A Pittsburgh jail is under fire after a video showing an employee spewing racial slurs has gone viral. Now, leaders in the area are calling for the white man in question to be fired, but that hasn’t happened just yet.
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The Allegheny County Jail (ACJ) employee named Brian Davis was featured in a now-deleted Instagram video showing him wearing a Patriots sweatshirt while holding a baseball bat wrapped in barbed wire. Written on the bat was “n****r beater,” which is expectedly sparking outrage.
According to the Safety and Justice Challenge, Black inmates at ACJ make up roughly 67 percent of the total population. With this, Davis’ actions have raised many concerns for activists. “I really, really am afraid to think of if that bat has been used before,” Tanisha Long, Abolitionist Law center organizer told 11 News.
“He needs to go. He needs to do some soul-searching and figure out what it is about Black people that he does not like,” Long continued. “But I also think we need to talk to every single person in that jail who has had an encounter with him.”
The caption to the racist video identified Davis, who has worked for ACJ since 2018, according to records obtained by the Pittsburg City Paper. After the video got back to ACJ officials, Davis was suspended but not fired pending an internal investigation.
A statement from ACJ read, “The ACJ administration, from Warden Wingard down, expects professionalism from all jail employees. The jail does not tolerate racist or abusive language or behavior. The employee in question has been suspended, and we are investigating the situation,” according to WTAE.
Meanwhile, outrage from the Pittsburg community has not slowed. “To know that this person was responsible for keeping them safe in that facility, and he had these horrible and disgusting views, it’s disappointing to me,” At-large Allegheny County Council Member Bethany Hallam said. “I’m happy that it got out there, that we now know how he’s been thinking this whole time.”
Hallam continued, adding that all jail employees sign a code of ethics upon hiring. She continued, insisting ACJ is taking the investigation into Davis’ actions very seriously.
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