Some Police Units Are Murdering and Torturing Civilians. We Need a National Investigation

On the night of January 24, 2023, in Mississippi, six members of the Rankin County Sheriff’s Office kicked in the front door of a house without a warrant.

For an hour and a half, these Mississippi officers — members of the self-named Goon Squad — tortured two Black men, Eddie Parker and Michael Jenkins. These officers used stun guns on the men repeatedly while yelling racial slurs. They beat them with their fists and batons, and abused them with a sex toy.  And then one of the cops shoved his gun in Mr. Jenkins’ mouth and pulled the trigger. (Jenkins lived.)

To conceal their crimes, the officers destroyed surveillance footage and planted false evidence. Then they lied to investigators.  

In March, a federal judge sentenced each of these officers, who all pleaded guilty, to between 10 and 40 years behind bars.

If this attack had been perpetrated by people who weren’t in law enforcement, it would have been front page headlines for weeks. But it wasn’t. In fact, I can’t ever remember civilians committing an incident this horrific.

But the fact is that this episode of sadism by rogue cops and innumerable others incidents like it have been tolerated and covered up for decades. This particular group of officers had been regularly inflicting unspeakable abuse on law-abiding citizens for many years. They brutally assaulted and sexually tortured their victims. They then concealed their heinous acts by framing these innocent people for crimes they had no connection to. 

Now, imagine for a moment that a group of Black men in street clothes had targeted a random motorist on his way home to his family after a long day at work. That they then pulled him from his car and severely beat him. And then when he tried to escape to his mother’s house nearby, they hunted him down and beat him to death. Imagine that afterward, they exchanged texts mocking him and congratulating each other. 

But this scenario wasn’t imaginary. It’s exactly what happened to 29-year old Tyre Nichols in Memphis. The SCORPION unit — the police who abused and killed him — had been getting away with similar behavior for years.

The cruelty of the phenomenon of police abuse is compounded by the under reported but common occurrence of police refusing to help in life or death situations. 

People often say, “We need the police to keep us safe!” 

But they may not realize that the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled in Castle Rock vs. Gonzales that no specific legal duty exists for law enforcement to intervene.

This may explain why in Uvalde, Texas, police sheltered outside for 77 minutes while the fourth graders of Robb Elementary begged them to enter their classroom and save their lives. During that time, none of the 376 officers there chose to intervene. Nineteen of those children and two teachers were killed.

These abuses are not confined to isolated cities, or to Red States. 

Some of the most outrageous behavior has taken place over decades in police departments in Chicago, Kansas City, Minneapolis, and Philadelphia. 

In Los Angeles, the Sheriff has admitted to the presence of many organized gangs inside his department. This includes the Banditos, which the U.S. Justice Department has labeled a criminal organization responsible for drug dealing, money laundering, and murder.

To address this scourge, we must reexamine the legal doctrine of qualified immunity, which protects far too many bad cops. Congress originally determined that police officers lose that immunity when they deprive any citizens of their constitutional rights. But courts have since decided that the rights have to be “clearly established.” For instance, in 2019, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in Jessop v. City of Fresno upheld the dismissal of a lawsuit alleging that police stole more than $225,000 in cash and rare coins from homeowners.

The judges’ decision said that the cops couldn’t be sued because citizens lack the “clearly established” right against such theft. As shocking as that sounds, the court’s ruling means stealing from people could possibly be allowed if you’re a cop.  

The Goon Squad was more than rogue cops. It was part of a culture — as those disgraced deputies readily admitted at their sentencing hearings. Former narcotics detective Christian Dedmon said he was actually rewarded with promotions because of his willingness “to do bad things.”

For generations, this culture has permeated far too many police departments. Now is the time for us to bring an end to qualified immunity, reexamine the role of policing, and form a national commission that will investigate these acts of torture.

Jason Flom is the Co-Founder and CEO of Lava Media and Lava for Good. He was the Chairman and CEO of Atlantic Records, Virgin Records, and Capitol Music Group. He is a founding board member of the Innocence Project and serves on the boards of numerous criminal justice reform organizations. He hosts the Wrongful Conviction podcast and is the executive producer of the hit Bone Valley podcast.