Tennessee governor signs bill blocking police reform law inspired by Tyre Nichols’ killing

Tennessee Republican Gov. Bill Lee has signed a bill into law that blocks cities from enacting some local police reforms, including a lauded Memphis traffic stop ordinance created after the fatal police beating of Tyre Nichols.

Tennessee Republican Gov. Bill Lee has signed a bill into law that blocks cities from enacting some local police reforms, including a lauded Memphis traffic stop ordinance created after the fatal police beating of Tyre Nichols. The Republican-controlled Tennessee legislature previously passed the bill, which bans any city from enacting any measure “that prohibits or limits the ability of a law enforcement agency to take all necessary steps that are lawful under state and federal law to fulfill the law enforcement agency’s duties to prevent and detect crime and apprehend criminal offenders.” The bill was introduced in the Tennessee House about a year after Nichols’ January 2023 death. Although the law doesn’t specifically mention the Memphis traffic stop measure, it has been widely interpreted as a rebuke of the ordinance and would prevent cities across the state from implementing similar reforms. The measure in Memphis, dubbed the “Driving Equality Act in Honor of Tyre Nichols,” prohibited police stops for minor infractions. The 2023 ordinance was passed by the Memphis City Council in the months after Nichols, a 29-year-old Black man, was severely beaten by Memphis police during a traffic stop. He was hospitalized and died several days later from his injuries, which included tearing and rupturing in his brain and bruising and cuts all over his body. The reform was supported by Nichols’ family as well as civil rights groups and activists, who have argued police stops for minor infractions – also called pretextual stops – unfairly target Black drivers and expose them to police violence. Pretextual stops allow police to use minor traffic infractions or broken taillights as grounds to investigate motorists for more serious crimes. Police have defended those kinds of stops, saying they are crucial for fighting possession of illegal drugs, weapons possession, human trafficking and drunken driving.