A6 EZ RE THE WASHINGTON POST.SUNDAY, MAY 15 , 2022
Deputies emptied Edwards’s
wallet and a jar of silver dollars he
had been saving — about $
total. They also took two cars
from his front yard and his fa-
ther’s old revolver. But deputies
found no other drugs. Then they
shoved Edwards out the front
door and into the back of a
cruiser, bound for the county jail.^2
That same night, Wade said he
sent Edwards, who is Black, a
text: “That’s what you get mess-
ing with a white girl.”
A rural war on drugs
The 2014 raid on Edwards’s
home was a no-knock, one of the
most dangerous and intrusive po-
licing tactics, in which officers
force their way into homes with-
out warning. These high-risk
searches were intended to be used
sparingly. But over the years, po-
lice have increasingly deployed
no-knock raids across the country,
with little pushback from judges
who sign off on the warrants.
And in Monroe County, no-
knocks were the rule rather than
the exception. Cantrell, elected in
2011 on a promise to crack down
on crime, waged a war on drugs
for years in this rural community
of roughly 35,000 residents. The
same judge routinely signed off
on no-knock warrants, including
the one for Edwards’s home.
Sloan said in a deposition that
deputies carried out hundreds of
no-knock searches, although the
county and courts have little rec-
ord of them. The sheriff attended
many drug busts, often posing for
the local television cameras with
the spoils of the seizures.
The Post’s investigation into
these drug raids revealed broader
allegations that the Monroe
County Sheriff’s Office had
abused its power and trampled
on the rights of residents. There
were complaints of corruption,
sexual misconduct and excessive
force. Some of these accusations
eventually drew the scrutiny of
state investigators and the FBI.
Cantrell declined to answer
questions about the raids, includ-
ing how many happened under
his watch. He also wouldn’t dis-
cuss allegations of misconduct.
But in an interview with The Post,
he spoke expansively about his
priorities while in office.
“I decided if this county was
going to be cleaned up, that it had
to start with the sheriff,” he said,
sitting on the porch of his home
last summer. “Nobody had ever
cleaned this county up. I’m talking
about nobody. And I got me some
good deputies and we went to
work. We worked day and night. I
worked, honestly, seven days a
week and seven nights a week.
“The thugs, the people that
MONROE COUNTY FROM A1 warrant anyway.
Edwards was released without
charge after about three days in
jail. A few months later, he ran
into Wade at a barbecue. Edwards
claimed that Wade taunted him
with racial slurs. It turned into a
fight. Wade stabbed Edwards,
and Edwards fired a gun at Wade,
leaving him with a gash on his
head. Both men landed in the
hospital — but only Edwards end-
ed up behind bars with an aggra-
vated assault charge.^4
Police in nearby Amory inter-
viewed Wade, who was 45 and
also had a criminal record. Wade
told police that the fight stemmed
from the call he’d made to the
sheriff months earlier.
“So I called Cecil and I told him
the deal. I’d currently bought
drugs from Bengie before a year
or so past ago,” Wade said. “And I
knew where he kept his drugs.”
His account conflicted with
what Sloan wrote in the affidavit
— that the confidential source
had seen drugs in Edwards’s
home within the past 72 hours.
The detective then asked how
Wade knew that the sheriff had
actually gone to Edwards’s house.
“I called Cecil back and asked
him if he had took care of the
matter and he said he did,” Wade
said. “That they had busted in.
They found the kids there and
Eva and they locked Bengie up.”
Edwards said the drugs actual-
ly belonged to Wade’s girlfriend,
York. Police never brought charg-
es against her.^5
Edwards spent several weeks
in the Amory jail before a judge
denied him bond on the assault
charge. He was eventually trans-
ferred to the Monroe County De-
tention Center, where he would
sit behind bars for months.
‘You can tell me something’
Cantrell’s war on drugs began
almost as soon as he took office.
