The US Division of Justice has opened a civil rights investigation right into a Mississippi sheriff’s division whose officers tortured two Black males in a racist assault that included beatings, repeated use of stun weapons and assaults with a intercourse toy earlier than one of many victims was shot within the mouth, officers mentioned Thursday.
The justice division will examine whether or not the Rankin county sheriff’s division has engaged in a sample or follow of extreme power and illegal stops, searches and arrests, and whether or not it has used racially discriminatory policing practices, based on assistant legal professional common Kristen Clarke.
5 Rankin sheriff’s deputies pleaded responsible in 2023 to breaking into a house with out a warrant and fascinating in an hours-long assault on Michael Corey Jenkins and Eddie Terrell Parker. A sixth officer, from the Richland police division, was additionally convicted within the assault.
A number of the officers have been a part of a bunch so prepared to make use of extreme power they known as themselves the “Goon Squad”. All six have been sentenced in March, receiving phrases of 10 to 40 years.
The costs adopted an Related Press investigation in March 2023 that linked a few of the officers to not less than 4 violent encounters since 2019 that left two Black males useless.
“The issues concerning the Rankin county sheriff’s division didn’t finish with the demise of the Goon Squad,” Clarke mentioned Thursday, including that the justice division has obtained details about different troubling incidents.
The assaults on Jenkins and Parker started on 24 January 2023 with a racist name for extrajudicial violence, based on federal prosecutors. A white particular person phoned Brett McAlpin, the sheriff’s deputy, and complained that two Black males have been staying with a white lady at a home in Braxton.
As soon as inside the house, the officers handcuffed Jenkins and Parker and poured milk, alcohol and chocolate syrup over their faces whereas mocking them with racial slurs. They compelled them to strip bare and bathe collectively to hide the mess. They mocked the victims with racial slurs and assaulted them with intercourse objects.
Along with McAlpin, the others convicted have been the previous deputies Christian Dedmon, Hunter Elward, Jeffrey Middleton, Daniel Opdyke and the previous Richland police officer Joshua Hartfield.
“The depravity of the crimes dedicated by these defendants can’t be overstated,” Merrick Garland, US legal professional common, mentioned after the sentencing.
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