Tennessee Democratic lawmakers announced plans to introduce bills in the upcoming legislative session that focus on statewide police reforms after a group of officers savagely beat Tyre Nichols earlier this month.
Nichols died in the hospital on Jan. 10, three days after Memphis police pulled him over and began pummeling, tasering and pepper-spraying him, according to video of the attack that was released Friday.
At a press conference Saturday morning, Tennessee state Reps. Joe Towns, G.A. Hardaway and John Ray Clemmons announced that the House Democratic Caucus plans to file bills in the coming days to address police training and mental health evaluations for officers, the Commercial Appeal reported.
“We want to make sure when you’re hired that you’ve had a psychological evaluation and that you are suited for this job and the job is suited to you,” Hardaway said.
Other legislation would have law enforcement officers switch from de-escalating to non-escalating techniques and require implicit bias training for police officials in Tennessee.
“It’s truly unfortunate that we would need to legislate humanity in 2023,” Clemmons said.
Democrats hold a mere 24 out of 99 seats in the state house, but Towns said that given the severity of Nichols’ death, he believes bipartisan support is possible.
Read more of the Post’s coverage of Tyre Nichols’ beating death
“You would be hard-pressed to look at this footage, see what happened to this young man and not try to do something,” he said.
Five police officers who were involved in Nichols’ arrest — Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Emmitt Martin III, Desmond Mills Jr. and Justin Smith — were fired by the Memphis Police Department and charged with his murder.
On a call Friday with President Biden, Nichols’ parents and their lawyer, Benjamin Crump, pressed the commander-in-chief to renew efforts for police reforms.
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