A Memphis Black man was beaten and thrown off his own porch by cops responding to a call of a drunk man allegedly waiving a gun last July. After Mario Shaw, 49, was accused of assaulting cops on the scene, doorbell footage reportedly showed something different, and unearthed the involved cops’ disturbing history on the police force.
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“I came out and talked to one of the officers and explained to him what was going on. I noticed that the officers seemed to be getting kind of aggressive,” Shaw told ABC 24 about a dispute he had been having with a neighbor. Ring doorbell footage showed Shaw telling a cop to, “Get out of my yard,” before the cop sprints toward Shaw and grabs him. After a brief shoving match, the cop can be seen throwing Shaw off of his porch while a second officer approaches them. The initial officer, according to ABC 24, repeatedly punched Shaw in the back of his head while the other officer had his stun gun drawn. A second Ring doorbell clip shows the second officer kneeing Shaw, who was also left with a visible bite mark, in his back.
The cops, Taiyuan Brooks, who joined the MPD in 2018, and Keith Shannon, who joined in 2022, were both cleared of any wrongdoing. MPD told local media Shaw was “possibly armed” and that Brooks and Shannon used “less-lethal methods to safely take the suspect into custody.” In their reports obtained by ABC 24, the officers wrote Shaw was the aggressor who “started to physically swing his fist at Officer Brooks” and that they were the victims.
Shaw was charged with two counts of assault against a first responder, resisting arrest, disorderly conduct and public intoxication. However, those charges were dismissed thanks to Ring footage that contradicted Brooks and Shannon’s statements.
“The way that they acted is completely inconsistent with what you would do if you were doing what they said they were doing in the report so it’s very clearly a false report, which is actually a C felony under Tennessee law,” attorney James White, who shares his commentary about police interactions on his YouTube channel Southern Drawl Law, said in a video. He added how, “No police officer observing officer safety would ever rush towards a person they thought was armed,” but would instead “have taken cover, probably drawn either a firearm or a Taser, and started giving verbal commands to Mr. Shaw.”
Now, Shaw, who claims he was denied body cam footage as internal affairs is still investigating, is preparing to file a lawsuit against the Memphis Police Department.
“I felt that the system had let me down,” Shaw said. “It destroyed my trust in the Memphis Police Department and ruined my mental [health]. When I’m out driving around, I’m looking around worrying about a cop targeting me again.”
Brooks and Shannon both had a history of suspensions in the Memphis Police Department. In records obtained by ABC 24, Brooks, who has had multiple write-ups for various offenses, was suspended for 20 days after violating five MPD policies when he drove his police car into an ATV during a police chase. It was deemed “intentional and excessive” by the MPD. Brooks also turned off his body worn camera and dash cam before the incident was complete.
Shannon was suspended twice for leaving his patrol car unlocked while apprehending suspects, allowing detainees to drive off in his cruiser which led to police chases. In a statement, the MPD says they “remain committed to transparency and accountability.”
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