TYRE NICHOLS’ FAMILY and friends have gathered for a funeral that blended a celebration of his life with outrage over the brutal beating he endured at the hands of Memphis police.
The Reverend Al Sharpton and Vice President Kamala Harris both delivered impassioned speeches calling on Congress to pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, a broad package of reforms that includes a national registry for police officers disciplined for misconduct, a ban on no-knock warrants and other measures.
Ms Harris said the beating of Mr Nichols by police officers was a violent act that went against the stated mission of police to ensure public safety.
“It was not in the interest of keeping the public safe, because one must ask, was not it in the interest of keeping the public safe that Tyre Nichols would be with us today?
“Was he not also entitled to the right to be safe? So when we talk about public safety, let us understand what it means in its truest form. Tyre Nichols should have been safe,” she said.
Mr Sharpton began his eulogy by recognising family members of others who have been killed by police who attended the funeral, including George Floyd, Botham Jean, Eric Garner and Breonna Taylor.
He said the officers who beat Mr Nichols might have acted differently if there was real accountability for their actions. He also said he believes that if Mr Nichols had been white, “you wouldn’t have beat him like that”.
“We understand that there are concerns about public safety. We understand that there are needs that deal with crime,” Mr Sharpton said.
“But you don’t fight crime by becoming criminals yourself. You don’t stand up to thugs in the street by becoming thugs yourself. You don’t fight gangs by becoming five armed men against an unarmed man. That ain’t the police. That’s punks.”
His remarks drew rousing applause from the crowd.
“If that man had been white, you wouldn’t have beat him like that,” Mr Sharpton said.
The Reverend Lawrence Turner called Mr Nichols “a good person, a beautiful soul, a son, a father, a brother, a friend, a human being” who was gone too soon and “denied his rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, denied the dignity of his humanity, denied the right to see the sun set another day, to embrace his mother, hang out with his friends, hold his child, and the right to grow old”.
“As we celebrate Tyre’s life and comfort this family, we serve notice to this nation that the rerun of this episode that makes Black lives hashtags has been cancelled and will not be renewed for another season,” Mr Turner said. “We have come and we shall overcome.”
Tiffany Rachal, the mother of Jalen Randle, who was fatally shot by a Houston police officer in 2022, sang a rendition of the classic gospel standard Total Praise to rousing applause from the congregation and Mr Nichols’ family.
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