ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
Jury selection is underway in Memphis, Tenn., today in a high-profile police brutality case. It's a federal civil rights trial for three former Memphis officers accused of beating Tyre Nichols to death in 2023. NPR's Debbie Elliott is covering the trial and joins us from Memphis. Hi, Debbie.
DEBBIE ELLIOTT, BYLINE: Hi there, Ari.
SHAPIRO: What is at stake in this case?
ELLIOTT: You know, this is the very first trial stemming from Tyre Nichols' killing, which you'll recall was recorded on video. A lot of people saw that, showing police brutally beating him after a traffic stop in January of last year. Five of the detectives involved in that stop were fired, and the city disbanded the special street crime task force that they were a part of.
Nichols was Black, as were - or as are all of the five former officers. Now, three of them - Justin Smith, Tadarrius Bean and Demetrius Haley - are in court to face these felony charges from the federal government. They include excessive use of force, willful failure to intervene, obstruction of justice for conspiring to cover up what happened. Two other former officers have pleaded guilty and are now cooperating with prosecutors.
SHAPIRO: And what happened as the first day of jury selection got underway today?
ELLIOTT: You know, it's been slow going. The judge and lawyers spent much of the morning behind closed doors dealing with some matters that are sealed, so we really don't know what that was about. About 200 people showed up for this jury pool from four counties around west Tennessee. They're looking to seat a jury of 12, with four alternates.
Federal Judge Mark Norris warned them not to read about the case or talk to anyone about it. And then he sort of started this free-flowing conversation with the first group to be vetted about how bias comes into play when you're a juror and whether they would be able to put racial and religious prejudices aside, for instance. You know, the challenge here, Ari, is seating a jury when so many people have seen that disturbing video of the beating. So the court is looking for people who can keep an open mind as the evidence is presented - as the judge said, the evidence that's within these four walls, not anything you saw on the outside. And at least one potential juror admitted it was really going to be hard to unsee what he had witnessed in that footage from the scene.
SHAPIRO: And what have you heard from people in Memphis about the significance of this trial?
ELLIOTT: You know, there is much curiosity about, why? What led these officers to act like you see them on the video? Why did they pull Nichols over in the first place? Why did they act so aggressively right off the bat and just escalate their use of force at every turn? Local civil rights attorney Van Turner was president of the Memphis NAACP in 2023 when Nichols was killed. He says it was a really painful episode for the city. And he's hopeful this trial is sort of the first opportunity to hold the ex-officers responsible for the way they acted. Here's what he told me.
VAN TURNER: One thing we have to realize is that those five officers are not indicative of the entire police force. And so we have to understand that these are not officers which represent all of law enforcement. But to the extent that they did what they did, they need to be punished to the fullest extent possible.
ELLIOTT: I'm hearing the very same sentiment from Tyre Nichols' parents, RowVaughn and Rodney Wells. They've been in the courtroom today. They say they're looking not just for justice for their family but for a message that law enforcement can be held accountable.
SHAPIRO: That's NPR's Debbie Elliott in Memphis. Thank you.
ELLIOTT: You're welcome.
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