At funeral, Sharpton calls out 5 Black police officers accused of killing Tyre Nichols: 'How dare you'
Delivering the eulogy at the funeral of Tyre Nichols, the 29-year-old Black man who died three days after being beaten by Memphis police during a traffic stop, the Rev. Al Sharpton called out the five Black officers who have been charged in Nichols’s death for their conduct in the city where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in 1968.
Video Transcript
AL SHARPTON: And the reason why, Mr. And Mrs. Wells, what happened to Tyre is so personal to me is that five Black men that wouldn't have had a job in the police department would not ever be thought of to be in an elite squad in the city that Dr. King lost his life. Not far away from that balcony, you beat a brother to death. There's nothing more insulting and offensive to those of us that fight to open doors that you walk through those doors and act like the folks we had to fight for to get you through them doors.
[APPLAUSE]
You didn't get on the police department by yourself. The police chief didn't get there by herself. People had to march and go to jail, and some lost their lives to open the doors for you. And how dare you?
[APPLAUSE]
Act like that sacrifice was for nothing. You ain't in no New England state. You're in Tennessee, where we had to fight for you. And you take that position?
