Rural Mississippi paper sheds light on previous allegations against former deputy who led a deadly raid

A former deputy in Monroe County, Mississippi, who helped lead a deadly no-knock raid in a rural area, had previously faced allegations of false arrest, racism and theft, reports Caleb Bedillion of the Daily Journal, as part of an investigative series about the raid. The Daily Journal, formerly the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal, is one of America’s largest rural newspapers and serves 17 counties in the northeastern part of the state. 

During the 2015 raid, Monroe County sheriff's deputies broke down the door to Ricky Keeton's Smithville mobile home, only identifying themselves as they were breaking through with a battering ram. They fired at least 49 gunshots toward Keeton, who was struck six times and died at the scene.

Monroe County narcotics officers had been investigating Keeton and believed he was using and selling drugs. And though methamphetamines were found in Keeton's home and in his body, his loved ones say the no-knock warrant unnecessarily resulted in his death. "In a federal lawsuit scheduled to go to trial in Greenville early next year, the daughters of Keeton say Monroe County law enforcement wrongfully killed their father and violated his constitutional rights," Bedillion reports. "The lawsuit names Monroe County and former deputy sheriff Eric Sloan as defendants."

Keeton's longtime girlfriend, Wanda Stegall, was present the night of the raid and said Keeton believed the deputies were intruders trying to break in. "All they had to do was knock on the door," she told Bedillion.

No-knock warrants have come under increasing scrutiny, especially since the 2020 death of Louisville, Ky. resident Brionna Taylor. Critics say such warrants are more likely to lead to violence and injury, from officers or the targets of the warrants. Some cities, states, and federal law enforcement arms have restricted or banned their use, but Mississippi has not.

Keeton's case is also under scrutiny because of questions whether Sloan, then the head of the narcotics division, was fit to be on the job at all. "At the time local law enforcement agents had Keeton staked out, Sloan was under investigation by the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation over misconduct allegations raised by an informant involving extortion," Bedillion reports. "Amid this investigation, Sloan resigned from the sheriff’s office by December 2015."

Sloan changed his story several times about what happened the night of Keeton's death, and failed to show that the legal authority existed for a no-knock warrant that night. A judge also found that the warrant didn't explicitly authorize no-knock entry, Bedillion reports. And though the sheriff's department had recently received body cameras, they had not yet been put into use and deputies were not wearing them.