Earve Mathis sat bundled up with his two young children on the hood of a sedan as this year’s Raleigh Christmas Parade proceeded down Austin Peay Highway.

Mathis works as a supervisor for Memphis Allies, a gun violence intervention program. He’s also open about his criminal past.

“I used to gang bang, I used to sling ‘caine, raise h---, I even went to jail,” Mathis said. “I made a decision for my family that I want to live and be more positive in the community, and I did that.”

When asked at the Dec. 13 Christmas parade about his perceptions on the Memphis Safe Task Force, Mathis said he feels “up and down.” He’s thankful for the work but doesn’t think it should last forever.

“I know why they’re here, but for me, I just hope the city can understand it’s our problem and it’s going to take us to solve it,” Mathis said. “But I’m definitely glad for a handout to help encourage all coming together to solve this gun violence problem in Memphis.”

View Gallery

The Daily Memphian spoke with people across the city to gauge their opinions on the Memphis Safe Task Force. Keep reading for the full quotes and thoughts from the Mid-Southerners our reporters interviewed. 

The Task Force officially launched in Memphis on Sept. 29. Since then, it’s been the subject of attention and controversy, both lauded and reviled.

It’s crowded the court dockets and caused an already swollen jail population to grow even larger. It’s helped to reduce crime, or at least accelerate a trend line that was already declining. It’s done that while being criticized for its heavy-handed approach, relying on pretextual traffic stops that some say disproportionally target Black and Latino people for nonviolent offenses. Fear has surged in the Latino community particularly; immigration-related arrests total more than 650 and make up about 17% of the Task Force’s total.

It’s boosted expired tag renewals. It’s prompted more traffic pursuits. It’s brought hundreds of federal law enforcement and state National Guard personnel to Memphis and cost taxpayers millions.

It’s seized hundreds of guns. It’s made thousands of arrests and hundreds of federal indictments. It’s caused both boycotts and support campaigns at local restaurants. 

It’s led to legal infighting among the community’s elected officials; a lawsuit challenging Gov. Bill Lee’s authority to deploy the Tennessee National Guard to Memphis as part of the Task Force is set to be heard by the state Appeals Court in March.

And inside all of those daily headlines about the Task Force’s impact are the personal feelings of each Memphian.

What do the people living in Memphis think about the federal-state-local law enforcement surge? The Daily Memphian recently set out to capture a snapshot of those sentiments, asking people about their perceptions and whether the MSTF has affected crime in their neighborhoods.

Here are some of their thoughts.

Many — but not all — in Klondike see MSTF as positive

Ellanor Mays watched the annual Klondike-Smokey City Christmas Parade line up Dec. 13 from the wheelchair ramp attached to her front porch at Ayers Street and Vollintine Avenue.

“Merry Christmas, babies,” she said to a group of steppers watching her and to the women who were lining them up as they adjusted headbands and practiced steps.

Mays took a break from caring for her son, who is in hospice care inside her home.

She says the presence of the Memphis Safe Task Force in the area has made a difference. Mays describes the area as being “more serene.”

Before Task Force, there was Operation Viper — and nearly 500 arrests

“It has stopped a lot of stuff because they were shooting guns around here all the time,” she said. “They ain’t doing that now. At first, I thought it wasn’t going to be alright. But it’s OK. It seems to be better to me.”

A few feet away on the other side of Vollintine Avenue, Donna Griffin of Orange Mound was decked out head to toe in Christmas gear with a multi-colored sweater, red and green knit cap and bright red sneakers. 

Griffin was skeptical that the Task Force has had any effect on crime. 

“I don’t see anything that they are doing,” she said as she waved to people she knew in the parade. “I don’t see where it’s working.” 

Brenda Shotwell, who was in one of the cars in the lineup, agreed with Griffin on the effectiveness, even if she was thankful for the law enforcement presence. Memphis Police Department officers and Tennessee Highway Patrol troopers were working parade duty by the community center that chilly Saturday morning.

Task Force officers arrested a murder suspect. The Daily Memphian was along for the ride.

“They are just walking around,” Shotwell said of the Task Force. “I’m glad they have the police here and the state troopers and whatever they have.”

Shotwell lives in Frayser and says she hasn’t experienced problems with crime herself.

“But I see problems people have from break-ins and everything,” she said. “They need to get more police officers and get more people involved in what is going on in our city.”

Lopaka Thomas says the park at Dave Wells Community Center is showing signs of life with what he describes as a heavy Task Force presence in the surrounding neighborhood “from morning to night.”

