Jefferson has been organizing residents of Lexington, the seat of rural Holmes County, for more than two years amid a culture of policing described as abusive and corrupt.
Both the town’s government and police force of 10 officers are currently under investigation by the Department of Justice following dozens of resident complaints alleging racially targeted policing, sexual assaults, the use of excessive force and extortion of payments via third-party means.
Two ongoing federal lawsuits allege much of the same – the second of which was filed relating to abuses committed by officers after the DOJ investigation began.
In June the Department of Justice hosted a listening session where residents spoke freely about their experiences with police. Days later, Jefferson herself was arrested by Lexington PD while filming a traffic stop.
She says she was recording to obtain evidence for an ongoing federal lawsuit -- and that the arrest came as a form of retribution that residents in the town have lived under for years..
“One piece of evidence I talked about in cross examination was that there was an LPD officer who told me that they had targeted me. That the officers who arrested me were the ones specifically chosen to make that arrest for a reason,” she told MPB News.
“I read from an affidavit he gave me while on the stand and the judge even ignored that. We proved my innocence, and the fact that basically that didn’t matter in a court was really heartbreaking.”
In his late-January verdict, Holmes County Justice Court Judge Marcus Fisher found Jefferson guilty of five charges, including resisting arrest, disorderly conduct, blocking a public roadway and failure to comply. But Fisher's recent reversal came after, as he said in the order, he considered all evidence connected to the case.
Jefferson says she's unsure why that occurred after her verdict was reached, and believes it's emblematic of the system Lexington residents live under every day.
“I knew that it was going to be a canned verdict before my trial even started because we arrived early and watched other trials. We noticed that the judge had the verdict already written out and printed on his desk before the trial started,” she said.
“And when the trial was over and it was time for him to render his verdict, he read verbatim from that paper, even flipping pages, and we could tell he didn’t write that because he couldn’t pronounce some of the words in the verdict.”
She also says that when comparing her arrest documents with her attorney, who obtained his copies shortly after her June 2023 arrest, they discovered in the courtroom that a number of charges were added after the fact by the arresting officers.
Body camera footage documenting the arrest also was not made available to Jefferson nor her attorney, Michael Carr, until January 30, the night before her trial began.
Officer Scott Walters, who Jefferson says was the main officer involved in her arrest, also reportedly bragged about the arrest at a number of businesses in town and even sent Jefferson a Facebook friend request after her initial verdict as a form of taunting.
Through a courtroom review of Jefferson’s cell phone video from her arrest, Carr then caught Walters in a number of lies while on the stand for cross-examination.
But Jefferson says that despite that and other contradicting testimony – and without a full review of all available evidence – Judge Fisher found her guilty anyways.
“I’m sure this isn’t the first time and it’s definitely emblematic of what we’re organizing against. If there hadn’t been public outcry, this never would have gotten reversed – and quite honestly that’s what is frustrating about this,” she told MPB News.
“It’s a personal victory for me, but in terms of this community, they’re not going to do that for any of the innocent Black people that they’ve put canned verdicts against. They’re not going to re-examine those cases and give them a second chance. They only did that because I’m an attorney and know my rights and we kicked up a stink about all of this.”
Judge Marcus Fisher did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
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