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If the criminal justice system is truly about justice, corrections officers at Jefferson City Correctional Center should soon become customers at their former place of employment.
A CNN report details the gruesome final moments of a 39-year-old inmate named Othel Moore Jr. who was subjected to violent abuse and intentional neglect by five members of the JCCC’s Corrections Emergency Response Team (CERT) who have been charged with his death. A 27-year-old former inmate named Jordan Seller was a first-hand witness to the horrors that claimed Moore’s life and he spoke to CNN about the incident that will likely haunt him for the rest of his days, “I never watched anybody die before”.
Seller says that during a mandatory cell search, CERT officers refused to acknowledge Moore’s pleas that he has a medical condition that requires him to be placed in two sets of handcuffs to ease the amount of tension on his back. Instead, Seller says that the officers treated Moore as if he was not complying with their orders and sprayed him with mace.
“He can’t see. He’s spitting out mace, he’s coughing, he can’t breathe and he’s telling them ‘I’m allergic to mace, you need to hurry up and get medical here,’” Seller said.
After being maced, Moore was placed in a restraint chair and had a spit mask placed over his face as he tried desperately to expectorate the poison that was restricting his air passage.
At this point, the situation became more dire and more violent on the part of the CERT.
“Of course, he’s refusing this because there’s no reason for them to put a spit mask on,” said Seller, who also says he witnessed this a few feet from his cell door. “He don’t know what’s going on. He can’t see, you know, so they’re grabbing on him trying to put something on his head. He’s fighting it. Well, then they started shocking him with the shock glove.”
Seller says that after all that, the COs, placed “an all-black motorcycle helmet, you know, darkened mask…” over Moore’s head, exacerbating his frantic condition.
“He’s jumping up and down shaking. And, you know, slowly, his screams are getting weaker and weaker,” Seller said per CNN. “I believe I watched him die before they even took him out the wing,” he said.
“I watched the people that are supposed to be protecting me, kill somebody, literally killed them, you know? And that brought on such a fear, you know? The realization that these people can kill me and there’s nothing I can do about it,” said Seller.
Justin Leggins, Jacob Case, Aaron Brown, Gregory Varner, and Bryanne Bradshaw were all charged with various crimes in connection to Moore’s death. Leggins and Case were charged with second-degree murder and second-degree assault. Brown was charged with second-degree murder and second-degree assault. Varner was charged with second-degree murder and second-degree assault. Bradshaw was charged with involuntary manslaughter in the second degree.
We hope these pigs are found guilty and placed in general population with the rest of the inmates.
