A little Mississippi city and its cops department are being takenlegalactionagainst weeks after the authorities chief was fired after bragging about shooting and killing individuals in a racist and homophobic tirade.
Five Black Mississippians have submitted a federal suit requesting a limiting order versus the Lexington Police Department to avoid officers from infringing upon residents’ constitutional rights, according to a copy of the suit acquired by USA TODAY.
The suit, submitted by civil-rights law company JULIAN, is designated to stop law enforcement in Lexington from “threatening, persuading, pestering, attacking or interfering” with the city’s mostly Black population, the group stated. The match declares the department has a pattern and practice of utilizing extreme force, making incorrect arrests and strikingback versus officers who report misbehavior.
‘SERIOUS BREACH OF TRUST’: Mississippi authorities chief fired after dripped audio recorded racist tirade, him boasting about killing 13 individuals
Last month, cops chief Sam Dobbins was fired by the city’s board of alderman after he boasted, in a discussion with a previous officer that was privately tape-recorded, about shooting a Black male more than 100 times. The recording was released last month to the media by JULIAN, which is based in Jackson, Mississippi.
The fit names Dobbins and interim Chief Charles Henderson. Henderson and Lexington Mayor Robin McCrory did not instantly respond to a demand for remark. Dobbins was notable to be rightaway reached.
“We’re bringing this match since we’ve got to secure the Black people of Lexington,” Jill Collen Jefferson, president and creator of JULIAN, informed USA TODAY. “Their rights are being consistently broken. They’re being frightened, they’re being bothered, they’re being targeted, over and over and over onceagain. And it has not stopped with the shooting of that cops chief.”
JULIAN is likewise calling for a federal examination into “systemic, excused bigotry in both the authorities leave