Former Knoxville Officer Indicted for Abuse of Corpse

A former Knoxville Police Department officer, Shigeki Nagamoto, has been indicted on a single count of abuse of a corpse after a Tennessee Bureau of Investigation probe found he allegedly exposed and inappropriately touched part of a deceased woman’s body at a death scene in December 2024. The indictment followed Nagamoto turning himself in and being booked into the Knox County Jail on a $10,000 bond, with his resignation from KPD already in July during the investigation. Investigators began the TBI inquiry in June, and a Knox County Grand Jury subsequently charged Nagamoto with the abuse of a corpse, a Class E felony under Tennessee law. Nagamoto, 38, was employed by the Knoxville Police Department at the time of the incident and had been under administrative reassignment before his resignation. The charges and allegations are presented as accusations of criminal conduct, with Nagamoto presumed innocent until proven guilty in court.