Will be laid to rest on
Wednesday at a Memphis church.
There will also be a vigil at
the sack ramp skate shop in
South Sacramento this Saturday.
That's from on February 4th and
that's from 2:00 PM to 5:00 PM,
the business wrote on their Instagram.
Quote. We will stand up together
to celebrate his life and family,
and the death of Tyree Nichols at
the hands of Memphis police officers
has amplified calls for reform in
the culture of law enforcement.
We saw some in the wake of George
Floyd's murder back in 2020,
some calling to defund the police, others.
Calling for more focus on community based
mental health crisis response teams.
So we decided to turn to community
leaders here to ask what they
would like to see change.
We do see a pattern and a trend of
police killing people and hurting
people in the city and nationwide.
Tanya Faison is the founder of Black
Lives Matter Sacramento. We know
that this moment will happen again.
How will other? Law enforcement
agencies respond throughout
the country in this moment.
Barry Axius, Sacramento Community leader
and founder of Voice of the Youth,
says he thinks the culture of law
enforcement needs reform everywhere,
not just in Memphis. Is there
one or two changes that you
would point to locally where
you say this is something that
I'm pushing for, that needs to change ASAP?
We're fighting for the removal of
gang enforcement teams and gang units.
Sheriff has the gang suppression
unit and then the SAC PD has the gang
enforcement team and they literally
go to neighborhoods like old.
Mark Valley High Meadow View and
they they pull over people just
for driving down the street.
They say, oh, it's because your
windows are tinted or it's because
your name is so and so and we know
who you used to be a gang member.
And so we want to search your car.
We took these concerns to the
Sacramento Police Department and
Sacramento County Sheriff's Office.
We don't have the ability to simply
pull people over for no reason.
Search them for no reason.
And you know, without any type
of liability or oversight,
Sergeant Amar Gandhi is now the
spokesperson for the Sacramento
County Sheriff's Office since sheriff.
Jim Cooper took office in December,
but prior to this he supervised
the gang suppression unit.
If you are participating in gang activity,
organized crime or hanging out or
associating with those that are,
you will definitely be
contacted by our gang unit.
And that is not by accident,
that is not by mistake, but it's also not
by any particular racial group either.
We are targeting criminals.
We're targeting folks that are going
out there doing violent crimes,
Sacramento police told ABC 10.
The Sacramento Police Department positions
gang teams in affected areas of the city.
In response to the ongoing violence that
has plagued Sacramento for decades,
as most recently witnessed in the 2022 K St.
Shooting amongst others,
all officers at the Sacramento
Police Department received
training and procedural justice,
racial profiling,
implicit bias de escalation techniques,
crisis intervention techniques,
the critical decision making
model and cultural competency
with members of the gang units
receiving additional training.
We have a lot of work to
do here in Sacramento.
I think that, you know, I see SAC PD
trying to make a move for better.
There's definitely still more.
Work for them SAC sheriff.
I mean, even though we have a
a a new person at the head,
there's a lot more work.
It seems to be for them just
in our own local community.
There's a lot.
And it's not only law enforcement.
I don't believe that.
You can't just depend on a culture
changing with law enforcement if
a culture is not changing within
our community and within ourselves.
And Becca joins me now.
Becca, we know that the ex
officers who attacked Tyree,
they were part of a special unit,
the Scorpion unit, right.
And there are specialized A-Team,
right? Yeah, yeah.
You know, the Memphis police chief
said that she thinks some kind
of group think set in among those
officers as they beat Nichols.
I asked the Sacramento County
Sheriff's spokesperson about that.
You know, he told me, first of all,
quote, the people most angry about
cops doing bad things are good cops
because they tarnish everything
we're working toward every day.
He said he added there should
be multiple layers of oversight
within law enforcement agencies.
In the Sacramento County sheriff's
Gang suppression unit, for example,
he says 2 lieutenants and
a captain oversee it.
It's housed in the Central
Investigations Division,
right next to the homicide and robbery units.
You know, there are body worn cameras,
something they didn't start
wearing until 2021, I should add,
after a lot of community organizations,
including the NAACP advocated for that.
You know,
he said there are many systems in
place to prevent members of the
gang units from going rogue or.
Calling into groupthink.
And we know that a lot of people
here feel targeted, even profiled,
by the police or sheriff's
deputies here in our community,
right? You know, Black Lives Matter,
Sacramento's founder told me there
are some people who, for example,
were involved in a gang,
serve their time, and are now out
trying to live productive lives,
but they feel targeted due
to their former involvement.
And what does she propose?
And as an alternative to,
like gang units, for example, what
does she think? Well, you know,
she says it's foundational issues,
and they start by,
you know, fixing those.
Start by bringing meaningful.
Resources to communities,
she says once people have their needs met,
they're less likely to seek
those needs in harmful ways.