It’s been a grief-stricken road for RowVaughn Wells nearly two years after the fatal beating of her son Tyre Nichols. On Thursday, the Memphis, Tennessee, mother was able to close one chapter after three of the five former police officers were found guilty of federal witness tampering charges in the fatal beating. But they were […]
Memphis
Posted inHistory, Politics & Policy
Black Residents Battle Against Tennessee GOP’s Effort to Ban Reparations
The Rev. Earle J. Fisher, an activist and longtime resident of Memphis, Tennessee, is battling against yet another assault on Black economic and political progress by state Republicans. Since the murder of George Floyd in 2020, these efforts have ramped up, particularly in majority-Black Shelby County, the largest county in the state. Just last month, […]
Posted inCriminal Justice, Policing
What Happened to Jaylin McKenzie? His Mom Demands Police Transparency
A week before Christmas last year, Jaylin McKenzie was visiting family in Memphis, Tennessee, when he was shot and killed by a police officer following a traffic stop. For nearly nine months, his mother, Ashley McKenzie-Smith, says she has been trying every avenue possible to get the truth about what happened to her only son […]
Posted inEnvironmental Justice, Unsafe Water
Dirty Water, Distrust, and a Crisis
Black Americans struggling to live through a water crisis are urging the rest of the country to recast what is viewed as violence. “People just don’t get the big picture,” says Brooke Floyd, coordinator for the Jackson People’s Assembly, a social justice organization in Jackson, Mississippi. “There are a lot of things that are making […]
Posted inPolitics & Policy
‘America Can Go Only as Far as the South Goes’
Residents can’t afford to look away from the issues afflicting Tennessee, even though national media coverage has dwindled since April, when state Reps. Justin J. Pearson and Justin Jones, both Democrats, returned to the General Assembly’s lower house. Too much is at stake, especially for those in Pearson’s city of Memphis, in Shelby County, which […]
Posted inClimate Change, Environmental Justice, Partner Content
Long burdened by environmental racism, activists in Memphis are turning the tide
This story was originally published by The 19th. First, the butterflies disappeared. Then, the family dog died; and then the neighbors did, too. But Marquita Bradshaw’s biggest loss of those adolescent days was probably her great-grandmother. Susie Hall died in 1995 after developing uterine and kidney cancers. “We lost our matriarch. … She was the […]
