Racist policing has plagued the United States for decades

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Tire Nichols and Rodney King (AP)

The deadly use of force by American police officers against black people is pervasive and lessons have not been learned over the decades, Rodney King’s attorney has warned.

The comments come following the death of Tire Nichols, 29, who was savagely beaten by five Black Memphis police officers on January 7. He died three days later in hospital.

Authorities released four different videos on Friday showing the father of a child punched, kicked in the head, beaten with a baton and sprayed with pepper spray, after a traffic stop.

The footage was compared to beatings delivered to Rodney King in 1991, which were also caught on video; though Mr. Nichols did not survive like Mr. King.

Milton Grimes, who was the lawyer for the late Rodney King, said: The beating of Rodney King should have been a wake-up call to address the military style, racist police culture of violence in the United States, but unfortunately nothing has changed.

The United States is not a war zone, but the violence suffered by African Americans testifies to a culture of impunity and the oppressive use of force.

The aggressive nature of policing in the United States is a national disgrace well below international standards.

Tire Nichols, a 29-year-old black man who was arrested while driving and died three days later, is being held by Memphis Police Department officers on Jan. 7, 2023. (AP)

A Memphis police chief said the video showing officers beating Mr Nichols may have been worse than the notorious footage showing the attack on Mr Kings.

Mr King was beaten by a group of Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) officers in 1991 in an attack that was filmed by a bystander. He was then 26 years old.

All four officers were later exonerated by a predominantly white jury that sparked the 1992 Los Angeles riots.

Mr King survived the beatings and later became a peacemaker, saying during the riots we can all get along. He died in 2012 at the age of 47.

Members of the United Nations-backed International Commission of Inquiry into Systemic Racist Police Violence Against People of African Descent in the United States have condemned unlawful violence against black people who are often treated as second-class citizens area.

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The group, made up of members and groups across the UK, US and the Caribbean, has further called on US President Joe Biden to establish an independent national commission to oversee federal law enforcement, with the power to oversee and regulate the performance of all US police departments, implement a zero-tolerance policy for instances of police brutality and the use of excessive and deadly force.

Members of the commission include Justice Peter Herbert (UK), Labor MP Bell Ribeiro-Addy MP (UK), former councilor Lee Jasper, Operation Black Vote, the Society of Black Lawyers, the Pan African Lawyers Union, Sir Hilary Beckles (Barbados), Reverend Al Sharpton (USA), Bert Samuels MP (Jamaica) and more.

Nichols’ parents, RowVaughn Wells and Rodney Wells, have accepted an invitation from the Congressional Black Caucus to attend Mr. Bidens’ State of the Union address next week.

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