Citizen Report No. 1783966790 - 182220880

Eric Sloan

Monroe County Sheriff's Office

700 North Meridian Street

Aberdeen, Mississippi 39730

(662) 369-2468

Date of Offense

August 24, 2015

Offense(s)

Abuse of Authority

Deprivation of Rights

Obstruction of Justice

Perjury

Statement

During the investigation and subsequent federal civil rights litigation surrounding the execution of a search warrant at the trailer of Ricky Keeton, Deputy Eric Sloan provided materially inconsistent accounts under oath regarding a critical piece of evidence: his visual observation of the decedent during the raid.

In his initial official law enforcement statement recorded immediately following the shooting, Deputy Sloan claimed that when the trailer door opened, he distinctly saw Ricky Keeton holding a black handgun and firing it directly at another deputy.

When later placed under oath during a federal court deposition, Deputy Sloan contradicted his original claim, stating: "He [Keeton] would have had to actually come out on the porch in order for me to see him," admitting that from his physical vantage point, he could not have seen what he previously claimed to see inside the threshold.

Furthermore, Deputy Sloan maintained that deputies loudly announced "Sheriff's Department, Search Warrant" prior to breach. This statement was directly contradicted by a third-party witness present inside the trailer (Connie Stegall), who testified under oath that law enforcement never announced or identified themselves before firing, rendering the execution an unconstitutional and unannounced "no-knock" entry.

Because Deputy Sloan provided mutually exclusive accounts of a fatal use of force in official documentation versus formal deposition testimony, his baseline credibility is severely impaired. In any future criminal proceeding where Sloan is a material witness, the prosecution is constitutionally required to disclose these records to the defense to satisfy its obligations under Brady v. Maryland and Giglio v. United States.

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https://www.wcbi.com/former-monroe-county-sheriff-deputy-returns-to-law-enforcement/

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