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1 month ago | 
rawstory.com | Steph Quinn |Mukta Joshi
Before the Rankin County Board of Supervisors meeting began Thursday, May 15, 2025, John Osborne held a sign outside the building in Brandon that read, “Steve Gaines claimed that Michael Jenkins and Eddie Parker raped and doped your daughters. Steve Gaines lied.” Credit: Mukta Joshi/Mississippi Today At Thursday’s standing-room-only Board of Supervisors’ meeting, several Rankin County citizens called for Supervisor Steve Gaines to resign because of remarks that some have called racist.
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2 months ago | 
mississippitoday.org | Steph Quinn |Mukta Joshi
The lawyer for Rankin County Sheriff Bryan Bailey defended the sheriff’s use of trusties on his family’s chicken farm, saying it was part of an inmate work program authorized by statute. But four trusties who said they worked at the farm were released from the Rankin County Detention Center before 2021, when the only statute governing a work program for jail inmates was passed.
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Mar 31, 2025 | 
mississippitoday.org | Mukta Joshi |Steph Quinn
Anthony Burt still remembers the day he became a “blue suit.”When Burt was jailed in Rankin County in 2017 on methamphetamine possession charges, he said he had never heard of the Rankin County Sheriff’s Department’s lauded work program for trusted inmates, or “trusties.” But when an acquaintance in the program told Burt it could make his life in jail easier, he became determined to work his way to the top tier of male trusties, who wear blue uniforms and enjoy additional privileges in the jail.
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Mar 28, 2025 | 
rawstory.com | Steph Quinn |Mukta Joshi
State Auditor to Investigate Sheriff Who Used Inmate Labor on Family FarmReporters for Mississippi Today worked in partnership with The New York Times Local Investigations Fellowship. The Mississippi State Auditor’s office on Friday said it had launched an investigation into allegations that Rankin County Sheriff Bryan Bailey had staffed his mother’s commercial chicken farm with jail inmates who were in his custody.
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Mar 28, 2025 | 
mississippitoday.org | Mukta Joshi |Steph Quinn
This story was done in partnership with The New York Times Local Investigations FellowshipState Auditor Shad White has initiated an investigation into allegations that Rankin County Sheriff Bryan Bailey used jail inmates to work on his family’s chicken farm south of Puckett, a representative of the auditor’s office confirmed Friday.
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Mar 27, 2025 | 
nytimes.com | Steph Quinn |Mukta Joshi |Jerry Mitchell
In Mississippi, incarcerated trusties cleaned chicken houses, fixed cars and installed flooring for the benefit of a local sheriff and his associates, a new investigation found. McLain Farms in Puckett, Miss., is owned by Rankin County Sheriff Bryan Bailey's family. Credit...
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Mar 1, 2025 | 
djournal.com | Steph Quinn |Mukta Joshi
Sheldon Bray of Blue Springs said he took his wife and two sons to the “March to Save America” rally in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6, 2021, because he wanted to show his boys the importance of making their voices heard. “I don’t like people that complain about what’s going on, but you don’t participate and let your representative know,” Bray told Mississippi Today. Instead of “sending somebody up there to read your mind,” Bray said, people should “get involved.”kAmw6 D2:5 E92E :?
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Feb 28, 2025 | 
rawstory.com | Steph Quinn |Mukta Joshi
by Steph Quinn and Mukta Joshi, Mississippi TodaySheldon Bray of Blue Springs said he took his wife and two sons to the “March to Save America” rally in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6, 2021, because he wanted to show his boys the importance of making their voices heard. “I don’t like people that complain about what’s going on, but you don’t participate and let your representative know,” Bray told Mississippi Today.
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Feb 28, 2025 | 
mississippitoday.org | Steph Quinn |Mukta Joshi
Sheldon Bray of Blue Springs said he took his wife and two sons to the “March to Save America” rally in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6, 2021, because he wanted to show his boys the importance of making their voices heard. “I don’t like people that complain about what’s going on, but you don’t participate and let your representative know,” Bray told Mississippi Today. Instead of “sending somebody up there to read your mind,” Bray said, people should “get involved.”He said that in months before Jan.
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Oct 25, 2024 | 
mississippitoday.org | Mukta Joshi |Steph Quinn
A “listening session” organized by the Rankin County chapter of the NAACP along with the Department of Justice changed course after attorneys who represent the sheriff’s department and the county sat in, and were asked to leave to prevent victims from feeling intimidated. The NAACP had organized the session on Thursday, Oct. 25, in association with the Justice Department to provide for a safe space for victims of police excesses by Rankin County law enforcement to speak up.
