Mississippi Today

Convicted killer of two set for May release

Published

2 years ago

April 19, 2023

Staff Editor

Convicted killer of two set for May release

by Jerry Mitchell, Mississippi Today
April 19, 2023

Double murderer James Williams III is set to walk out of a Mississippi prison May 16.

The state Parole Board has agreed to release Williams, who was convicted in 2005 of shooting to death his father, James Jr., and stepmother, Cindy Lassiter Magnum, after failing to poison them to death. He was 17 at the time of the killings in south Jackson.

“He murdered ‘em, threw ‘em in trash bags, put them in Rubbermaid trash cans and threw ‘em out like the trash,” said Magnum’s son, Zeno. “We are concerned not only for our personal safety, but also for the safety of anyone who may come in contact with this psychopath.”

Parole Board Chairman Jeffrey Belk said he was limited in what he could share, “but I can tell you all facts and information was considered and he received the majority number of votes required to be paroled.” He said the parole received no objection from the family or others.

Williams’ lawyer, Jake Howard, called his client “an exceptional candidate for parole. He has served over 20 years in jail and prison — more than half his life — for the tragic crimes he committed on December 28, 2002, when he was just 17 years old.Since then, he has worked tirelessly to better himself and atone for his crimes.”

Originally given two life without parole sentences, Williams, now 38, qualified for parole after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2021 that juveniles should be eligible for parole.

Magnum’s sister, Barbara Rankin, said it may have been more than 20 years since the 2002 killings took place, but it seems like yesterday to her and her family.

She said Williams presumed by killing his father and stepmother he would inherit $850,000 in life insurance benefits. Their bodies were found a week later in the woods.

“My husband and I saw the bodies,” Rankin said. “The investigator said it was the most horrific thing he’d ever seen.”

Williams initially denied that he killed them before telling police that his father beat him and pulled a gun on him for missing work days earlier, according to court records.

Williams then got a gun from his room and shot his father, and when Magnum walked in the room and started screaming, he shot her, too, according to records.

At trial, Williams gave a different version of events. He testified that his father accidentally shot Magnum and that a friend shot his father.

A jury convicted Williams of murdering the couple, and the judge sentenced him to life without parole.

Magnum’s son, Zeno, said each time Williams has become eligible for parole, the family has flooded the Parole Board with letters and has appeared before the board.

Last year, the board assured her and her family that Williams would never be paroled, Rankin said.

On her birthday, April 15, she opened something from the mailbox. It was a letter from the Parole Board.

“We understand this decision may come as a disappointment to you,” Stephanie Walters, the board’s executive secretary, wrote. “However, the board believes that Offender James Williams is able to be a law-abiding citizen and that parole supervision would be more beneficial than further incarceration.”

Rankin said she couldn’t read past the first line before she was overcome with emotion.

Former Parole Board Chairman Steve Pickett said he and the Parole Board had reviewed Williams’ case “numerous times, and he was previously denied for parole multiple times.”

Pickett worked at the time in the Hinds County Sheriff’s Department. “Because it happened in Hinds County,” he said, “I was familiar with the case.”

Asked why parole was denied, Pickett replied that Williams gave varied stories to the board “about the circumstances that led to the deaths of his father and stepmother.” There was also “community opposition all along,” he said.

Belk told Mississippi Today that Magnum’s family “admittedly chose not to reply or schedule a meeting with the Parole Board.”

Zeno Magnum responded that he received no notification.

Belk disputed that claim, saying that the board and Victim Services of the Mississippi Department of Corrections “made numerous attempts months ahead of the hearing to notify all registered victims. They admittedly chose not to reply or schedule a meeting with the Parole Board.”

He added that Williams’ parole also received no opposition from the sheriff, district attorney or judge.

James Williams III, convicted of killing his father and stepmother, is seen in this photo from his graduation from the New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary with a Bachelor’s degree in Christian Ministry.

Howard pointed to Williams’ achievements as proof of change: a GED and a bachelor’s degree in Christian ministry as well as completing numerous other educational and rehabilitation programs.

“James has devoted himself to serving God and his fellow inmates,” Howard said. “He has been affiliated with MDOC’s faith-based programs since 2008, began tutoring students in 2012, became a field minister in 2018, and served as the Minister of Music for Parchman’s Koinonia Church from 2020 until 2022.”

At that time, Williams voluntarily agreed to transfer to the Marshall County Correctional Facility as a missionary and field minister, served as pastor for the Living Waters Baptist Church, taughta “Fundamentals of the Faith” class and provided counseling services to other inmates, Howard said.

Williams has received glowing letters of support for his release from chaplains, the seminary director and the Parole Board’s own psychologist as well as dozens of others, Howard said. Upon release, Williams hopes to serve as a chaplain at the Central Mississippi Correctional Facility.

If Williams is truly changed, Rankin asked, why hasn’t he reached out to the family?

“He has never shown an ounce of remorse,” she said. “In 20 years, he has never reached out to Zeno and said he’s sorry, because he’s not sorry.”

Howard responded that Williams “is deeply remorseful, makes no excuses for his crimes, and understands why members of his father’s and stepmother’s families oppose his release on parole.”

He pointed to Williams’ letter to the Parole Board, where he wrote, “I will have to live the rest of my days knowing that I took the lives of two people I loved. I could give reasons for my state of mind at the time, but I know that nothing can ever justify taking lives. I also know that there is nothing I can do to lessen the pain of those I deprived of loved ones. I sincerely wish I could change the past, but I cannot.”

