2 more former Miss. deputies sentenced for racist torturing of pair of Black men
JACKSON, Miss. — A fourth former Mississippi sheriff’s deputy has been sentenced for his part in the racist torture of two Black men by a group of white officers who called themselves “the Goon Squad.” Christian Dedmon was sentenced Wednesday to 40 years in federal prison, hours after Daniel Opdyke was sentenced to 17½ years.
Dedmon, 29, did not look at the victims as he apologized and said he’d never forgive himself for the pain he caused.
All six of the white former officers charged in the torture pleaded guilty, admitting that they subjected Michael Corey Jenkins and Eddie Terrell Parker to numerous acts of racist torture in January 2023 after a neighbor complained that the men were staying in a home with a white woman.
Federal prosecutors detailed sexual assaults by Dedmon that made him stand out among the other officers charged.
Mr. Jenkins, who still has trouble speaking due to his injuries, said in a statement read by his lawyer that Dedmon’s actions were the most depraved of any of those who attacked him.
“Deputy Dedmon is the worst example of a police officer in the United States,” Mr. Jenkins said. “Deputy Dedmon was the most aggressive, sickest and the most wicked.”
Earlier Wednesday, Opdyke, 28, cried profusely as he spoke in court before the judge announced his sentence. Turning to look at the two victims, he said his isolation behind bars has given him time to reflect on “how I transformed into the monster I became that night.”
“The weight of my actions and the harm I’ve caused will haunt me every day,” Opdyke told them. “I wish I could take away your suffering.”
Mr. Parker rested his head in his hands and closed his eyes, then stood up and left the courtroom before Opdyke finished speaking. Mr. Jenkins said he was “broken” and “ashamed” by the cruel acts visited upon him.
U.S. District Judge Tom Lee said Opdyke may not have been fully aware of what being a member of the Goon Squad entailed when Lt. Jeffrey Middleton asked him to join, but he did know it involved using excessive force. “You were not a passive observer. You actively participated in that brutal attack,” Judge Lee said.
All six of the former officers pleaded guilty last year to breaking into a home without a warrant and torturing the Black men with a stun gun, a sex toy and other objects.
On Tuesday, Judge Lee gave a nearly 20-year prison sentence to Hunter Elward, 31, and a 17½-year sentence to Middleton, 46, calling their actions “egregious and despicable.” They, like Opdyke and Dedmon, worked as Rankin County sheriff’s deputies during the attack.
Another former deputy, Brett McAlpin, 53, and a former Richland police officer, Joshua Hartfield, 32, are set for sentencing Thursday.
Last March, 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.
The former officers stuck to their cover story for months until finally admitting that they tortured Mr. Jenkins and Mr. Parker. Elward admitted to shoving a gun into Mr. Jenkins’ mouth and firing it in a “mock execution” that went awry.
In a statement Tuesday, Attorney General Merrick Garland condemned the “heinous attack on citizens they had sworn an oath to protect.”
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 shouted at Mr. Jenkins and Mr. Parker to “stay out of Rankin County and go back to Jackson or ‘ their side’ of the Pearl River,” court documents say.
Opdyke was the first to admit what they did, his attorney Jeff Reynolds said Wednesday. On April 12, he showed investigators a WhatsApp text thread where the officers discussed their plan and what happened. Had he thrown his phone in a river, as some of the other officers did, investigators might not have discovered the encrypted messages.