Police Abuse

C.J. Ciaramella | 9.27.2024 1:17 PM

A Justice Department investigation concluded that a small Mississippi town piled more than $1.7 million in fines on its residents and then jailed them in an unconstitutional debtor's prison when they couldn't pay up.

The Justice Department's Civil Rights Division released a report Thursday detailing a litany of alleged constitutional violations by the 10-member police department of Lexington, Mississippi, a majority-black town of about 1,200 people. Justice Department investigators found that Lexington police violated residents' rights at every stage: engaging in illegal traffic stops and searches, unconstitutionally jailing residents for unpaid fines and "investigative holds," and retaliating against anyone who criticized them. That's in addition to racial discrimination and numerous reports of sexual harassment by officers. The report concludes that a complete lack of leadership and oversight has "created a system where officers can relentlessly violate the law."

"Lexington has turned the jail into the kinds of debtors' prisons Charles Dickens described in his novels written in the 1800s," U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Mississippi Todd Gee said in a press conference announcing the report's findings. "Only this is happening in Mississippi in 2024."

The Justice Department opened an investigation into Lexington in November of 2023, a year after the former Lexington police chief........

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