Four Oklahoma natives have filed a lawsuit claiming that the popular children's song, Baby Shark was used as a means of torture while they were incarcerated.
According to The Oklahoman, Daniel Hedrick, Joseph "Joey" Mitchell and John Basco filed a civil lawsuit in Oklahoma City federal court on Tuesday against Oklahoma County commissioners, Sheriff Tommie Johnson III, the jail trust and two former jailers.
The four men allege that the tactics used by the above-mentioned individuals were "torture events."
The fourth former jail inmate, Brandon Newell, did not join the lawsuit as he was convicted of first-degree murder a month after the "torture" incident and was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
In 2020, an internal investigation found that at least four inmates were apprehended to a wall with their hands cuffed behind them while the song played continuously at a loud volume for hours in two separate incidents in November and December 2019, according to the Associated Press.
Also, the attorneys stated that in West Palm Beach, Florida, the widely-known song was blasted outside of a local event center in 2019 to prevent the homeless from sleeping there at night, according to AP.
As a result of the 2020 investigation, former detention employees Gregory Cornell Butler Jr. and Christian Charles Miles, both 21, and their supervisor, Christopher Raymond Hendershott, 50, were charged with misdemeanor counts of cruelty to a prisoner and conspiracy.
David Prater, the Oklahoma district attorney who handled the investigation told The Oklahoman in 2020 that if he could, he would issue felony charges regarding the unfortunate situation.
"It was unfortunate that I could not find a felony statute to fit this fact scenario," Prater said. "I would have preferred filing a felony on this behavior."
The utilization of music as a means to torture inmates isn't a new tactic in modern society. In 2014, a Senate Intelligence Committee report found out that the CIA used music as a "no-touch torture device" against detainees. The report uncovered that CIA agents would play the same song loudly repeatedly over and over again.
Additionally, in 2008, a report surfaced regarding the conditions at Guantanamo Bay. The report stated that the CIA would play different songs at loud volumes on loop in order to disrupt detainees' sleep and "to create fear, disorient...and prolong capture shock."
A jury trial in the criminal case is set for February 2022.
Newsweek reached out to Oklahoma City officials for comment.
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