Isolated, alone and afraid, rural domestic abuse victims endure

Living in a small Mississippi River town, Hayden endured her husband’s cruelty, adhering to the belief that domestic abuse is something to be hidden from the broader community and kept within the confines of the household.

‘No one cared’: Black women face disproportionate rates of abuse at the hands of their loved ones — and a lack of protection from the system meant to help them

Michelle Coleman’s marriage had been rocky and violent, but things seemed better when she and her husband of a decade moved to the Mississippi Gulf Coast in 2017. After her new job at a medical unit in a jail, things “got physical,” she said, and she was forced to leave with her two children.

A jailed mentally ill man accused law enforcement of abuse. Then he disappeared.

Threatened. Beaten. Denied food, water and his clothes. Constrained in a straitjacket.

Months after Travis Sean Hunt posted a note in Facebook Messenger accusing law enforcement in Choctaw County and Ackerman of these abuses while in their custody, he walked out the back door of his grandmother’s home and hasn’t been seen since.