Lubbock County has decided transparency is overrated. After 20-year-old Erskin Jenkins was shot and killed by a sheriff’s deputy last November, EverythingLubbock.com asked for the basics—body cam footage, a case report, even just whether the deputy’s back at work. The county’s response? A laundry list of excuses pulled straight from the “Texas Government Code Mad Libs” playbook, including “terrorism exemptions” and “confidential homeland security information.” Because nothing screams terrorism like a college kid in Wolfforth.
The county’s letter even tried to spin Erskin’s grieving mother and the NAACP into some kind of looming threat to officers’ safety—apparently, posting on Facebook now counts as domestic terrorism in Lubbock County legal theory. Meanwhile, the family’s attorney called BS, accusing officials of making up “non-existent facts” just to keep the public in the dark.
The Jenkins family, understandably, just wants answers about how their son ended up dead in what was supposed to be a disturbance call. They’ve asked for a deeper investigation and hope Ken Paxton’s office will force the county to cough up the records. (Yes, the same Ken Paxton currently busy dodging his own scandals—you can’t make this up.) The local NAACP also pushed back, pointing out that they don’t actually advocate violence, no matter how badly the county’s narrative needs a boogeyman.
For now, a grand jury has already taken a pass on further investigation, and the case is closed. The only thing left is whether Lubbock County will keep hiding behind technicalities—or finally admit that “accountability” is more than just a word they use in campaign season.
If a deputy shooting a student in your town requires “terrorism exemptions” to keep the files sealed, maybe the real threat to public safety isn’t the grieving mom with a Facebook post.
