Simpson County family files $150 million lawsuit in Taser-related death
By Jerry Mitchell | Originally published by Mississippi Today
The mother of Jared Padgett, who died in 2023 after being shocked with a Taser and shot by deputies from the Simpson County Sheriff’s Department, has filed a $150 million federal lawsuit against the officers and the department.
The response to this mother’s plea for help, the lawsuit says, was officers “who proceeded to murder Jared for no apparent reason at all, other than a perverse concept of ‘law enforcement’ that is itself pure lawlessness, an exercise of brute, mortal force inflicted to needlessly kill a young man who needed medical attention.”
The lawsuit alleging a civil rights violation was filed April 1 in the U.S. District Court in Jackson and represents one side of a legal argument. Simpson County Sheriff Paul Mullins has declined to comment on the case or release the incident report on the death. The county attorney did not respond to a request for comment.
READ ALSO: In Taser logs, a practice that long went unnoticed is revealed
In September 2023, Padgett, a 34-year-old oil rig worker with a degree in accounting from the University of Southern Mississippi, told his family he was hallucinating, so they called 911 in hopes that he would be taken to a hospital. His mother said the toxicology report showed he had used crystal meth.
But when two deputies arrived at the family’s home near Magee, they said they couldn’t take him because he had not been charged with a crime, family members said. When deputies ordered him to the ground, he got down on his knees with his hands behind his head and begged officers not to shoot him. But the deputies shocked him with a Taser at least 16 times in 10 minutes, and Padgett took off running, according to the lawsuit.
Deputies pursued him to a nearby church, where his family lost sight of him for several minutes.
The next time they saw him, Padgett was kneeling in the road, covered in blood, said his brother, Jacob.
Padgett climbed into a patrol car and drove away, according to a news release from the Simpson County Sheriff’s Department. A deputy chased him to a nearby gas station and fatally shot him as he opened the car door holding a deputy’s rifle.
Taser logs from the department obtained by Mississippi Today and The New York Times show that deputies fired their devices 17 times.
Deputies repeatedly shocked Padgett, “even as he fearfully surrendered on his knees with his hands interlocked behind his head, begging not to be shot,” according to the lawsuit. “After nearly killing him with brute, unnecessary force, the … Simpson County Deputies, like Keystone Kops, then allowed Jared to sit in the passenger’s seat of a patrol car, with keys in the ignition, alongside an unsecured (but unloaded) AR-15 rifle, and left him there unattended.
“When Jared – dazed, bloodied, and in crisis from the repeated tasings and abuse – fled the scene in the patrol car, Deputy Jason Runnels pursued Jared to a nearby service station and fatally shot him to death, then left Jared laying in his blood on the concrete, without so much as even requesting medical attention for Jared, who was eventually pronounced dead at the scene,” the lawsuit alleges.
“At least two witnesses have reported that Jared was not threatening harm to anyone, but instead merely surrendered, and laid the AR-15 on the ground beside the car, not pointing it at anyone, when Runnels fired his barrage of fatal bullets into Jared’s body.”
Runnels was quoted as telling an investigator that Padgett exited the patrol car with the AR-15 and “appeared to be attempting to load it” when the deputy shot him multiple times.
Despite the shooting, Runnels was never placed on administrative leave, according to the lawsuit.
When Runnels previously worked as a deputy in Smith County, he was involved in a fatal accident, “wherein he struck and killed a child while operating a vehicle at an obscene rate of speed in excess of any such speed needed,” the lawsuit says. “Runnels faced no criminal or disciplinary consequence for that incident, nor did he receive any corrective or rehabilitative training.”
Runnels could not be reached for comment.
The lawsuit says the investigation was referred to the state attorney general and that no one but the Simpson County Sheriff’s Department and the officers involved “appear to have any idea of the status of any investigation, assuming there was even one at all.”
Padgett’s mother, Beverly Padgett, said she has repeatedly called authorities for more information.
“That was my son that I love,” she told Mississippi Today. “Why did y’all do that?”
The family has never received a copy of her son’s autopsy report or any explanation about what happened, she said.
“Money can’t bring him back, but I want the truth exposed,” she said. “I’ve got to get closure to be OK. I want to know how many times they shot my son. They told me it’s none of my business. Why is it not?”
This article was originally published by Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Source: Original Article
