Tough legal team will represent family
Attorneys experienced in similar court cases
Baltimore defense attorney Billy Murphy and Memphis lawyer Art Horne have been engaged by the family of Martavious Banks, who was shot and critically wounded by Memphis police on Sept. 17.
Murphy represented the family of Freddie Gray, a 25-year-old AfricanAmerican man killed by Baltimore police in 2015.
Horne has also worked with the father of Darrius Stewart, an unarmed 19-year-old who was killed by Connor Schilling, then a Memphis police officer, in 2015. Horne recently was found not guilty of aggravated rape, assault and kidnapping charges.
They will be joined by Atlanta defense counsel Drew Findling, who has gained a reputation for successfully representing A-list rappers and was profiled in February in the New York Times.
When contacted on Thursday, Murphy said they were unable to
comment on the case.
Horne said he has worked with Murphy on other cases in Tennessee. He also would not discuss any of the details of their representation.
“At this point we’re investigating the facts of the case and doing the work that we need to do so we can represent the family and represent Mr. Banks and possibly file a claim against the Memphis police,” Horne said.
Banks was critically wounded on Gill Avenue in South Memphis on Sept. 17 following a traffic stop at about 6 p.m. Police have said Banks was armed.
But the details are unclear and officers involved in the initial stop had either shut off body cameras and vehicle video recording systems or never turned them on to begin with.
Nevertheless, Memphis Police Director Michael Rallings said there were officers at the scene who had their recording equipment engaged.
Because the body and vehicle cameras were not operating, Shelby County District Attorney General Amy Weirich asked the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation to handle the investigation.
The TBI automatically takes over when a police shooting results in a fatality.
The officers involved in the shooting are:
❚ Jamarcus Jeames, age 26. MPD says he was involved in the initial traffic stop and is the officer who fired shots. He was hired in March 2017.
❚ Christopher Nowell, age 27. He was involved in an initial traffic stop and arrived to the scene after the shooting occurred, according to MPD. He was hired in September 2014.
❚ Michael R. Williams II, age 27. He was involved in the initial traffic stop and arrived to the scene as the shooting occurred, according to MPD. He was hired in August 2015. Williams is also the son of Memphis Police Association president Mike Williams, who ran for mayor in 2015.
All of the officers worked out of the Airways Station and have been relieved of duty while the TBI investigates.
Immediately after the shooting, protesters took to the streets for hours, demanding transparency from law enforcement.
Protesters included Banks’ mother, Janice Banks, who did not believe her son fired a gun at police.
“If he shot, show me the bullets. He’s at the hospital, do a test kit on his hands. Let me see the proof that he shot a gun,” she said.
A witness, Thoedus Hibbler, told The Commercial Appeal he saw officers open fire without giving verbal commands.
“As he got out of the car, they started (shooting),” Hibbler said. “There was no lights on, no sirens, nothing. It was like, he started running from them and they just started shooting right away.”