NAACP Says Noose Incident Is Hate Crime

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) – The state NAACP says white students at a south Mississippi high school put a noose around the neck of a black student and “yanked backward.”

Ayana Kinnel, spokeswoman for the civil rights group, says Monday that the incident took place the afternoon of Oct. 13 at the Stone County High School field house in Wiggins.

Names and ages of the students involved weren’t immediately released Monday. The Stone County NAACP president, Robert James, says the black student is a football player.

Kinnel says that according to a statement from the black student’s family, he returned to practice after the incident.

Inita Owen, the superintendent of education for Stone County schools, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.