Lexington, Mississippi, Black residents have come together to file a lawsuit against the town’s police department. Boasting a population of approximately 1,800 citizens, 86 percent of them African-American, the complaint alleges the community needs protection from local law enforcement.
On Tuesday, Aug. 16, JULIAN, the civil rights and legal advocacy organization, filed the lawsuit on behalf of five Black citizens in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi, a month after officials dismissed its police chief, according to Newsweek magazine.
Sam Dobbins, the former top cop, was caught on audio bragging about killing 13 people in the line of duty and repeatedly using the N-word when he described a person he claims to have shot 119 times.
The claim lists Dobbins, Henderson, the city of Lexington, and the Lexington Police Department as defendants, claiming they are responsible for members of the LPD violating their civil rights and “terrorizing” Black people as a whole.
The plaintiffs, made up of concerned citizens of color, are seeking compensatory and punitive damages to be determined at trial, believing an investigation into the force will prove the town’s police department has a history of racist behavior embedded in its culture.
“The culture of Lexington is corrupt,” the lawsuit declares.
“The city is in a sense under its own martial law with Black citizens held hostage to the police, afraid to even move,” it continues.
The only way to hold those wearing the badge accountable for prejudicial actions, the lawsuit alleges, is for outsiders to come in and comb through their records.
Lawyers representing the group note their clients have witnessed officers using “disproportionate and unnecessary force” against people of African descent. They further allege the officers have been known to make wrongful arrests and have retaliated against good cops who go against the brass and report misconduct.
The filing states Lexington Police Department allegedly “operates within a culture of corruption and lawlessness, daily and habitually subjecting Black citizens to targeting, harassment, and brutality, including violence, in violation of their constitutional rights.”
To make matters worse, Lexington is located in one of the state’s poorest counties – Holmes County, according to Mississippi Today. Poor and Black, the lawsuit claims the residents feel incredibly ill-prepared to counter the culture of police-involved tyranny.
According to the lawsuit, the citizens are afraid of the police, asking a judge to declare that the police department’s “policy, practice, and/or custom of targeting, threatening, coercing, assaulting, and harassing these Plaintiffs and other Black Lexington citizens” is a violation of the group’s the First, Fourth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution.
Attorneys have asked the court to issue a temporary restraining order against the police department and appoint a receiver to secure the safety of dozens believing as injunctions are implemented, their lives can be placed in danger.
In the past, the lawsuit states, when Black residents complained, “the constitutional violations have only worsened,” noting that over 200 Black residents feel as though they have been targeted after complaining, formally or informally, about the police. They allege they have not only been harassed but arrested or fined for trivial or baseless infractions.
Robert and Darius Harris, two of the plaintiffs, believe they have personally been targeted.
The brothers say cops came to them on New Year’s Eve and said they would arrest them for violating Lexington’s fireworks ordinance, according to the lawsuit. The Harrises alleged they told the officers to leave their homes and resisted the officers’ threats.
The two recorded the altercation on a cellphone. The lawsuit featured stills from the footage detailing the moves of the event. First, Robert Harris is seen raising his hand to ask the police to stand down. His brother, Darius Harris, is standing behind him.
Another still from the video, shows Darius Harris on the ground after being tasered by officers.
The next still shows cops, including Dobbins, shining a flashlight on Darius Harris, as they appear to be giving commands despite him being tased.
One last image shows Darius Harris getting arrested by the officers as he lay on the ground.
Michael Stewart, another plaintiff, says he was arrested after attending a meeting and protesting the treatment of the Harris brothers.
This “receiver” will be in place until officials appoint “a new, just” force of officers.
The old force was so toxic, the complaint stated, twenty-three officers have resigned since 2021, after “refusing to go along with the city’s culture of corruption.”
One former resident stated Dobbins, the disgraced chief, was directly responsible for much of the profiling.
“He made my and my son’s lives a living hell. He wrote me baseless tickets and made repeated excuses to arrest my son without a warrant. I had to get help to put my son in a safe place, so no harm came to him,” revealed Walden. “I had to move him out of state to keep him protected from Sam Dobbins and the police working with him.”
Jill Collen Jefferson, president and founder of JULIAN, said in a statement, “It’s both unconscionable and illegal for Lexington residents to be terrorized and live in fear of the police department whose job is to protect them.”
“We need both the courts and the Department of Justice to step in immediately.”
African-Americans in the town started the process of filing the lawsuit against the police department with Mayor Robin McCrory and the city’s Board of Aldermen in July 2021.
