Tyre Nichols often went to the city park on the weekends to take pictures of the sunset. He found that photography gave him a creative way to look at the world and let him say things that words couldn’t. His family says that he loved taking pictures of landscapes and that the warm colours of the setting sun were his favourite.
“My goal is to take my viewers deep into what I see with my eye and show them what I see with my lens,” Nichols says.
Nichols, a father of two who was 29 years old and liked to take pictures, was pulled over on January 7 after taking pictures of the sky. Tragically, he was killed just a few blocks from his home, where he lived with his mother and stepfather. Five Memphis police officers are accused of beating him up badly.

Because of his death, these officers have been charged with second-degree murder and other crimes. wrote. “Everyone has something to say, so why not write it down?”
“Nobody’s perfect, nobody. But he was damn close,” his mother, RowVaughn Wells, said at a news conference this week after watching the video of her son being beaten to death. “He was almost as good as it gets.”

He was the youngest child in their family. He came along 12 years after his closest siblings. His family said he had a 4-year-old son and worked hard to be a better father. He loved to skateboard and lived in Sacramento, California. He moved to Memphis right before the pandemic and got stuck there. Wells said that he didn’t mind because he was with his mother, and they were very close. He got a tattoo of her name on his arm.
At a memorial service this week, Nichols’ friends talked about how happy and liked he was. Angelina Paxton, a friend who came from California to attend the service, said, “Everyone loved him when he walked into a room.” Nichols grew up in Sacramento, California, where he spent a lot of time at a skate park on the edge of town. Even though the park could be hard for younger kids, Niko Chapman’s parents felt safe enough to let him walk around alone as long as Nichols was there.

“You remember really nice people, and Tyre was just a very nice person,” Chapman said. “He just made me feel very welcome all the time.”
Niko Chapman’s dad, Curtis Chapman, was in charge of a youth group at a local church. The group would often get pizza at the skate park. Nichols became a regular member quickly. He was known for his high energy and quick wit. But when he wasn’t with the group, Nichols often went to the Chapmans’ house to talk about life and ask for advice. Curtis Chapman said, “What drew me to Tyre was that he was real. He would talk about the challenges of being a young father and how he wanted to be a good one.”

Nichols and his friend Brian Jang would go to a Bible study every Thursday. One time, the group listened to a sermon about how the world is full of things to take your attention away. Jang said that the sermon had a big effect on Nichols, so much so that he took out his flip phone and put it in a cup of water.
“I thought it was great to see how much he had grown and how much he cared,” Jang said.
Jang last saw Nichols in the food court of a local mall in 2018. Jang said that he and Nichols hadn’t seen each other in a while, but as they caught up, Nichols came up behind him and gave him a big hug.

“It’s honestly pretty devastating to see such a good human go through such unnecessary brutality, such unnecessary death,” Jang said.

His mother said that she taught him to love everyone until they give you a reason not to. So Nichols made friends quickly.

Every morning in Memphis, Nichols went to Starbucks, where he hung out with Nate Spates Jr. They talked about sports and everyday things. Once, Spates and his wife were somewhere and ran into Nichols. They all talked for a few hours. Spates said that his wife told him afterward, “He has such a good soul and calm presence.”
Nichols and his stepfather both worked the second shift at FedEx. Every day at 7 p.m., when they went home for their break, his mother would have a meal ready for them.
Wells said that she had offered to buy her son popular athletic shoes called Jordans, but he didn’t want them.

She said, “He was just his own person.” “He didn’t do what other people did.”
He went to the park when he wasn’t working to skateboard and take pictures. His website is called This California Kid, and the first thing it says is, “Welcome to the world as I see it.”

He put together a gallery of what he thought were his best works, such as black-and-white bridges and railroad tracks and the neon lights of Beale Street at night. He took pictures of pink flowers, sunsets over the Mississippi River, fields of grass, and statues of Elvis. He talks about a quote by another photographer that starts, “A good photographer must love life.”

After she saw the video of her son’s death, she stood at a lectern with her family and lawyers, shaking, to tell the world what it had lost.

“He was a human piata,” the lawyer said about the beating shown in the video. Wells turned her head away and buried her face in her hands.

Family lawyers say that Nichols can be heard on the video, which will be made public on Friday, saying that all he wants to do is go home. He was about 100 yards from where his mother lived.

Lawyers described the last words Nichols is heard saying — calling for his mom, three times.

“Oh my God,” she wailed as they spoke. “Oh my God.”

She still finds herself waiting for him to walk in the door every day at 7 p.m.

“It’s not even real to me right now. I don’t have any feelings right now,” she said. “I know my son Tyre Nichols is not here with me anymore. He will never walk through that door again.”