Tyre Nichols' mother: Verdict a ‘devastating blow'
Wells spoke at a rally for her son Wednesday afternoon as rain poured outside the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis.
'What we heard was not what we wanted to hear. But was I shocked, surprised? No, I wasn't,' she said.
Next step for Tyre Nichols' family: $550M civil lawsuit that could bankrupt city
An out-of-town jury from Hamilton County took about eight and a half hours over two days to find Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, and Justin Smith not guilty on all charges after a nine-day trial in Memphis.
Wells praised the job done by prosecutors with the D.A.'s office, but the out-of-town jury brought in from Hamilton County in East Tennessee didn't give a 'rat's butt' about her son.
'My son was murdered. He was murdered, and three of them got off, because those jurors decided not to look at the evidence, but only to look at the fact that my son was a Black man running from the police,' she said.
Sen. Brent Taylor calls out D.A. Mulroy after 'not guilty' verdicts in Tyre Nichols case
Rodney Wells, Nichols' stepfather, said the verdict was not what the family expected. They had expected to retire to Chattanooga, he said, but now would not visit the city where the jurors were drawn from.
'Of 21 charges, nothing,' he said, referring to the seven charges faced by each of the three officers.
He noted that officers still face sentencing in the earlier federal trial.
'We do have a little solace in our family for that reason and that reason only, that they are going to jail,' he said.
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