A former Mississippi law enforcement officer, Hunter Elward, has been sentenced to 45 years in prison for his involvement in the torture and abuse of two Black men in January 2023. Elward is the fourth of six former officers to be sentenced in this case.
The sentencing took place in state court on Wednesday, where Elward received a 45-year prison term to be served concurrently with his federal sentence. This comes after the other five officers, including Rankin County Sheriff’s deputies Brett McAlpin, Christian Dedmon, Daniel Opdyke, Jeffrey Middleton, and former Richland Police Department officer Joshua Hartfield, were handed federal prison sentences ranging from 10 to 40 years last month.