“They round up a lot of people that don’t deserve to be out here,” Thomas said. “Not wishing to see somebody locked up, but now you can see the area. People are out and showing themselves. 

“Kids can move around now. People can come out and sit on their front porch. Things happen, but it’s gotten a whole lot better.”

11 face federal charges after interactions with Task Force officers

Asked what should come next after the Task Force leaves, he said, “I think the police should stay tightened up and do what they’ve got to do.”

Markkiah Bramlett stood with her daughter, a cheerleader at KIPP Academy, during the Klondike-Smokey City Christmas Parade.

They came to the parade from their home in Raleigh, where crime has been a problem and the MSTF has been a visible presence.

“It’s been pretty decent, I’d say,” Bramlett said. “What they are doing now has been great. They need to keep on doing what they are doing now.”

‘I’ve definitely seen a decrease in crime. I think that’s because of the Task Force’

The Beale Street Christmas Parade, also on Dec. 13, saw clusters of Tennessee National Guard troops, along with law enforcement agencies from the MSTF, including the FBI.

Memphians and tourists were mixed in the crowd with those who came specifically for the parade and those who had been at FedExForum earlier in the day for the University of Memphis commencement ceremonies.

Among the newly minted graduates watching the parade was Thomas McDaniel, a teacher at Westside Middle School who earned his master’s degree in education and was still wearing his graduation robe. McDaniel’s personal experience with crime makes him particularly ardent about the issue.

Pam Bondi, Bill Lee tout crime decline 56 days into Memphis Safe Task Force

“The city needs to step up their game. I’ve been a victim of violent crime,” he said. “I’m a school teacher. I’ve been shot outside the school, and they still haven’t found out who did it.”

McDaniel, a football coach and a social sciences teacher at Westside Middle, was shot and wounded Sept. 19, 2024, as he was driving a group of students home from practice. It began as a drive-by shooting. One of the suspects got out of a car and fired at McDaniel’s car, which was still carrying his players, at the intersection of Frayser Boulevard and Dawn Drive on the northern edge of Westside’s campus.

He has seen the Task Force working in the neighborhood around the school, at 3389 Dawn Drive, after school hours.

“We need an increase in police presence in a lot of parts of our community, especially Frayser,” McDaniel said. “It’s there. We hear gunshots after school, sometimes walking kids to the crosswalk.”

Dr. Vera McGhee and Andrey Axila say they are relatively isolated from the MSTF impact.

“We live on Mud Island. For us, nothing much changed,” McGhee said. 

Task Force has made nearly 3K arrests since it began

Axila likens his experience to being “in a bubble.”

“I feel safer on the highway because people are not speeding as much,” he said.

McGhee says after the Task Force, the emphasis should be on something other than a continued high visibility for law enforcement.

“I am more liberal leaning,” she said. “So, I am always looking for more resources to assistance programs and counseling, community outreach, rather than use of force. That’s probably where we should be allocating our resources.”

Blake Walker, who also attended the Beale Street parade, delivers food for DoorDash at night.

“I’ve been seeing a positive change and everything going in the right direction, a lot less shootings, a lot less physical violence,” he said, attributing the difference specifically to the Memphis Safe Task Force.

“I think (MSTF) has a definite effect on the city, especially in the late-night hours — a lot less crime around those times,” Walker said. “I’ve definitely seen a decrease in crime. I think that’s because of the Task Force.”

Is Shelby County’s cash crunch really about the Task Force?

After the MSTF leaves, Walker said it’s up to local enforcement to sustain the momentum, although he doesn’t think that’s exclusively about boots on the street.

“I think we keep the momentum up, the local law enforcement community as well,” he said. “Just keep the momentum going — the peace going — keep the city occupied with events like this.”

Raleigh couple decries Task Force’s immigration enforcement component

Hundreds of people lined the stretch of Austin Peay Highway near the Raleigh Library and adjacent Memphis Police Department precinct. Parents held on to little ones and filmed the Dec. 13 Raleigh Christmas Parade procession as it moved down the street. Older children chased each other around groups of people and collected candy thrown by those in the procession. 

Marie and Tony Isbell have lived a few blocks down for nearly four decades. The married white couple hasn’t seen much crime throughout that time, aside from their home being broken into more than 20 years ago. 

They aren’t fond of the Task Force, particularly the National Guard and the immigration-enforcement component of the operation.

“We could hire people in Memphis and put a uniform on them and say, ‘If you see a crime, call the police,’” Marie Isbell said of the National Guard in Memphis. Around 15 guardsmen were spaced out down the street on either side during the parade. 

