Memphis police disbands so-called ‘Scorpion unit’ involved in Tyre Nichols beating | CBC News

The Memphis Police Department has disbanded the so-called “Scorpion” special unit whose officers violently beat Black motorist Tyre Nichols, who died in hospital three days later.

Police Director Cerelyn “CJ” Davis said Saturday that she “listened intently” to Nichols’ relatives, community leaders and uninvolved officers in making the decision.

“It is in the best interest of all to permanently deactivate the Scorpion unit,” she said in a statement. She said the officers currently assigned to the unit “agree unreservedly” with the step.

The “Scorpion” unit is composed of three teams of about 30 officers who target violent offenders in areas beset by high crime. It had been inactive since Nichols’ Jan. 7 arrest.

In an interview Friday with The Associated Press, Davis said she would not shut down a unit if a few officers commit “some egregious act” and because she needs that unit to continue to work.

“The whole idea that the Scorpion unit is a bad unit, I just have a problem with that,” Davis said.

The announcement comes a day after footage was released of officers savagely beating Nichols, a 29-year-old FedEx worker, for three minutes while screaming profanities at him in an assault that the Nichols family legal team has likened to the infamous 1991 police beating of Los Angeles motorist Rodney King.

Nichols calls out for his mother before his limp body is propped against a squad car and the officers exchange fist-bumps.

Five officers, who are also Black, have been fired and charged with second-degree murder and other crimes in Nichols’s death.

Davis has said other officers are under investigation, and Shelby County Sheriff Floyd Bonner said two deputies have been relieved of duty without pay while their conduct is investigated.

A Memphis police spokesperson declined to comment on the role played by other officers who showed up at the scene.