There is no indication what religion this lady is, but the jail has a new policy to allow inmates to wear head coverings for religious purposes. But what if someone makes up their own religion that they must wear a football helmet or astronaut mask during mugshots?
Anitra Carter, 31, was arrested on December 19, 2025 fully clothed in a hair scarf covering at the Mecklenburg County Jail in Charlotte, NC. The jail has a new policy on allowing hair coverings during arrest photos. But Anitra also has a mugshot from 2025 without her hair covering on. Charlotte Alerts is on Instagram.
Anitra was arrested in Charlotte, NC charged with governor’s warrant. It appears the warrant was out of Tennessee regarding a failing to appear in court allegation. In the mugshot Anitra is seen in a full hair covering.
The jail recently instituted a new policy allowing inmates to wear head coverings for religious purposes due to the First Amendment of freedom of religion. The Mecklenburg County Jail and Sheriff’s Office was sued for making muslim woman Laila El Ali take off her hair covering during a mugshot when she was arrested accused of impeding traffic and a noise violation during a city council protest of the Gaza Israel war.
There was never any court order issued to force the Mecklenburg County Sheriff’s Department to allow the hijab in arrest photos or for the Mecklenburg jail to remove the mugshot. Instead the county jail voluntarily decided to settle the lawsuit in 2025, remove Laila’s mugshot from the jail system, and allow inmates to wear hijabs.
But Anitra was arrested in October 2025 at the same jail without her hair covering scarf on in which she was charged with extradition fugitive other state.
It is not known why Anitra has her hair covering on in one arrest photo and not in the other arrest photo. The problem with the jail policy is that what if someone makes up their own religion and says they have to wear a toboggan or ball cap due to their religious right? Will the jail allow that person to keep their baseball hat on, or straw hat, astronaut helmet, or even football helmet during a mugshot arrest photo?
If not then they could sue the jail just like Laila did.
