Advocates: Black cops not exempt from anti-Black policing

That the death of Tyre Nichols — young, Black, just trying to get home — came at the hands of Memphis police officers was a familiar refrain in the nation’s seemingly endless lamentation of racism and police brutality aimed at Black people.

This time around, though, it was five Black officers who were fired and charged with second-degree murder in the horrifying Jan. 7 beating that was caught on video and led to Nichols’ death in a hospital bed three days later.

But the fact that Black officers killed a Black man didn’t remove racism from the situation. If anything, say reform advocates, it showed that a police culture of racial bias and dehumanization is pervasive enough to spread in all directions, even among minority officers whose presence in law enforcement is often touted as proof of reform efforts.

“What we have to understand is it is not the color of the officer,” said Joshua Adams, an activist in Memphis. “It is the color of who’s being policed. That’s what creates the difference.” The key question is “why does policing show differently for Black people?”

Black and brown officers can be conditioned to view Black and brown people as suspect, advocates say.