RANKIN COUNTY SHERIFF’S OFFICE Vs. NEW YORK TIMES (Hour #2 / Ep #1,105)

Clay dedicated the second hour of Episode #1105 to the escalating war between the Rankin County Sheriff’s Department and the New York Times/Mississippi Today over unreleased videos involving the late inmate Larry Buckhalter.

 

After being forwarded an internal email exchange between the sheriff’s legal team and the journalists, Clay obtained the three full, unedited videos the outlets plan to feature in an upcoming follow-up hit piece. He posted them publicly and played them in their entirety on air.

 

The clips show Buckhalter, a frequent-flier crack addict who spent enormous amounts of time in the Rankin County jail and had died after release, in three separate interactions with detention staff. In one, he voluntarily puts on a shock vest (similar to a dog shock collar but for humans) and gets zapped in exchange for a Coca-Cola while clearly stating on camera that he was doing it of his own free will. Another has him wearing a party hat, blowing a party horn, and singing “Happy Birthday” to Undersheriff Barry Vaughn. The third captures him telling Vaughn he loved him and was being released that day, then getting playfully startled when a deputy slams a yellow “wet floor” caution sign behind him while others laugh.

 

The New York Times framed these as proof of guards “mocking and abusing” a mentally ill inmate. Clay’s unfiltered take was that Buckhalter was never ruled mentally incompetent by any court or medical professional. The drugs had clearly fried him, but he knew exactly what he was doing, had genuine affection for certain staff members, celebrated countless birthdays and milestones inside the facility, and was treated far better (and safer) as a trustee than he ever was on the street.

 

Clay acknowledged the optics are rough (“just because you can doesn’t mean you should”) but insisted the full context makes it clear this was horsing around with a willing participant, not torture or mockery. He read the sheriff’s department’s full response verbatim, which accused the journalists of deliberately spinning harmless (if wild) moments into abuse because it fits their narrative.

 

Callers and texters lit up the lines: some were disturbed by the shock vest, others saw it exactly as Clay did (rough jailhouse humor with a guy who was part of the “family” in that building). Either way, Clay made one thing clear: the corporate media already decided the conclusion before they ever asked for the sheriff’s side, and the unedited videos blow their story apart. Another round of Rankin County Sheriff’s Department versus the legacy media, and Clay says the deputies come out looking human, not monstrous.