At least four inmates were forced to stand handcuffed for hours and listen to the popular children’s song ‘Baby Shark’ on repeat as punishment in Oklahoma jail.
Investigators said that the prisoners were secured to a wall with their hands cuffed behind them while the song played on a loop at a loud volume for hours as punishment. The separate incidents occurred in an attorney visitation room of the facility last November and December, they added.
The officials said that the music put the prisoners under ‘undue emotional stress’.
Gregory Cornell Butler Jr. and Christian Charles Miles, both 21, and their supervisor, Christopher Raymond Hendershott, 50, on Monday were charged with misdemeanor counts of cruelty to a prisoner and conspiracy, Mail Online reported.
Butler and Miles are accused of imposing the discipline and Hendershott is accused of knowing about it but not stopping it.
‘It was unfortunate that I could not find a felony statute to fit this fact scenario,’ Oklahoma County District Attorney David Prater said.
According to an affidavit filed in the case, Miles admitted to working with Butler to ‘teach [the inmates] a lesson because they felt that disciplinary action within the Detention Center was not working in correcting’ their behavior.
Investigators said the prisoners suffered ‘inhuman’ discipline as well as ‘undue emotional stress’ from the unconventional punishment.
‘This appeared to have led to the Officers continuing to mistreat inmates,’ investigators said.
Sheriff P.D. Taylor said Monday that Butler and Miles resigned during an internal investigation and that Hendershott retired.
‘We don’t tolerate it,’ Taylor said of the mistreatment. ‘We always did an excellent job policing ourselves.’
