Mississippi Sheriff Insists He Was Oblivious to His Drug Warriors' Long Pattern of Brutality

Years before a federal case shined a light on the problem, Rankin County Sheriff Bryan Bailey should have known something was amiss.

Last August, six former Mississippi police officers, including five former employees of the Rankin County Sheriff's Office (RCSO), admitted to punching, kicking, tasing, torturing, and humiliating two black men, Michael Jenkins and Eddie Parker, during an unlawful home invasion on January 24. The cops, who ostensibly were conducting a drug investigation, "tortured and inflicted unspeakable harm on their victims, egregiously violated the civil rights of citizens who they were supposed to protect, and shamefully betrayed the oath they swore as law enforcement officers," said Attorney General Merrick Garland. The officers "committed heinous and wanton acts of violence," said U.S. Attorney Darren J. LaMarca, thereby "violat[ing] their oaths," "disgracing the badge," and "becom[ing] the criminals they were sworn to protect us from."

Rankin County Sheriff Bryan Bailey also claimed to be shocked. "The badge worn by so many has been tarnished by the criminal acts of these few individuals," Bailey said at an August 3 press conference. "This is a perfect example of why people don't trust the police, and never in my life did I think it would happen in this department….I never, ever could imagine any of these five individuals [were] capable of these horrendous crimes….I'm just floored and shocked….These guys were so far past any boundary that I know of that it's unbelievable what they did….This was a bunch of criminals that did a home invasion."

But according to a joint investigation by The New York Times and Mississippi Today, Bailey, who has served as sheriff for 12 years and was reelected on November 7 after running unopposed, had plenty of reasons to think something like this would happen in his department. Similar things had been happening in Rankin County "for nearly two decades," the Times reports, and Bailey himself had repeatedly received complaints about them.

According to the Justice Department's description of the attack on Jenkins and Parker at their home in Braxton, the ex-cops admitted they had "kicked in the door" without a warrant or exigent circumstances. They handcuffed and arrested Jenkins and Parker "without probable cause to believe they had committed any crime." They "called them racial slurs" and "warned them to stay out of Rankin County." They "punched and kicked the men, tased them 17 times, forced them to ingest liquids, and assaulted them with a dildo." One of the officers, narcotics investigator Christian Dedmon, "fired his gun twice to intimidate the men."

Another officer, Deputy Hunter Elward, "surreptitiously removed a bullet from the chamber of his gun," shoved the gun into Jenkins' mouth, and "pulled the trigger." The gun "clicked but did not fire." Elward then "racked the slide, intending to dry-fire a second time." But this time "when Elward pulled the trigger, the gun discharged." The bullet "lacerated [Jenkins'] tongue, broke his jaw and exited out of his neck."

Instead of providing medical aid, the officers "gathered outside the home to devise a false cover story and took steps to corroborate it." They planted a gun on Jenkins, destroyed evidence, submitted "fraudulent drug evidence," filed false reports, charged Jenkins with "crimes he did not commit," made false statements to investigators, and pressured witnesses to corroborate their cover story.

The Justice Department noted that three of the defendants "admitted in court that they were members of 'The Goon Squad,' a group of RCSO officers who were known for using excessive force and not reporting it." Although "it's unclear when Rankin County deputies adopted their nickname," the Times says, last year "they ordered commemorative coins emblazoned with cartoonish gangsters and the words 'Lt. Middleton's Goon Squad.'" Lt. Jeffrey Middleton, their supervisor, was one of the five deputies who pleaded guilty on August 3 to a total of 16 federal felonies, including deprivation of rights under color of law, obstruction of justice, and firing a gun during a crime of violence. The defendants also included RCSO Chief Investigator Brett McAlpin. On August 14, the same deputies pleaded guilty to state charges, including aggravated assault and home invasion, stemming from the "horrendous crimes" that "shocked" Bailey.

At his August 3 press conference, Bailey complained that his deputies had lied to him about the attack on Jenkins and Parker. He said he had never heard of the "Goon Squad" until late July and had no inkling that his deputies were capable of such abuses. "Nobody's ever reported that to me," he said.

Bailey's claim of ignorance is hard to believe given the longstanding pattern of abuse described by the Times. "Narcotics detectives and patrol officers, some [of whom] called themselves the Goon Squad, barged into homes in the middle of the night, accusing people inside of dealing drugs," the paper reports. "Then they handcuffed or held them at gunpoint and tortured them into confessing or providing information, according to dozens of people who say they endured or witnessed the assaults."

Robert Jones, for example, said Bailey's deputies had tased him "while he lay submerged in a flooded ditch, then rammed a stick down his throat until he vomited blood." Mitchell Hobson said deputies had choked him with a lamp cord, "waterboarded him to simulate drowning," and beaten him "until the walls were spattered with his blood." Rick Loveday "said he was dragged half-naked from his bed at gunpoint, before deputies jabbed a flashlight threateningly at his buttocks and then pummeled him relentlessly."

The Times and Mississippi Today investigated "dozens of allegations" and "were able to corroborate 17 incidents involving 22 victims based on witness interviews, medical records, photographs of injuries and other documents." In those 17 cases, "accusers described similar tactics by deputies, almost always over small drug busts. Deputies held people down while punching and kicking them or shocked them repeatedly with Tasers. They shoved gun barrels into people's mouths. Three people said deputies had waterboarded them until they thought they would suffocate. Five said deputies had told them to move out of the county."

Although the case that drew national attention to police brutality in Rankin County involved two black victims, the Times notes that Bailey's deputies were equal-opportunity abusers. They "appear to have targeted people based on suspected drug use, not race," the paper says, noting that "most of their accusers were white."

Taser logs helped corroborate many of the allegations: "Electronically recorded dates and times of Taser triggers lined up with witness accounts and suggested that deputies repeatedly shocked people for longer than is considered safe." On at least 32 occasions during the last decade, the Times says, "Rankin deputies fired their Tasers more than five times in under an hour, activating them for at least 30 seconds in total—double the recommended limit. Experts in Taser use who reviewed the logs called these incidents highly suspicious."

Even without analyzing Taser logs, Bailey should have known something was amiss. "Many of those who said they experienced violence filed lawsuits or formal complaints, detailing their encounters with the department," the Times notes. "A few said they had contacted Sheriff Bailey directly, only to be ignored." McAlpin, one of the deputies involved in the torture of Jenkins and Parker, "was named in at least four lawsuits and six complaints going back to 2004." That did not stop Bailey from honoring McAlpin as investigator of the year in 2013. "I knew him well," Bailey told reporters in August, noting that McAlpin had been with the RCSO for two decades.

"Over the years," the Times reports, "more than a dozen people have directly confronted Sheriff Bailey and his command staff about the deputies' brutal methods, according to court records and interviews with accusers and their families. At least five people have sued the department alleging beatings, chokings and other abuses by deputies associated with the Goon Squad." The RCSO settled two of those cases, while two others "were dismissed over procedural errors by accusers representing themselves." According to one of the lawsuits that resulted in a settlement, McAlpin "kicked 19-year-old Brett Gerhart in the face and pressed a pistol to his temple in 2010 during a mistaken raid at the wrong address."

Despite all this, Bailey insists he had no reason to think his deputies were abusing their authority. "I'm gonna fix this," he promised in August. "I'm gonna make everyone a whole lot more accountable." Given his professed obliviousness, Bailey does not seem like the right man for that job. If he really believed in accountability, he would have the decency to resign. He refuses to do that. "The only thing I'm guilty of," he said, "is trusting grown men that swore an oath to do their job correctly." He added that "the people of Rankin County elected me to do a job," and "I'm gonna stay here."