JACKSON, Miss. (WJTV) – One of the six former law enforcement officers who pled guilty to a long list of state and federal charges for torturing two Black men has filed an appeal.
Attorney Aafram Sellers said Brett McAlpin’s notice of appeal was filed on April 15 for his sentencing on federal charges.
McAlpin, a former Rankin County deputy, was sentenced to 27.25 years in prison by U.S. District Judge Tom Lee on March 21, 2024. He was sentenced to 15 years in prison on state charges on April 10, 2024.
The victims of the so-called “Goon Squad,” Michael Corey Jenkins and Eddie Terrell Parker, were subjected to numerous acts of racially motivated, violent torture last year.
In January 2023, the group of six burst into a Rankin County home without a warrant and assaulted Jenkins and Parker with stun guns, a sex toy and other objects. Hunter Elward admitted to shoving a gun into Jenkins’ mouth and firing in a “mock execution” that went awry.
The terror began on Jan. 24, 2023, with a racist call for extrajudicial violence when a white person phoned McAlpin and complained that two Black men were staying with a white woman at a house in Braxton. McAlpin told Deputy Christian Dedmon, who texted a group of white deputies so willing to use excessive force they called themselves “The Goon Squad.”
Once inside, they handcuffed Jenkins and his friend Parker and poured milk, alcohol and chocolate syrup over their faces. They forced them to strip naked and shower together to conceal the mess. They mocked the victims with racial slurs and shocked them with stun guns.
After Elward shot Jenkins in the mouth, they devised a coverup that included planting drugs and a gun. False charges stood against Jenkins and Parker for months. Jenkins suffered a lacerated tongue and broken jaw.
In March 2023, months before federal prosecutors announced charges in August, an investigation by The Associated Press linked some of the deputies to at least four violent encounters with Black men since 2019 that left two dead and another with lasting injuries.
All six former officers are facing potentially decades-long prison sentences on the federal charges. Time served for separate convictions at the state level will run concurrently with the potentially longer federal sentences.
The majority-white Rankin County is just east of the state capital, Jackson, home to one of the highest percentages of Black residents of any major U.S. city.
The officers warned Jenkins and Parker to “stay out of Rankin County and go back to Jackson or ‘their side’ of the Pearl River,” court documents say, referencing an area with higher concentrations of Black residents.
Attorneys for several of the deputies have said their clients became ensnared in a culture of corruption that was not only permitted, but encouraged by leaders within the sheriff’s office.
For months, Rankin County Sheriff Bryan Bailey, whose deputies committed the crimes, said little about the episode. After the officers pleaded guilty in August, Bailey said the officers had gone rogue and promised to change the department.
Jenkins and Parker have called for his resignation, and they have filed a $400 million civil lawsuit against the department.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.