Deputies accused of beating, sexually abusing Black men fired by Mississippi sheriff
Deputies accused of beating and sexually assaulting two Black men before shooting one of them in the mouth, prompting a federal civil rights investigation, have been fired, a Mississippi sheriff announced Tuesday.
The announcement comes months after Michael Corey Jenkins and his friend Eddie Terrell Parker said six deputies from the Rankin County Sheriff’s Department burst into a home without a warrant. The men said deputies beat them, assaulted them with a sex toy and shocked them repeatedly with Tasers in a roughly 90-minute period during the Jan. 24 episode, Jenkins and Parker said.
Attorneys representing Jenkins and Parker held a virtual press conference Wednesday and acknowledged the firings but said they would not be satisfied "until justice is done for these families." They're calling for criminal charges to be filed against the six law enforcement officers.
Jenkins said one of the deputies shoved a gun in his mouth and then fired the weapon, leaving him with serious injuries to his face, tongue, and jaw.
What happened to the officers involved?
Rankin County Sheriff Bryan Bailey announced Tuesday that deputies involved in the episode had been fired, but he would not provide the names of the deputies who had been terminated or say how many law enforcement officers were fired. Bailey would not answer additional questions about the January episode.
“Due to recent developments, including findings during our internal investigation, those deputies that were still employed by this department have all been terminated,” Bailey said at a news conference. “We understand that the alleged actions of these deputies has eroded the public’s trust department. Rest assured that we will work diligently to restore that trust.”
Bailey’s announcement also follows an Associated Press investigation that found several deputies who were involved with the episode were also linked to at least four violent encounters with Black men since 2019 that left two dead and another with lasting injuries. Deputies who had been accepted to the sheriff’s office’s Special Response Team — a tactical unit whose members receive advanced training — were involved in each of the four encounters.
What did the victims' attorneys say?
Malik Shabazz, an attorney for the two men in the January raid, said Wednesday that Bailey fired or accepted the resignations of five deputies.
"We affirm today that Brian Bailey has made an inch of progress, but under his leadership we've seen one of the worst occurrences of police brutality that sets the standard for police misconduct," Shabazz said.
Shabazz said Jenkins and Parker said they're angered that the names of the deputies were not publicly released and the identity and whereabouts of the sixth law enforcement officer involved are unknown.
He blamed Bailey for a “pattern of covering up.”
The mother of Michael Corey Jenkins, Mary Jenkins, said Wednesday that the unnamed, fired deputies should be prosecuted and barred from working for other law enforcement agencies.
"They are here to project and serve, but who is going to protect us from them?" Jenkins said. "They're unfit. They treated our children like they aren't even human."
Trent Walker, a Mississippi attorney representing the families, called on Bailey to release the names of all the deputies involved, including the sixth person he believes may have been working for another agency.
"If they were involved enough to be fired, there’s no reason to keep covering for them by failing to release their names," Walker said, accusing the deputies of launching a coverup with an inaccurate police report.
“They started covering up that night," he said, adding the department should have taken months to fire the deputies.
Deputies said the raid was prompted by a report of drug activity at the home. Police and court records obtained by the AP revealed the identities of two deputies at the Jenkins raid: Hunter Elward and Christian Dedmon. It was not immediately clear whether any of the deputies had attorneys who could comment on their behalf.
Craig Slay, the board attorney for the Rankin County Board of Supervisors, declined to comment on the firings.
One officer allegedly involved in death of Damien Cameron
A grand jury declined to charge Elward after the 2021 in-custody death of Damien Cameron. Cameron's family maintains deputies knelt on his back and neck for several minutes at the scene.
Elward and another deputy were the responding officers at the fatal 2019 shooting of Pierre Woods. In 2020, another Black man, Carvis Johnson, sued the department and accused Dedmon of placing a gun in his mouth during a drug bust in 2019.
Civil rights investigation launched into Rankin County Sheriff's Department
The Justice Department opened a civil rights investigation into the Rankin County Sheriff’s Department after the episode.
There is no body camera footage of the episode. Mississippi law does not require departments to use the body-worn devices. Records obtained by The AP show that Tasers used by the deputies were turned on, turned off or used dozens of times during a roughly 65-minute period before Jenkins was shot.
Jenkins and Parker have also filed a federal civil rights lawsuit and are seeking $400 million in damages.
Community activists weigh in
Marquell Bridges, leader of Mississippi-based nonprofit Building Bridges for Community Unity and Progress, said he's celebrating the firing of the officers involved. And he's hopeful charges and convictions will follow, particularly given the speed with which the federal government has gotten involved.
Bridges said he hopes Jenkins’ and Parker’s case will help bring justice to Cameron’s family and others who “haven’t gotten the attention that they deserve.”
“It's an epidemic,” he said. “It's just a corrupt system that we're fighting from top to bottom and the higher you go, the more corruption."
Contributing: The Associated Press
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Mississippi deputies accused of abusing Black men fired by sheriff
