This story was originally published by MLK50: Justice Through Journalism. Subscribe to their newsletter here. Keyana Dixon agreed to meet on her day off. It was a warm yet cloudy and rainy Monday morning – Dixon’s favorite type of weather. The rain recharges her, she said. The conditions seemed ideal for the heavy conversation ahead: discussing what […]
Tyre Nichols
Posted inCriminal Justice, Policing
Tyre Nichols Died. A Tennessee Jury Didn’t Convict Three Ex-Officers for His Death.
Just days after the controversial acquittal of three former Memphis, Tennessee, police officers in the death of Tyre Nichols, his family is condemning the “wanted” posters showing the men involved in his brutal beating that are appearing across the city. Since the verdict, the family has been “made aware of posters in public places around […]
Posted inCriminal Justice, Policing
Split Verdict Closes One Chapter for Tyre Nichols’ Family, Yet The Fight Isn’t Over
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 […]
Posted inCriminal Justice, Policing
Tyre Nichols Killing: Jury Selection Begins for 3 Ex-Officers Accused in Fatal Beating
Nearly a year ago, five Black former Memphis police officers were indicted in federal court after a traffic stop in January 2023 that resulted in the fatal beating of Tyre Nichols. The FedEx worker cried out for his mother as the officers repeatedly kicked, used a baton and Tasers, and pepper sprayed him. He was […]
Posted inCriminal Justice, Policing
Reform Rollbacks May Lead to Another Rise in Mass Incarceration
LaNaisha Edwards was 15 when she started going to funerals in the mid-1990s. By her senior year, getting dressed for another memorial service “became the normal thing to do — sadly” in Los Angeles, she said. By September 2010, the plague of gun violence that destroyed other families hit too close to home. Her 24-year-old […]
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 inCriminal Justice, Policing
The ‘Black Cop’ Isn’t Enough Reform to End Police Brutality
More than 25 years before Nas released “Cops Shot the Kid,” KRS-One wrote about the “Black Cop,” describing them as strategically placed props in a systemically racist system used to oppress Black people. During slavery, there were Black overseers who beat other enslaved people. Fast forward to 1993, KRS-One wrote, “Black slave turned black cop […]
Posted inCriminal Justice, Partner Content, Policing
‘They Need to See’: RowVaughn Wells on What It Means to Attend the State of the Union Address
This story was originally published by The 19th. RowVaughn Wells is nervous; at 61, she never expected to be the face of a movement, to visit the White House, or to be singled out in front of the nation by the president of the United States. Now, a month to the day since her son, Tyre […]
Posted inCriminal Justice, Policing
The Tyre Nichols Video Is Coming Out. You Don’t Have to Watch.
Footage of five Memphis, Tennessee, police officers, who were fired after participating in a traffic stop that resulted in the death of Tyre Nichols earlier this month, is expected to be televised during Friday’s prime-time lineup. It’s unclear how long — and how horrific — the video will be. But since the police department announced […]
