Sixth Memphis police officer fired over Tyre Nichols death

WASHINGTON: The Memphis Police Department on Friday said it had fired a sixth officer involved in the arrest of Tyre Nichols, the 29-year-old African American whose fatal beating shocked the nation.

Preston Hemphill, who had been in the southern US city´s police force since 2018, “violated multiple departmental policies,” including on “personal conduct,” “truthfulness” and regulations on Taser gun use, the department said in a statement.

Five other officers had already been fired and charged with murder over Nichols´s death.

Hemphill, a white man, had been suspended since the beginning of the department´s investigation, but that was not made public until Monday.

Nichols was arrested by members of a special police unit called Scorpion on January 7 for what police said was a traffic violation.