The arrests last year of two Alabama journalists, school board members and school employees were part of an unconstitutional scheme by the former superintendent of Escambia County Schools and her “allies in law enforcement,” a new federal lawsuit states.

The arrests that occurred last year were orchestrated to dole out punishment over a political dispute and were part of a conspiracy aimed at retaliation over a controversial decision to oust former Superintendent Michele McClung, according to the court filing.

The 70-page complaint was filed Wednesday ahead of a news conference outside the U.S. District Court of South Alabama in downtown Mobile. It claims that Escambia County District Attorney Stephen Billy, Sheriff Heath Jackson, and four sheriff’s deputies – Arthur Odom, Kevin Durden, Matthew Rabren, and Stephen Dereck Lowery – violated the constitutional rights of four people during their arrests after the Escambia County School Board voted 4-3 to not renew McClung’s contract.

The case was filed by attorneys with the Arlington, Va.-based Institute for Justice, and surfaces about seven months after the Alabama Attorney General’s Office dismissed all criminal charges against the journalists and school officials – Atmore News publisher and Escambia County School board member Sherry Digmon, Atmore News journalist Don Fletcher, Escambia County School Board member Cynthia Jackson and Escambia County school employee Veronica “Ashley” Fore.”

Constitutional violations

The complaint alleges that Billy, Jackson and the four sheriff’s deputies conspired with McClung to violate the First and Fourth Amendment rights of the four plaintiffs in the case. The plaintiffs seek compensatory and punitive damages.

McClung is not named as a defendant, but the lawsuit claims she had knowledge of the arrests before they occurred.

The case highlights much of the activity that led to their arrests and indictments of the journalists in late 2023, and which stirred national attention over press freedoms and the extent to which prosecutors can punish the media for publishing confidential material.

In the Atmore case, the story at issue revolved around the publication of confidential information contained in a subpoena and published in a story written by Fletcher in The Atmore News in late October 2023.

Read more: Small-town Alabama journalist talks arrest, dismissal of case: ‘My heart was beating fast’

The case also focuses on the activities of Billy, the county’s longtime top prosecutor, who the lawsuit states made both private and public warnings “to punish anyone who opposed McClung” through the grand jury process.

It also alleges Jackson wanted to “unleash his ‘wrath’” on McClung’s detractors so they would have to “eat his hotdogs” all weekend, while at the Escambia County Jail.

Digmon and Jackson, as board members, voted against renewing McClung’s contract twice in September and October 2023. Fletcher was arrested based on writing a newspaper story that Billy claimed was a violation of the state’s grand jury secrecy law. Fore was arrested for allegedly disclosing grand jury secrets.

‘Malicious, Abusive’

Billy, Jackson and the four deputies are named for being “malicious, abusive, and retaliatory” for their arrests of all four plaintiffs.

The lawsuit also includes details about the arrests of each of the plaintiffs. Specifically, Digmon, 73 – who was arrested three times during the course of the investigation – was once placed in handcuffs and taken to the county jail, directed to remove all her clothes, handed a rag and instructed to shower. Digmon showered in front of a female officer, who made her squat, the lawsuit states. And because there was no door to the shower, male officers could see inside the shower as they walked by, the filing says, with some shielding their eyes.

Digmon was then given an XL orange jumpsuit that did not fit her, according to the complaint.

Officers led Digmon back and forth through the men’s holding cell to take her mugshot and then to get her fingerprints while she had to hold her orange jumpsuit closed with her hands as she walked through a holding cell that was filled with eight to 10 men, according to the complaint.

The lawsuit claims that Billy pursued criminal charges on Sept. 19, 2023, one day after a local GOP meeting in which Jackson claimed he would arrest any of McClung’s detractors and require them to “eat his hotdogs” while they were incarcerated for a weekend.

Billy pursued criminal charges that all four plaintiffs disclosed grand jury secrets. He then issued a subpoena to the Escambia County School Board pursuant to his powers as district attorney.

But the federal lawsuit claims that Billy characterized his subpoena as “a secret grand jury document.” The document, the lawsuit says, “very clearly came from him — not a grand jury.”

Billy, in February, recused himself from prosecuting the case at which time it was forwarded to the Attorney General’s Office before the office dismissed the charges about two months later.

The arrests over the school board decision also drew the ire of the Alabama Association of School Boards, which assisted Digmon against an impeachment charge Billy also brought against her. The impeachment proceeding was based on a violation to the School Board Governance Act of 2012, which establishes training requirements and accountability measures for all school board members.

Sally Smith, president of the AASB, called the impeachment charge in November the “most outlandish situation” she’s seen of outside influence in a school board matter in her 37-year career with the organization.

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