Johnny Hurley, 78, a Black man, was found badly beaten on the morning of October 27, 2013, in and around Glenview Park on South Barksdale Street in Memphis, Tennessee. Police were dispatched to the park for an injured-person call and arrived to discover him on the ground, bleeding heavily from injuries to his head and face. He was rushed to Regional One Hospital in critical condition, beginning what became a long, uncertain stretch in which the beating’s damage lingered far beyond the first
frantic hours.
In the months that followed, the violence of that morning never truly let go. Those close to him described how he briefly regained consciousness but was not himself afterward, as if the assault had taken away more than physical strength. The ordeal strained the family in every direction, with daily life reshaped by hospital time, recovery setbacks, and the grinding costs that come when a loved one survives an attack but cannot return to who they were before it.
On March 21, 2014, the struggle ended. The medical examiner concluded that Hurley died as a result of the injuries from the Glenview Park assault, and the death was ruled a homicide. His passing was later memorialized publicly in Memphis, marking the close of nearly five months in which an attack in a neighborhood park became a slow-moving tragedy.
Investigators treated the beating as a robbery-driven attack, and the case eventually focused on a juvenile suspect. Authorities identified 15-year-old Alzavious Turner as the person charged in connection with Hurley’s death, accusing him of first-degree murder in the perpetration of a robbery. Public reporting has described the charge as tied to the belief that Hurley was assaulted during an attempted robbery in the park.
