MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — An FBI agent who interviewed two former Memphis police officers on trial in the fatal beating of Tyre Nichols testified Thursday that they accepted accountability for participating.
FBI Special Agent Anthony Householder took the stand in the federal trial of Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley and Justin Smith, who have pleaded not guilty to charges of excessive force, failure to intervene, and obstructing justice through witness tampering. Two other former officers, Emmitt Martin III and Desmond Mills Jr., have testified after pleading guilty to depriving Nichols of his civil rights.
Householder said he interviewed Bean and Smith as part of the FBI’s investigation into the January 2023 beating.
Householder said Smith told him that he and Martin both punched Nichols. Smith said he should have stopped Martin from punching Nichols, Householder said.
Smith added that he didn’t tell emergency medical technicians about punches delivered to Nichols because he thought Nichols would be able to tell them himself, Householder said. Nichols died in the hospital on Jan. 10, 2023, three days after the beating.
The officers used pepper spray and a Taser on Nichols, who was Black, during a traffic stop, but the 29-year-old ran away, police video shows. The five officers, who also are Black, then punched, kicked and hit him about a block from his home, as he called out for his mother. Video also shows the officers milling about and even laughing as Nichols struggled with his injuries.
Smith “took ownership” and said he had failed, Householder testified. The FBI agent also acknowledged that Smith cried during the interview.
“He was certainly remorseful,” Householder said.
Bean also accepted responsibility and told Householder that he had previously omitted information about the beating because he did not want to be labeled a “snitch,” the FBI agent testified.
“He didn’t want to throw his team under the bus,” Householder said.
Householder said he did not record the interviews. Under questioning by Bean’s lawyer, John Keith Perry, Householder acknowledged that some agents do record such interviews, which are summarized by FBI agents and known as proffers. But the recordings are not required, Householder said.
Taylor Chesser, a nurse who treated Nichols in the emergency room, said he was in cardiac arrest and not breathing when he arrived at the hospital. Chesser said medical providers eventually were able to restore his heart beat.
Nichols was “dead until we intervened,” Chesser said.
Prosecutors rested their case after her testimony.
Lawyers for the three officers then requested an acquittal based on claims that prosecutors have failed to present enough evidence. U.S. District Judge Mark Norris did not immediately rule on the requests Thursday.
Earlier Thursday, Mills testified he had not previously seen Bean nor Smith participate in the “street tax,” which is police slang for punishing people who run away from police. Prosecutors maintain officers employed the “street tax” or “run tax ” against Nichols.
The officers were part of a since-disbanded crime suppression unit. Under cross-examination from Smith's lawyer, Martin Zummach, Mills said he got to know Smith well in the two years they rode together with the Scorpion Unit. Mills said he had not previously seen Smith abuse people and Smith would not tolerate other officers mistreating suspects.
Mills, who used pepper spray on Nichols and hit him with a baton, said it’s possible that the beating could have ended if one of the officers had said to stop.
Mills, who cried on the stand and apologized during testimony earlier in the week, said Thursday that he “couldn’t hold it no more” after seeing the video of the beating.
“I wasn’t going to stand and say I did right,” Mills said.
Bean, Haley and Smith face up to life in prison if convicted.
The five officers also have been charged with second-degree murder in state court, where they pleaded not guilty. Mills and Martin are expected to change their pleas. A trial date in state court has not been set.
Associated Press reporter Kimberlee Kruesi contributed from Nashville, Tennessee.
Former Memphis police officer Tadarrius Bean, left, arrives at the federal courthouse with his attorney John Keith Perry, right, for the day's proceedings during the trial in the Tyre Nichols case Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2024, in Memphis, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV)
Former Memphis police officer Justin Smith arrives at the federal courthouse for the day's proceedings during the trial in the Tyre Nichols case Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2024, in Memphis, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV)
Former Memphis police officer Desmond Mills, left, arrives at the federal courthouse with his attorney Blake Ballin, right, to testify against his former colleagues during the trial in the Tyre Nichols case Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2024, in Memphis, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV)
RowVaughn Wells, mother of Tyre Nichols, closes her eyes during a prayer vigil outside the federal courthouse during the trial of three former Memphis police officers accused of killing her son Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2024, in Memphis, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV)
NEW YORK (AP) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday vowed to carry out “full force” strikes against Hezbollah until it ceases firing rockets across the border, dimming hopes for a cease-fire proposal put forth by U.S. and European officials.
