An Alabama town completely disbanded its police force after a text message allegedly sent by one of the town’s police officers contained a racist joke and was posted on social media.
Following the suspension of both the city’s police chief James Srygley, and assistant police chief John L. Goss, the city council voted to dissolve the three-member police department, Mayor James Latimer told NPR.
Though the decision was called “reversible” by Latimer, the city’s remaining police officer, Officer Lee Carden, tendered his resignation after the council’s vote was made public.
The city of Vincent lies 45 minutes outside of Birmingham, and houses a population of less than 2,000 that is 12% Black.
For the time being, the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office will handle policing duties for the town, which will employ a private investigation firm to look into the incident and spend the rest of this year recruiting new police officers and rebuilding its department.
“There is a little more to the decision than just this one incident,” Latimer told NPR but did not elaborate on what else was troublesome about the Vincent PD.
The text, sent from someone only identified in the screenshot as “752,” was published by Alabama news outlet AL.com. The sender of the text asked, “What do y’all call a pregnant slave?”
When the receiver responded with first one question mark and then with two question marks, the answer given by “752” reads, “BOGO Buy one, get one free.”
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