Jerry Mitchell, Brian Howey, Mukta Joshi and Nate Rosenfield are reporters for Mississippi Today. They have been examining the power of sheriffs’ offices as part of The New York Times’s Local Investigations Fellowship . This story was also supported by the Fund for Investigative Journalism , the Alicia Patterson Foundation and The Pulitzer Center.

Two newly discovered videos taken inside the Rankin County jail show officers mocking and laughing at an intellectually disabled inmate, the same man guards had filmed days earlier being shocked in an electrified vest after he asked for a Coke.

Former department employees said the videos, recorded in 2018, were shared widely on an encrypted WhatsApp group chat. The footage provides a deeper look into the culture of the jail, w

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