesson.

"I hope the Tyre Nichols case has sensitized my office, as well as law enforcement, to the fact that we need to be on the lookout for systemic problems," he said.

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: Shelby County DA drops cases officers that beat Tyre Nichols worked on