RANKIN COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI – The American Civil Liberties Union of Mississippi, the ACLU, and local partners launched the Seven States Safety Campaign today, filing coordinated public records requests to uncover police misconduct in Rankin County, MS and six other states where the U.S. Department of Justice under former President Biden found police engaged in unconstitutional and racially discriminatory policing.
In addition to Rankin County, MS demands were filed over the last 24 hours in Tennessee, Massachusetts, New York, Arizona, Minnesota, and Kentucky – states where federal civil rights investigations and reports confirmed widespread patterns of police abuse. The Trump administration has pledged to halt federal oversight and has begun reversing course, including by attempting to rescind near-final agreements in Minneapolis and Louisville, leaving communities at risk of continued misconduct.
“There is no one, regardless of race or political party, who can justify the DOJ’s abrupt decision to no longer investigate and hold accountable the Rankin County Sheriff’s Department,” said Jarvis Dortch, executive director of the ACLU of Mississippi. “The Trump administration is essentially giving a green light to police abuse and unconstitutional policing. If the agency that allowed the goon squad to operate for years doesn’t warrant federal investigation, no law enforcement agency does.”
From 2021 to early 2025, the DOJ launched 11 “pattern or practice” investigations into local police departments. The DOJ also prosecuted Rankin County deputies known as the “Goon Squad” for federal criminal civil rights violations related to the violent assaults of two Black men, Michael Jenkins and Eddie Parker. In the seven that are the focus of this campaign, investigators found that police routinely used excessive force, targeted people of color, and violated constitutional rights as a matter of practice, or in the case of Rankin County Goon Squad, deputies admitted to egregious illegal policing. Despite these findings, the seven departments continue to operate without binding consent decrees in place to hold them accountable to address these documented civil rights abuses.
“The DOJ under Biden found police were wantonly assaulting people and that it wasn’t a problem of “bad apples” but of avoidable, department-wide failures,” said Jenn Rolnick Borchetta, deputy project director on policing at the ACLU. “By turning its back on police abuse, Trump’s DOJ is putting communities at risk, and the ACLU is stepping in because people are not safe when police can ignore their civil rights.”
The DOJ got guilty pleas from six Goon Squad officers including on charges of civil rights conspiracy, deprivation of rights under color of law, discharge of a firearm during a crime of violence, conspiracy to obstruct justice, and obstruction of justice. Based in part on these convictions, the DOJ opened a pattern and practice investigation into the Rankin County Sheriff’s Department in September of 2024; however, before that investigation could be completed, the Trump administration ceased the DOJ’s civil rights work. The Rankin County Sheriff’s conduct included:
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“In the pursuit of drug arrests, deputies of the Rankin County Sheriff’s Department shocked Robert Jones with a Taser in 2018 while he lay submerged in a flooded ditch, then rammed a stick down his throat until he vomited blood.” (https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/30/us/rankin-county-mississippi-sheriff....)
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“The six men, all of whom are White, called themselves the ‘Goon Squad.’ They tortured two Black men with stuns gun and sex toys, and subjected them to a mock execution over 90 minutes on Jan. 24, 2023 — a racist assault that reignited public calls for increased police accountability.” (https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2024/09/19/rankin-county-goon-squad-justice-department-investigation/)
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“Rankin County has always been notorious,’ says Garry Curro, one the Goon Squad’s many alleged victims. ‘They don’t follow the laws of the land. They make their own laws.’” (https://revealnews.org/podcast/mississippi-goon-squad-drug-crimes-torture/
The DOJ’s investigation into Rankin County was spurred by community demands following reports of racial profiling, excessive force and violation of civil rights. As the federal government retreats from oversight, communities are once again stepping up to demand transparency and justice, partnering with the ACLU in this campaign.