His deputies quickly ratcheted up
arrests and drug-bust seizures —
taking cars, trucks, TVs, guns and
cash. The value of money and
property seized jumped from
around $12,000 the year before
Cantrell took over to more than
$68,000 in 2013 — nearly double
the average annual household
income here.^6
But there were early contro-
versies at the sheriff’s office, espe-
cially with Sloan, Cantrell’s new
narcotics agent. In January 2013,
the county paid about $1,200 to a
Black man who filed a lawsuit
that accused Sloan of illegally
confiscating that amount after
his car broke down. A few months
later, another Black man contest-
ed more than $11,000 that Sloan
seized during a traffic stop. A
court ruled that all of the money
had to be returned.^7
SEE MONROE COUNTY ON AOBTAINED BY THE WASHINGTON POST
TOP: Deputies carried out a no-knock raid in 2014 at Bengie Edwards’s home in Monroe County, Miss. Joe Wade Jr., seen below
in an unrelated booking photo from 2017, said he called the sheriff after his girlfriend refused to leave Edwards’s home. Wade
told the sheriff that he bought drugs from Edwards “a year or so past ago.” That conflicted with what would be written on the
affidavit for the search warrant, above — that a source had seen drugs in Edwards’s home within the past 72 hours.MARVIN JOSEPH/THE WASHINGTON POSTunsuccessfully for sheriff twice
before his third try in 2011, when
he vowed to end the scourge of
drugs.
Meth and opioids had taken
root in Monroe County, like they
had in so many communities. Butit can be difficult to measure the
problem because many overdose
cases go undocumented. From
1999 through 2020, 47 overdose
deaths were reported to health
officials, and the county’s drug
overdose death rate consistentlydon’t believe in law enforcement
... that break in your houses, steal
your guns, steal your furniture,
steal your TVs. These people, most
of them were drug addicts. ... I
decided, well, we’re going to clean
her up, boys. And we did, ma’am.
We cleaned this county up. ”
Cantrell grew up in Monroe
County, a quiet pocket in the
northeastern corner of Mississip-
pi, and played football in junior
college. He spent about two dec-
ades as a justice court judge,
officiating marriages for lots of
couples here in the heart of the
Bible Belt.
During his time on the bench,
Cantrell was publicly reprimand-
ed by the Mississippi Commis-
sion on Judicial Performance for
two instances of misconduct.
This included a complaint that
Cantrell issued an arrest warrant
at the request of a car dealer for a
customer who the dealer said
owed money.^3
Cantrell, who is White, ranranked below state and national
averages.
Cantrell was 61 and had no law
enforcement experience. But his
message resonated. He won in a
landslide and took office in Janu-
ary 2012. He oversaw a few dozen
deputies, including Sloan, whom
he quickly promoted to the nar-
cotics unit. Sloan had about eight
years on the force and, at around
6 foot 5, cut an imposing figure.
When Cantrell got a call about
cocaine at Edwards’s house on
that Saturday night in November,
Sloan requested a no-knock war-
rant.
Sloan, who is White, typed up
an affidavit stating that a confi-
dential source told the sheriff
that Edwards was selling crack
cocaine from his residence and
had seen a half-ounce within the
past 72 hours.
Sloan didn’t sign the affidavit
— the document swearing that
everything was true — but Judge
Robert Fowlkes approved theIn Monroe County, no-knock raidswere the rule, not the exception2017 PHOTO COURTESY OF MONROE COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICE2. The Post obtained search warrant records, including an inventory list, and interviewed Edwards about the raid. 3. Cantrell said he issued the warrant but later argued that he shouldn’t be publicly reprimanded, according to the
commission’s records. 4. Wade, in a police interview, described his injuries and said he tried to stab Edwards’s arm to move the gun. Amory, Miss., police said they took Edwards to the hospital but did not arrest Wade “based on the
totality of circumstances.” 5. Wade recounted the conversation in a recorded police interview. Wade and York did not return messages seeking comment. Cantrell declined to discuss individual raids. 6. The Post analyzed forfeiture
records from the North Mississippi Narcotics Unit and court records. The totals for 2011 and 2013 include only property with a documented dollar value. 7. When the county agreed to settle the lawsuit in January 2013, it admitted no
wrongdoing.