an investigation launched last December revealed that “the agencies have
helped to operate a school-to-prison pipeline whereby children arrested
in local schools become entangled in a cycle of incarceration without
substantive and procedural protections required by the U.S.
Constitution. The department’s findings show that children in
Lauderdale County have been routinely and repeatedly incarcerated for
allegedly committing school disciplinary infractions and are punished
disproportionately, without constitutionally required procedural
safeguards. Children have also been arrested at school for offenses as
minor as defiance.”