National Guard deployment has already cost millions

Her husband cut in, making his stance even clearer: 

“The National Guard shouldn’t be here. It’s stupid. It’s just (President Donald) Trump trying to show his power to set up an authoritarian regime,” Tony Isbell said. 

Marie Isbell doesn’t believe the rhetoric that the Task Force is only focused on violent offenders who are also undocumented.

“Although I understand people should come here legally, I don’t agree how the president says, ‘We’re going to take out the criminals’ and all that. It doesn’t appear that’s happening,” she said. “They’re just taking out any random person that happens to walk by at the wrong time,” she said. 

Few Hispanic families attended last week’s parades, all three of which featured a large law enforcement presence of both THP troopers and MPD officers. State troopers have often been seen riding in caravans with agents from Homeland Security Investigations, which have been carrying out much of the immigration enforcement work in the city as part of the Task Force. Community organizers say that many members of the local Latino community are afraid to leave their homes as enforcement has ramped up.

Shureca Taylor attended the Raleigh parade with her young child. She said she recently moved to the area from Frayser.

Memphis Safe Task Force has seized more than 400 illegal guns. But, what is an illegal gun in Tennessee?

There was a lot more “going on” in Frayser, in terms of crime, compared to Raleigh, she said, particularly at night. 

She hasn’t had much interaction with the Task Force outside of seeing an increased Tennessee Highway Patrol presence on the expressway. Ultimately, she’s happy the MSTF is here.

“I don’t mind it. I don’t do much anyway. I feel like it’s helping,” she said.

Back on Beale

National Guard personnel patrol Beale Street, where Cameron Salter performs as a musician. Back in October, after the Task Force began, Salter and a friend agreed that they’d heard fewer shootouts. But they found themselves in the middle of Memphians with opposing positions on whether the surge in law enforcement would be good or bad for the city. 

In a recent follow-up interview, Salter said he’d expected something like a dictatorship.

Task Force agents have made hundreds of immigration arrests in Memphis. Here’s what happened at one.

His experience with the National Guard has been the opposite, he said.

“I’ve talked to some of the National Guard (personnel). They’re completely respectful. At the end of the day, I know why they’re down here, just do their job,” said Salter, who is Black and in his early 20s. 

But, he said, he’s concerned that their presence on the cobblestoned streets — outside the bars where he’s singing or playing piano, drums or bass guitar — could be deterring visitors. Beale Street experiences seasonal slumps, Salter said in a recent interview, but the street has been more desolate this winter than usual. 

He doesn’t blame the National Guard, but believes their patrols could be a “red flag” that signals Beale Street isn’t a safe place. 

“So as a result, Beale Street has been dying,” Salter said. “That’s not the only reason, but that is a huge reason.”

“It’s like almost the pandemic started all over again,” he said later. 

Hundreds of jail inmates will be moved to combat overcrowding, sheriff says

Back in October, Salter’s friend Marrik Flowers, another musician, went through similar pros and cons of the Task Force. Gunshots rang out less often in Flowers’ Frayser neighborhood, and people drove slower at an intersection where crashes happened often, he said. 

But the operation also was costing him money: Tags for his new truck had yet to arrive in the mail, so Flowers, also a Black man, was paying for Uber rides to work to avoid being pulled over for driving with expired tags, he said at the time.

Salter said recently that he and Flowers know people who fall on either side of support or disdain for the Task Force. 

Motivated by the MSTF presence, two people he knows turned themselves in on outstanding warrants, Salter said. While crime has dissipated in some ways, it’s not gone completely, Salter said. 

“I do feel like they shouldn’t be here for too much longer,” Salter said recently. “I feel like we got the message on how to conduct ourselves.”

What happens after the Task Force leaves?

When will it end?

When asked Dec. 16, Memphis Police Chief C.J. Davis did not give a timeline for when the National Guard would depart. 

Chad Hunt, the Task Force’s operation commander, told The Daily Memphian on Nov. 26 that there had been some internal talks about continuing the efforts long-term through local law enforcement. But an end date or wind-down efforts had not been discussed as of last month. 

The U.S. Department of Justice and Gov. Bill Lee have also not publicly given a timeline for the Task Force.

In the meantime, for the people of Memphis — those who were here well before Sept. 29 and those who will be here years after — the surge of law enforcement resources has subsided. Mathis, the father and Memphis Allies supervisor, offered some guidance:

“Obviously, if people can come together and we realize we can talk our problems out, find common ground and love this city, I think we can be better.”