A Justice Division investigation concluded {that a} small Mississippi city piled greater than $1.7 million in fines on its residents after which jailed them in an unconstitutional debtor’s jail once they could not pay up.
The Justice Division’s Civil Rights Division launched a report Thursday detailing a litany of alleged constitutional violations by the 10-member police division of Lexington, Mississippi, a majority-black city of about 1,200 folks. Justice Division investigators discovered that Lexington police violated residents’ rights at each stage: partaking in unlawful site visitors stops and searches, unconstitutionally jailing residents for unpaid fines and “investigative holds,” and retaliating in opposition to anybody who criticized them. That is along with racial discrimination and quite a few reviews of sexual harassment by officers. The report concludes {that a} full lack of management and oversight has “created a system the place officers can relentlessly violate the regulation.”
“Lexington has turned the jail into the sorts of debtors’ prisons Charles Dickens described in his novels written within the 1800s,” U.S. Lawyer for the Southern District of Mississippi Todd Gee mentioned in a press convention saying the report’s findings. “Solely that is occurring in Mississippi in 2024.”
The Justice Division opened an investigation into Lexington in November of 2023, a yr after the previous Lexington police chief resigned as a result of he was secretly recorded utilizing racist slurs and bragging about killing 13 folks. The Justice Division report notes that, on the identical day the division opened the investigation, “LPD officers chased a person accused solely of disturbing a enterprise and tased him 9 instances.”
In 2022, the Lexington Police Division adopted an expansive arrest coverage for low-level and noncriminal conduct. It paired this with aggressive debt assortment practices that jailed residents for unpaid fines, whether or not or not they might afford to pay.
“Over the previous two years, LPD has made almost one arrest for each 4 folks on the town, primarily for low-level offenses and site visitors violations,” the report says. “That’s greater than 10 instances the per capita arrest fee for Mississippi as a complete. Many of those arrests have been for non-criminal conduct, like owing excellent fines and utilizing profanity.”
Justice Division investigators discovered that Lexington adopted the arrest coverage, its income from fines elevated from $30,000 per yr to over $240,000, roughly 1 / 4 of the police division’s funds. The Lexington municipal courtroom is funded by way of the police funds, together with the choose’s wage. Over the identical interval, the quantity of fines owed by Lexington residents ballooned to greater than $1.7 million.
Lexington police have arrested 20 folks since 2022 underneath a 1963 metropolis ordinance that prohibits cursing at or ridiculing law enforcement officials, even though profanity is firmly protected by the First Modification.
These arrests are sometimes paired with extreme drive.
“When making low-level arrests, LPD makes use of techniques usually reserved for critical offenses,” the report says. “For instance, LPD officers broke down a Black man’s door to arrest him for swearing at a public official,” the Justice Division report says. “In one other case, whereas trying to arrest a person for having a tinted windshield, officers adopted the person’s automotive to his home, compelled their means into his dwelling, and tased him for 15 seconds.”
The Justice Division additionally discovered LPD officers inflated or created bogus fees to gather extra fines and illegally held folks in jail with out possible trigger for “investigative holds.” As soon as in jail, the division refused to launch folks till they paid off outdated fines, along with a $50 “processing charge,” no matter whether or not they may afford to. Holmes County, which incorporates Lexington, is without doubt one of the poorest counties in Mississippi.
Those that complained, criticized, and even tried to doc the Lexington police confronted unlawful retaliation. The report notes a highly publicized incident final yr when LPD officers arrested a civil rights legal professional for filming a site visitors cease.
“I wrote extra tickets for that lawyer the opposite evening; that is as a result of she had diarrhea of the mouth, y’all,” the arresting officer mentioned the following day, in response to the Justice Division report. “Did not know when to close up.”
In one other occasion, Lexington officers jailed a girl for alleged unpaid fines after she posted a touch upon Fb criticizing a site visitors cease. “Physique-worn digicam footage exhibits that, after handcuffing the lady an LPD supervisor mentioned, ‘Let’s have a look at if she gon’ put that one on Fb.'”
“The officers fist bumped,” the report says. “The girl, who was pregnant on the time, was jailed for 5 days with out entry to courtroom.”
The Lexington investigation is the newest by the Justice Division detailing widespread civil rights violations by police departments.
In June, the Justice Division launched the findings of the same “sample or follow” probe within the Phoenix Police Division. Investigators documented incidents the place Phoenix police fabricated incident reviews, needlessly used bodily drive and harmful restraints, illegally detained homeless folks and destroyed their property, delayed medical assist to wounded suspects, and assaulted folks for criticizing or filming them.
Final yr the Justice Division additionally launched reviews on pervasive civil rights violations by police in Minneapolis and Louisville.
These are main police departments, although. The Lexington report is notable as a result of it’s the kind of small speed-trap city that often escapes scrutiny. In 2022, the tiny city of Brookside, Alabama, turned a nationwide information story when the Birmingham Information reported that its mayor and police chief have been utilizing wildly extreme fines and forfeitures to bankroll its authorities.
The Lexington Police Division declined to touch upon the report.