Israel carried out a new strike in the Lebanese capital, which killed a senior Hezbollah commander, and the militant group launched dozens of rockets into Israel. Tens of thousands of Israeli and Lebanese people living near their countries' border have been displaced by the fighting.
Netanyahu spoke as he landed in New York to attend the annual U.N. General Assembly meeting, where U.S. and European officials were putting heavy pressure on both sides of the conflict to accept a proposed 21-day halt in the fighting to give time for diplomacy and avert all-out war.
Nearly 700 people have been killed in Lebanon this week as Israel dramatically escalated strikes, saying it is targeting Hezbollah’s military capacities. Israeli leaders say they are determined to stop the group's cross-border attacks, which began after Hamas' Oct. 7 attack that ignited the war in Gaza.
Israel’s “policy is clear," Netanyahu said. "We are continuing to strike Hezbollah with full force. And we will not stop until we reach all our goals, chief among them the return of the residents of the north securely to their homes.”
Just before his comments, the Israeli military said it killed a Hezbollah drone commander, Mohammed Hussein Surour, in an airstrike in the suburbs of Beirut. Hezbollah later confirmed Surour's death.
The Health Ministry said two people were killed and 15 wounded in the strike. Associated Press photos of the scene showed a gutted apartment in a residential building in Dahiyeh, the mainly Shiite suburb where Hezbollah has a strong presence.
Until recently, Israel had rarely targeted sites in Beirut during the low-level conflict with Hezbollah that has been ongoing since October. However, in the past week, Israel has struck Beirut’s southern suburbs several times.
Over the past week, Israel has carried out several strikes in Beirut targeting senior Hezbollah commanders. One strike in eastern Lebanon on Thursday killed 20 people, most of them Syrian migrants, according to Lebanese health officials.
Israel hit 75 sites early Thursday across southern and eastern Lebanon and launched a new wave of strikes in the evening, the military said. Throughout the day, Hezbollah fired some 175 projectiles into Israel, the Israeli military said. Most were intercepted or fell in open areas, sparking some wildfires, though one rocket hit a street in a town near the northern city of Safed.
Israel has talked of a possible ground invasion into Lebanon to drive Hezbollah -- an Iranian-backed Shiite group that is the strongest armed force in Lebanon -- away from the border. It has moved thousands of troops to the north in preparation. Some 100,000 Lebanese have fled their homes in the past week, streaming into Beirut and points further north.
Israeli military vehicles transported tanks and armored vehicles toward the country’s northern border with Lebanon a day after commanders issued a call-up of reservists. Several tanks arrived in Kiryat Shmona, a hard-hit town just several miles from the border.
On another front, Israel’s military on Friday said it intercepted a missile fired from Yemen that set off air raid sirens across the country’s center. Sirens rang out across Israel’s populous central area, including the seaside metropolis of Tel Aviv. Another missile from Yemen landed in central Israel about two weeks ago.
The escalation has raised fears of a repeat – or worse – of the 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah that wreaked destruction across southern Lebanon and other parts of the country and saw heavy Hezbollah rocket fire on Israeli cities.
“Another full-scale war could be devastating for both Israel and Lebanon,” U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said after talks with his British and Australian counterparts in London.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was at the U.N. meeting with Israeli officials over the truce proposal. Speaking in an interview with MSNBC, he said major powers, the Europeans and Arab nations were united, “everyone speaking with one clear voice about the need to get that cease-fire in the north.”
“I can’t speak for him,” Blinken said of Netanyahu.
Hezbollah has not yet responded to the proposal. Lebanon’s caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati welcomed it, but his government has no sway over the group.
Netanyahu’s office downplayed the initiative, saying in a statement that it was only a proposal.
One of Netanyahu’s far-right governing partners threatened on Thursday to suspend cooperation with his government if it signs onto a temporary cease-fire with Hezbollah – and to quit completely if a permanent deal is reached. It was the latest sign of displeasure from Netanyahu’s allies toward international cease-fire efforts.
“If a temporary cease-fire becomes permanent, we will resign from the government,” said National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, head of the Jewish Power party.
If Ben-Gvir leaves the coalition, Netanyahu would lose his parliamentary majority and could see his government come toppling down, though opposition leaders have said they would offer support for a cease-fire deal.
Hezbollah has insisted it would halt its strikes only if there is a cease-fire in Gaza, where Israel has battled Hamas for nearly a year. That appears out of reach despite months of negotiations led by the United States, Egypt and Qatar.
