Alabama Hoops Player, Mom Charged In Kidnapping Scheme

An Alabama Crimson Tide basketball player has been charged in connection with a kidnapping scheme that also landed his mom behind bars.

Forward Devonta Pollard was charged Tuesday as part of the April 30th plot in which six-year-old Jashayla Hopson was taken from her school in Scooba, Miss.

The Associated Press reports the ordeal stems from an ongoing land dispute between the child’s mother and Pollard's mom, Jesse Mae Brown Pollard. Kemper County Sheriff James Moore said Devonta now faces one count of conspiracy to commit kidnapping

According to a criminal affidavit, Wanda Dancy, who worked at the school told Jesse Mae Brown Pollard where the child was in the school and where she was wearing. Armed with that information, Brown Pollard concocted a scheme to hold the girl as “leverage” in order to get the disputed land back. 

Authorities later revealed they traced a cellphone used to contact the child’s mother back to Devonta Pollard. In all, six people have been charged in the scheme, including Dancy, Joyce Johnigan, Shaquayla Johnigan and Shamarius Ruffin.

The Associated Press also reported it was Ruffin who allegedly went to a school library to nab the girl under the guise that Dancy had “said it was all right.”

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