Federal judge seizes control of Mississippi jail

MICHAEL GOLDBERG
Associated Press/Report for America

JACKSON, Miss (AP) — A federal judge has seized control of a Mississippi jail after citing “severely deficient” conditions at the facility. U.S. Southern District of Mississippi judge Carlton Reeves placed Hinds County’s Raymond Detention Center into receivership. The judge will soon appoint an expert, known as a “receiver,” to temporarily manage the facility in hopes of improving its conditions. Reeves said that deficiencies in supervision and staffing lead to “a stunning array of assaults, as well as deaths.” Seven individuals died last year while detained at the jail. An attorney at the Brennan Center for Justice said only eight other times in U.S. history has a judge placed a local jail or state prison into receivership.