LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) – A federal jury has acquitted two former jailers who
were accused of unlawful use-of-force at a juvenile facility.
The Arkansas Democrat Gazette reports 27-year-old Will Ray and 48-year-old Thomas Farris were cleared Tuesday on charges related to pepper-spraying juvenile detainees between June 2012 and July 2014.
The U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division filed the case in 2017
after two of the men’s supervisors pleaded guilty to civil rights violations.
The alleged violations occurred at the juvenile detention facility in
Batesville, about 90 miles (145 kilometers) north of Little Rock. The facility
houses up to 75 youths between the ages of 5 and 21.
One of Ray’s attorneys says his team is “very grateful to the jury for their
careful consideration of the evidence.”
The supervisors are awaiting sentencing before a different judge.
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