Feds charge 6 Rankin County, MS, deputies in torture of two Black men – National & International News – THU 3Aug2023

Six Rankin County, MS, deputies federally charged in torture of two Black men.

Six months after OH trail derailment, no action from Congress.

Threats of war in Africa after Niger coup.

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NATIONAL NEWS

Six Rankin County, MS, deputies federally charged in torture of two Black men

The Department of Justice has announced charges against six Rankin County Sheriff’s deputies who allegedly tortured two Black men in a Braxton, MS, home for hours. The incident occurred on January 24. The six deputies, all of whom are white, went to the home of one of the men in the wee hours on the pretext of a drugs investigation. A federal civil rights lawsuit filed in by the two victims, Michael Jenkins and Eddie Parker, claims that the six deputies repeatedly tased them, forced them to strip and shower together, and attempted to use a sex toy on them. The assault culminated in one of the deputies, named in the indictment as Hunter Elward, shooting Michael Jenkins in the mouth.

The indictment names Elward and four fellow former Rankin County deputies Brett McAlpin, Jeffrey Middleton, Christian Dedmon, Daniel Opdyke, as well as Richland, MS, police officer Joshua Hartfield, who was off-duty at the time of the incident.

All six face charges of  conspiracy against rights, deprivation of rights under color of law, conspiracy to obstruct justice and obstruction of justice. Elward faces an additional charge of discharging a firearm during a crime of violence. 

Justice long deferred

According to indictment, the six men “called themselves ‘The Goon Squad’ because of their willingness to use excessive force and not to report it”.

It was only in June, six months after the assault took place, that the Rankin County Sheriff’s Department announced that all 5 of their implicated deputies had either been fired or resigned. Richland Police announced Hartfield’s resignation shortly thereafter.

To date, none of the deputies have faced any state charges. The office of Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch has only said the matter remains “under investigation”.

This is not the only incident in which these officers are accused of violence against Black men. Two other men have come forward saying one of the deputies put his gun in their mouth, injuring one when he fired the weapon. Two encounters proved fatal, including in one instance where a deputy knelt on a man’s neck while he pleaded he couldn’t breathe.

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Six months after OH trail derailment, no action from Congress

In February when a train carrying dangerous toxins derailed and upended life for residents of East Palestine, OH, there was a weeks-long furor both among members of the public and members of Congress in both parties. Since that incident, there have been over 60 other high-profile derailments, according to Transportation Trades Department, a coalition of rail workers’ unions. Many of those derailments also took place in Ohio and Pennsylvania, both of which were impacted by the East Palestine derailment near the Pennsylvania border.

Despite this outcry, there has been no real movement in Congress to do anything about rail safety. Shortly after the derailment, Ohio senators Sherrod Brown, a Democrat, and J.D. Vance, a Republican, proposed the Railway Safety Act of 2023. The bill would increase monitoring and require rail companies to update Civil War-era brakes on some trains. However, experts and safety advocates say the RSA doesn’t go far enough and wouldn’t have prevented the East Palestine derailment. But most Republicans in Congress have refused to back even this middling bill.

In comments directed at his fellow Republicans, Vance observed that, “These rail lines pass frequently through Republican areas, small towns with a lot of Republican voters. How can we look them in the eye and say, we’re doing a good job by you? If we choose the railroads over their own interests, we can’t.”

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INTERNATIONAL NEWS

Threats of continental war in Africa after Niger coup

Last week, a military junta deposed Mohamed Bazoum, the elected leader of Niger in West Africa. Up to then, Niger had been a major security partner for the US in the volatile Sahel region. But two of Niger’s Sahel neighbors, Mali and Burkina Faso, have also come under the control of military juntas, which are now more aligned with Russia. In fact, following the Niger coup, a social media channel linked to the Russian mercenary group Wagner shared a message, purportedly from its leader Yevgeny Prigozhin, lauding the coup and describing as a blow against colonialism in Africa.

But France, Niger’s one-time colonizers, were quick not only to condemn the junta, but to cease all aid to Niger unless and until Bazoum was returned to power. This led to violent protests outside the French embassy in Niamey, Niger’s capital.

On Sunday, Ecowas, a union of Western-aligned West African countries, imposed a 7-day deadline for the return to democracy in Niger, threatening military action against if this didn’t happen. Mali and Burkina Faso responded by warning that if Ecowas invaded Niger, they would treat it as an attack on their own territories.