Mississippi Today
Lexington drops charges in what civil attorney calls ‘an unjust arrest, fraudulent charges and a sham trial’
The city of Lexington has dropped all charges against civil rights attorney Jill Collen Jefferson, who has filed lawsuit against it and its police department for allegedly abusing its Black residents.
Months after Lexington police arrested her, Holmes County Justice Court Judge Marcus Fisher convicted Jefferson in a bench trial of the misdemeanor charges of resisting arrest, disorderly conduct, failure to comply and blocking a public roadway for filming a traffic stop.
She said the decision to drop those charges marks “the end of a challenging chapter characterized by an unjust arrest, fraudulent charges and a sham trial.”
In a statement, she said the experience “has unscored the critical importance of fighting against systemic injustice and advocating for accountability within our criminal justice system.”
Jefferson has filed two lawsuits on behalf of Black residents who accuse the Lexington police of mistreating them, and she complained about the force to the U.S. Department of Justice.
After her Jan. 31 trial, she claimed the outcome was unjust because the judge did not consider evidence presented during the trial, including an affidavit from a former Lexington police officer who had knowledge that Jefferson’s arrest was planned and targeted in response to her legal work.
Fisher had ordered her to pay $600 in fines, but with the charges dismissed, she will owe nothing.
About a week before Jefferson’s arrest, Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke came to Lexington to hear concerns from residents and Jefferson about the local police department.
In November 2023, the DOJ launched an investigation into the city and Lexington police.
Jefferson was arrested June 10, 2023, while filming a traffic stop from her car on a public street. An officer asked for her identification, which she gave. He instructed her to get out of out of the car, which she refused. The officer pulled her out and arrested her, said Michael Carr, her attorney.
Jefferson spent the weekend in the Holmes County jail. Her attorney had reached Police Chief Charles Henderson, who agreed to release her without bond, but she refused to pay a $35 processing fee because she said her arrest was unlawful and because people in Lexington can’t afford to pay the fee.
About a year earlier, the Mississippi Center for Investigative Reporting broke the story about then police Chief Sam Dobbins, who is white, bragging on an audio recording about killing 13 people in the line of duty, including how he shot one Black man 119 times.
A day later, the Lexington City Council fired Dobbins, and Henderson, who is Black, became chief. Jefferson and other residents said the harassment of Black residents has continued.
In response, Jefferson’s legal nonprofit, JULIAN, filed a lawsuit alleging unconstitutional treatment by Lexington police. Jefferson asked for a temporary restraining order, but afederal judge declined. The lawsuit is still active.
In January, JULIAN filed another suit in federal court against the police department and city for continued harassment of its Black residents. It includes over 20 plaintiffs and accounts from former Lexington officers.
Other attorneys and legal groups are also pursuing action against Lexington.
The ACLU of Mississippi filed a lawsuit in federal court against Lexington police and city officials in August 2023 on behalf of a former Jackson Public Schools resource officer over his unlawful arrest and jailing after attending a New Year’s Eve celebration.
Another civil rights attorney, Malik Shabazz, who is representing two Black men who were beaten by a group of Rankin County sheriff’s deputies and a local police officer in 2023, traveled to Lexington in August 2022 to call for an investigation into the Lexington police and charges for Dobbins.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
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This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
Hinds County loses fight over control of jail
The Hinds County sheriff and Board of Supervisors have lost an appeal to prevent control of its jail by a court-appointed receiver and an injunction that orders the county to address unconstitutional conditions in the facility.
Two members from a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with decisions by U.S. District Judge Carlton Reeves to appoint a receiver to oversee day-to-day jail operations and keep parts of a previous consent decree in place to fix constitutional violations, including a failure to protect detainees from harm.
However, the appeals court called the new injunction “overly broad” in one area and is asking Reeves to reevaluate the scope of the receivership.
The injunction retained provisions relating to sexual assault, but the appeals court found the provisions were tied to general risk of violence at the jail, rather than specific concerns about the Prison Rape Elimination Act. The court reversed those points of the injunction and remanded them to the district court so the provisions can be removed.
The court also found that the receiver should not have authority over budgeting and staff salaries for the Raymond Detention Center, which could be seen as “federal intrusion into RDC’s budget” – especially if the receivership has no end date.
Hinds County Board of Supervisors President Robert Graham was not immediately available for comment Friday. Sheriff Tyree Jones declined to comment because he has not yet read the entire court opinion.
