The Police Unit That Was Supposed to Keep Memphis Safe

This episode contains descriptions of violence.

The death of Tyre Nichols, a 29-year-old Black man, at the hands of officers in Memphis last month has intensified calls for fundamental reform in policing. Those calls were echoed yesterday by President Biden, who hosted Mr. Nichols’s parents at the State of the Union address.

Today, we hear about a Times investigation into the special team of officers, known as the Scorpion unit, that is accused of killing Mr. Nichols.

GuestMike Baker () , the Seattle bureau chief and a national correspondent for The New York Times.

Background reading:

• For 14 months, officers from the highprofile Scorpion unit patrolled Memphis with an air of menace () .

• City leaders had praised the Scorpion unit as a key strategy for fighting crime. Now they are trying to assess whether it was flawed from the start () .

• The unit has been disbanded, but Memphis wasn’t the only city to turn to specialized police teams () .

For more information on today’s episode, visit

nytimes.com/thedaily ()

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