US policeman pleads guilty in beating death of Black man

WASHINGTON: One of the five US police officers charged in the beating death of a young African-American man in the southern city of Memphis pleaded guilty on Thursday, the Justice Department announced.

Bodycam footage of the January incident showed the officers, who are all Black, repeatedly kicking and punching Tyre Nichols, 29, during a traffic stop close to his home in Memphis. Nichols died in hospital three days later.

The guilty plea by Desmond Mills comes as part of a settlement of pending state and federal charges, and marks a course reversal given that he had pleaded not guilty along with the other four officers in February when they appeared in court in Tennessee. Already facing felony charges from the state of Tennessee, the five police officers were indicted in September by a federal grand jury in Memphis.

Mills, 33, pleaded guilty on Thursday to two of four counts in the indictment -- excessive force and failing to intervene as well as an attempted coverup -- according to a statement from the Justice Department.

The Shelby County District Attorney´s office said in a statement that the plea was “part of a global settlement of all pending state and federal charges and comes after Mills pled guilty this morning to these federal charges.” The other four officers have pleaded not guilty to federal charges.