In 2016, the Department of Justice sued Hinds County alleging a pattern or practice of unconstitutional conditions in four of its detention facilities. The county and DOJ entered a consent decree with stipulated changes to make for the jail system, which holds people facing trial.
“But the decree did not resolve the dispute; to the contrary, a yearslong battle ensued in the district court as to whether and to what extent the County was complying with the consent decree,” the appeals court wrote.
This prompted Reeves to hold the county in contempt of court twice in 2022.
The county argued it was doing its best to comply with the consent decree and spending millions to fix the jail. One of the solutions they offered was building a new jail, which is now under construction in Jackson.
The county had a chance to further prove itself during three weeks of hearings held in February 2022. Focuses included the death of seven detainees in 2021 from assaults and suicide and issues with staffing, contraband, old infrastructure and use of force.
Seeing partial compliance by the county, in April 2022 Reeves dismissed the consent decree and issued a new, shorter injunction focused on the jail and removed some provisions from the decree.
But Reeves didn’t see improvement from there. In July 2022, he ordered receivership and wrote that it was needed because of an ongoing risk of unconstitutional harm to jail detainees and staff.
The county pushed back against federal oversight and filed an appeal, arguing that there isn’t sufficient evidence to show that there are current and ongoing constitutional violations at the jail and that the county has acted with deliberate indifference.
Days before the appointed receiver was set to take control of the jail at the beginning of 2023, the 5th Circuit Court ordered a stay to halt that receiver’s work. The new injunction ordered by Reeves was also stayed, and a three-person jail monitoring team that had been in place for years also was ordered to stop work.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
2 out of 5 child care teachers make so little they need public assistance tosupport their families
This story about child care wages was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit,
independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for the Hechinger’s early childhood newsletter.
Caring for children during their first few years is a complex and critical job: A child’s
brain develops more in the first five years than at any other point in life. Yet in America,
individuals engaged in this crucial role are paid less than animal caretakers and
dressing room attendants.
That’s a major finding of one of two new reports on the dismal treatment of child care
workers. Together, the reports offer a distressing picture of how child care staff are
faring economically, including the troubling changes low wages have caused to the
workforce.
Early childhood workers nationally earn a median wage of $13.07 per hour, resulting in
poverty-level earnings for 13 percent of such educators, according to the first report, the
Early Childhood Workforce Index 2024. Released earlier this month by the Center for
the Study of Child Care Employment at the University of California, Berkeley, the annual
report also found:
? 43 percent of families of early educators rely on public assistance like
food stamps and Medicaid.
? Pay inequity exists within these low wages: Black early childhood
educators earn about $8,000 less per year than their white peers. The
same pay gap exists between early educators who work with infants and
toddlers and those who work with preschoolers, who have more
opportunities to work in school districts that pay higher wages.
? Wages for early educators are rising more slowly than wages in other
industries, including fast food and retail.
In part due to these conditions, the industry is losing some of its highest-educated
workers, according to a second new report, by Chris M. Herbst, a professor at Arizona
State University’s School of Public Affairs. That study compares the pay of child care
workers with that of workers in other lower-income professions, including cooks and
retail workers; it finds child care workers are the tenth lowest-paid occupation out of
around 750 in the economy. The report also looks at the ‘relative quality’ of child care
staff, as defined by math and literacy scores and education level. Higher-educated
workers, Herbst suggests, are being siphoned off by higher-paying jobs.
That’s led to a “bit of a death spiral” in terms of how child care work is perceived, and
contributes to the persistent low wages, he said in an interview. Some additional
findings from Herbst’s study:
? Higher-educated women increasingly find employment in the child care
industry to be less attractive. The share of workers in the child care
industry with a bachelor’s degree barely budged over the past few
decades, increasing by only 0.3 percent. In contrast, the share of those in
the industry who have 12 years of schooling but no high school degree,
quadrupled.
? Median numeracy and literacy scores for female child care workers
(who are the majority of the industry staff) fall at the 35 th and 36 th
percentiles respectively, compared to all female workers. Improving these
scores is important, Herbst says, considering the importance of education
in the early years, when children experience rapid brain development.
This doesn’t mean child care staff with lower education levels can’t be good early
educators. Patience, communication skills and a commitment to working with young
children also matter greatly, Herbst writes. However, higher education levels may mean
staff have a stronger background not only in English and math but also in topics like
behavior modification and special education, which are sometimes left out of
certification programs for child care teachers.
You can read Herbst’s full report here, and the 2024 workforce index here.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
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