One day after Hamas’ Oct 7 attack on southern Israel that triggered the war in Gaza, Hezbollah began firing rockets into northern Israel, bringing Israeli counterfire and a cycle of reprisals that has gone on near daily since. Hezbollah says its barrages are a show of support for Palestinians and that it is targeting Israeli military facilities, though rockets have also hit civilian areas.
Before this week, the cross-border exchanges had killed about 600 people in Lebanon, mostly militants but including more than 100 civilians, and about four dozen people in Israel, roughly half of them soldiers and the rest civilians. The fighting also forced tens of thousands to flee homes on both sides of the border.
Israel says its escalated strikes across Lebanon the past week are targeting Hezbollah rocket launchers and other military infrastructure. Since Monday, strikes have killed more than 690 people in Lebanon, around a quarter of them women and children, according to local health authorities.
The campaign opened with what is widely believed to be an Israeli attack on Sept. 18 and 19 detonating thousands of pagers and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah, killing at least 39 people and maiming thousands more, including civilians.
Hezbollah in turn has fired hundreds of rockets into Israel. Several people in Israel have been wounded. On Wednesday, the group fired on Tel Aviv for the first time with a longer-range missile that was intercepted.
Early Thursday, an Israeli airstrike hit a building housing Syrian workers and their families near the ancient city of Baalbek in Lebanon’s eastern Bekaa Valley. The Lebanese Health Ministry said 19 Syrians and a Lebanese were killed, one of the deadliest single strikes in Israel’s intensified air campaign.
Hussein Salloum, a local official in Younine, said most of the dead were women and children. The state news agency had initially reported that 23 people were dead.
Lebanon, with a population of around 6 million, hosts nearly 780,000 registered Syrian refugees and hundreds of thousands who are unregistered — the world’s highest refugee population per capita.
Mroue reported from Beirut, Lidman from Tel Aviv. Associated Press journalist Sam McNeil contributed to this report from Kiryat Shmona, Israel.
Lebanese soldiers cordon off the area at the site of an Israeli airstrike in Beirut's southern suburbs, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)
A resident checks an apartment that was hit by an Israeli airstrike in Beirut's southern suburbs, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)
Israeli Iron Dome air defense system fires to intercept rockets that were launched from Lebanon, as seen from Haifa, northern Israel, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Baz Ratner)
A damaged building at the site of an Israeli airstrike in Beirut's southern suburbs, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)
A man carries a damaged bicycle at the site of an Israeli airstrike in Saksakieh, south Lebanon, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)
A man carries pictures of his relatives standing at the site of an Israeli airstrike in Saksakieh, south Lebanon, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)
Displaced children sit in a classroom in Beirut, after fleeing the Israeli airstrikes in the south with their families, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Displaced children play in a classroom at a school, in Beirut, after fleeing the Israeli airstrikes in the south with their families, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
A displaced boy sleeps in a classroom in Beirut, after fleeing the Israeli airstrikes in the south with his family, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Displaced youth hug as they take shelter at a school in Beirut, after fleeing the Israeli airstrikes in the south with their families, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Displaced people gather in the hallway of a school in Beirut, after fleeing the Israeli airstrikes in the south, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Volunteers distribute clothes to displayed women at a school in Beirut, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Displaced women smoke waterpipes as they sit in a school in Beirut, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Displaced people sit in a school yard in Beirut, after fleeing the Israeli airstrikes in the south, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Displaced women and children sit in a classroom in Beirut, after fleeing the Israeli airstrikes in the south, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
People take cover as a siren sounds a warning of incoming rockets fired from Lebanon, in Safed, northern Israel, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)
People run to take cover as a siren sounds a warning of incoming rockets fired from Lebanon, in Safed, northern Israel, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)
Ali Abdel Rahman Zorout, 5, who was wounded in an Israeli airstrike, poses for a picture at the Alaaeddine Hospital in Sarafand, south Lebanon, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)
Fatima Abdel Rahman Zorout, 7, who was wounded in an Israeli airstrike, is wheeled on a gurney at the Alaaeddine Hospital in Sarafand, south Lebanon, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)
A man carries a damaged bicycle at the site of an Israeli airstrike in Saksakieh, south Lebanon, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)
A man stands on top of a damaged car at the site of an Israeli airstrike in Saksakieh, south Lebanon, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)
A man reacts in a damaged apartment at the site of an Israeli airstrike in Saksakieh, south Lebanon, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)
An emergency worker cuts concrete blocks as he searches for survivors at the scene of an Israeli airstrike in the town of Maisara, north of Beirut, Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
