Two Memphis residents said one of the officers suspended in the death of 29-year-old Tire Nichols would have pointed a gun at him three years ago and threatened to shoot them both in the face.
Glenn Harris, 24, and Demarius Hervey, 27, recounted their encounter with former Memphis police officer Emmitt Martin III days after the department released officers’ body camera videos and video from security cameras. security, showing Nichols being fatally beaten by officers before his arrest. The images sparked a wave of protests against police violence in the city and across the country.
The brothers said on Sunday that they were standing outside a gas station in August 2020 when police cars suddenly surrounded them.
Fearing arrest because they had smoked marijuana and had a small amount in their pockets, as well as a registered handgun, both acknowledged that they tried to flee in Harris’s vehicle.
“I got scared,” Harris said, adding that he was able to evade police for about 2 miles before crashing. “When I got out of the car and tried to run, that’s when Officer Emmitt grabbed me. He knocked me to the ground and pulled out his gun.”
Harris said Martin pinned him to the asphalt with a knee to the neck and pointed his service pistol at Martin’s head saying, “I’m going to blow your face off,” the officer said, according to the resident.
Hervey said that Martin also threatened to shoot him in the face.
The brothers’ mother, Stacy Harris, said her son Glenn called him several hours after the arrest last Monday and told him about the meeting with Martin.
“He told me that (Officer Martin) threw him to the ground and put the gun on him and told him he was going to blow his head off,” the woman said, adding that she immediately became upset and feared for her son’s life. Likewise, she affirmed that her three children have had friction with the Memphis agents.
At the time Harris told her mother about the violent encounter, they did not know the officer was Martin. It wasn’t until he saw him on television during coverage of the Tire Nichols case that he identified the officer as the one who had threatened him.
Attorney Arthur Horne, who represented Glenn Harris in the case, said his client came into his office a few days after the encounter with Martin and told him that the police were aggressive towards him and arrested him.
“He said an officer pulled out a gun and put it to his head and called it the N-word,” Horne said. “I told him he could go to internal affairs, but they probably wouldn’t do anything.”
Harris did not file a complaint at the time because he was worried about getting out of jail. Horne said Monday that they were considering whether to file a lawsuit now.
An affidavit of complaint dated August 2, 2020 and signed by Officer Emmitt Martin III obtained by NBC News confirmed Harris and Hervey’s account that they were taken into custody after Harris crashed the black Nissan Maxima he was driving, then a short foot chase.
Harris was charged with possession of a firearm under the influence, reckless driving, driving on a suspended/revoked/cancelled license, leaving the scene of an accident, and evading arrest.
For their part, no charges were filed against Hervey, but police said in the affidavit that they found a small bag of what appeared to be marijuana in his right pants pocket and “more than $194 in various denominations.”
“Harris had more than $2,960 on his person,” according to the affidavit, which also mentions that police found a scale and a handgun with 15 rounds “in the magazine.”
The brothers said the officer did not need to threaten them the way he did.
“I was wrong, he wasn’t supposed to point a gun at me,” Harris said of Martin.
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- Fatal beating of Tire Nichols revives calls for police reform in the United States
- Sixth officer involved in death of African-American Tire Nichols identified in Memphis, Tennessee