The Rev. Al Sharpton wanted to make one thing clear the night before Tyre Nichols‘ funeral: No rumor will stop the pursuit of justice. Nichols was severely beaten by multiple Memphis police officers during a traffic stop on Jan. 7. On Jan. 10, Nichols died as a result of the injuries he sustained. On Jan. 20, the Memphis Police Department fired five Black officers involved in the beating. On Jan. 27, the video of Nichols’ beating was released to the public. On Jan. 30, the department “relieved” a White officer of his duties and suspended another officer on Jan. 31.
The rumor floating online is the ex-girlfriend of one of the officers involved, Demetrius Haley, was in a relationship with Nichols.
BREAKING NEWS: I am being told that Tyre Nichols was in a relationship with and worked at a Memphis @FedEx with #MemphisPolice Demetrius Halys’s ex-girlfriend & baby mama.
After the beating Officer Halys took a pictures of #TyreNichols face and sent it to his babymama. pic.twitter.com/vH8QDstOo8
— Sir Maejor 🇺🇸 (@Maejor4Congress) January 30, 2023
There was also a similar rumor that Nichols was having an affair with Haley’s wife.
I did some investigating into the #TyreNicols Murder and felt something was off and I was right🎯 I’m being told that #TyreNicols Murder was personal (which I felt) and he was sleeping with one of his murders wife “Demetrius Haley” Tyre & the Officer wife worked at FEDEX 2Gather!
— Lisa Campbell (@LisaCampbell102) January 31, 2023
Neither rumor has been confirmed. One Memphis man, John Best, went on social media and claimed he spoke with Nichols’ parents and said his father, Rodney Wells, said the rumors were not true.
Sharpton addressed the growing online narrative himself on Jan. 31.
“Let me say to those nefarious citizens,” Sharpton said. “No rumors on Tyre is going to justify what was done. You can get on any social media you want, but you will not do anything but incense us to continue fighting, because there’s nothing that you can say that can explain what we saw on that videotape. In fact, what you say may make it premeditated and upgrade the charges. So keep running your mouth and you will be running up the charges. Because we don’t care what you say. We know what we saw. And Tyre should not have been treated like that. That could have been any one of us. It’s her son and his son, it could have been mine. I don’t care what rumor you run. I’ve been Black all my life. I’m used to rumors, what I’m not used to is justice. And that’s why we’re going to fight.”
Sharpton spoke at the Mason Temple in Memphis. It was the same venue where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. gave his final speech the night before he was assassinated on April 4, 1968. Members of the NAACP, Black Lives Matter Memphis, Nichols’ brother and father also spoke. The family didn’t take any questions, but his brother said he wants the fight for justice to remain peaceful in honor of Nichols’ personality. Eric Garner‘s mother and Stephon Clark‘s brother were also in attendance at the press conference.
Sharpton said Vice President Kamala Harris is expected to be in attendance at Nichols’ funeral on Feb. 1 at Mississippi Boulevard Christian Church in Memphis. He assured the media the funeral would not focus on politics, but on justice.
