JACKSON, Miss. (WJTV) – A former Pearl police officer has been sentenced for bullying an arrestee into licking his own urine off the floor.
On Wednesday, June 12, a federal judge sentenced Michael Christian Green, 26, to 12 months in prison. He is expected to report to prison on July 26, 2024.
Green was also fined $1,500 and sentenced to one year of supervised probation once he has been released from prison.
The former officer pled guilty to a charge of deprivation of civil rights in March 2024.
The charge stemmed from a December 23, 2023, video that the City of Pearl provided to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
Although court documents did not mention race, a Pearl spokesperson said Green is white and the man he arrested is Latino. The charging document said Green arrested the man after a disturbance at a store in Pearl.
Security footage in the Pearl jail showed that once the man was in a jail cell, he knocked on the cell door and tried to tell Green that he needed to urinate, according to the court document. After waiting for some time, the man went to the back of the cell and urinated in a corner, the document said.
The man who was arrested is identified in the court document only by his initials, B.E. The security camera footage showed Green telling B.E. that he would beat him with a phone.
“You’re fixin’ to go in there and you’re going to lick that p—— up,” Green said, according the court document. “Do you understand me?”
Green took the man back into the cell and told him to get on the ground and “suck it up,” then used his phone to take videos of B.E. while the man got on the ground and licked his own urine, the document said. After the man gagged multiple times, Green told him, “don’t spit it out,” according to the document.
“Green did not have a government interest or law enforcement purpose in ordering B.E. to lick his urine,” the federal charging document said.
Pearl officials said when the city discovered the disturbing incident, they opened an internal investigation. By December 27, 2023, Green was relieved of his duties.
Pearl Mayor Jake Windham said Green had worked for the Pearl Police Department for about six months after having worked at other law enforcement agencies in the Jackson area.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.