Howard said Williams is “truly a model of what our correctional system hopes to accomplish. I’m honored to call him a friend, as well as a client.If James Williams hasn’t earned the privilege of supervised release on parole, then I’m not sure who could.”

Rankin said it would be one thing to parole someone for a drug offense or a nonviolent offense, “but when you have somebody who threw away bodies, and we can’t even see the bodies at the funeral because it’s so bad. No family should have to go through that.”

She has never missed a single parole hearing, but one of her sisters had to recently enter the intensive care unit, she said. “I don’t know if she’s going to die up in that hospital.”

She hopes the Parole Board will rescind Williams’ parole, just as the board has done before.

She choked back the tears. “I’m devastated to say the least, because it’s like living the thing over and over,” she said. “I feel like I’ve failed Zeno.”

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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Mississippi Today

On this day in 1997

Published

8 hours ago

December 22, 2024

Staff Editor

mississippitoday.org – Jerry Mitchell – 2024-12-22 07:00:00

Dec. 22, 1997

The Mississippi Supreme Court upheld the conviction of white supremacist Byron De La Beckwith for the 1963 murder of Medgar Evers.

In the court’s 4–2 decision, Justice Mike Mills praised efforts “to squeeze justice out of the harm caused by a furtive explosion which erupted from dark bushes on a June night in Jackson, Mississippi.”

He wrote that Beckwith’s constitutional right to a speedy trial had not been denied. His “complicity with the Sovereignty Commission’s involvement in the prior trials contributed to the delay.”

The decision did more than ensure that Beckwith would stay behind bars. The conviction helped clear the way for other prosecutions of unpunished killings from the Civil Rights Era.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Mississippi Today

Medicaid expansion tracker approaches $1 billion loss for Mississippi

Published

10 hours ago

December 22, 2024

Staff Editor

mississippitoday.org – Bobby Harrison – 2024-12-22 06:00:00

About the time people ring in the new year next week, the digital tracker on Mississippi Today’s homepage tabulating the amount of money the state is losing by not expanding Medicaid will hit $1 billion.

The state has lost $1 billion not since the start of the quickly departing 2024 but since the beginning of the state’s fiscal year on July 1.

Some who oppose Medicaid expansion say the digital tracker is flawed.

During an October news conference, when state Auditor Shad White unveiled details of his $2 million study seeking ways to cut state government spending, he said he did not look at Medicaid expansion as a method to save money or grow state revenue.

“I think that (Mississippi Today) calculator is wrong,” White said. “… I don’t think that takes into account how many people are going to be moved off the federal health care exchange where their health care is paid for fully by the federal government and moved onto Medicaid.”

White is not the only Mississippi politician who has expressed concern that if Medicaid expansion were enacted, thousands of people would lose their insurance on the exchange and be forced to enroll in Medicaid for health care coverage.

Mississippi Today’s projections used for the tracker are based on studies conducted by the Institutions of Higher Learning University Research Center. Granted, there are a lot of variables in the study that are inexact. It is impossible to say, for example, how many people will get sick and need health care, thus increasing the cost of Medicaid expansion. But is reasonable that the projections of the University Research Center are in the ballpark of being accurate and close to other studies conducted by health care experts.

White and others are correct that Mississippi Today’s calculator does not take into account money flowing into the state for people covered on the health care exchange. But that money does not go to the state; it goes to insurance companies that, granted, use that money to reimburse Mississippians for providing health care. But at least a portion of the money goes to out-of-state insurance companies as profits.

Both Medicaid expansion and the health care exchange are part of the Affordable Care Act. Under Medicaid expansion people earning up to $20,120 annually can sign up for Medicaid and the federal government will pay the bulk of the cost. Mississippi is one of 10 states that have not opted into Medicaid expansion.

People making more than $14,580 annually can garner private insurance through the health insurance exchanges, and people below certain income levels can receive help from the federal government in paying for that coverage.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, legislation championed and signed into law by President Joe Biden significantly increased the federal subsidies provided to people receiving insurance on the exchange. Those increased subsidies led to many Mississippians — desperate for health care — turning to the exchange for help.

White, state Insurance Commissioner Mike Chaney, Gov. Tate Reeves and others have expressed concern that those people would lose their private health insurance and be forced to sign up for Medicaid if lawmakers vote to expand Medicaid.

They are correct.

But they do not mention that the enhanced benefits authored by the Biden administration are scheduled to expire in December 2025 unless they are reenacted by Congress. The incoming Donald Trump administration has given no indication it will continue the enhanced subsidies.

As a matter of fact, the Trump administration, led by billionaire Elon Musk, is looking for ways to cut federal spending.

Some have speculated that Medicaid expansion also could be on Musk’s chopping block.

That is possible. But remember congressional action is required to continue the enhanced subsidies. On the flip side, congressional action would most likely be required to end or cut Medicaid expansion.

Would the multiple U.S. senators and House members in the red states that have expanded Medicaid vote to end a program that is providing health care to thousands of their constituents?

If Congress does not continue Biden’s enhanced subsidies, the rates for Mississippians on the exchange will increase on average about $500 per year, according to a study by KFF, a national health advocacy nonprofit. If that occurs, it is likely that many of the 280,000 Mississippians on the exchange will drop their coverage.

The result will be that Mississippi’s rate of uninsured — already one of the highest in the nation – will rise further, putting additional pressure on hospitals and other providers who will be treating patients who have no ability to pay.

In the meantime, the Mississippi Today counter that tracks the amount of money Mississippi is losing by not expanding Medicaid keeps ticking up.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Mississippi Today

On this day in 1911

Published

1 day ago

December 21, 2024

Staff Editor

mississippitoday.org – Jerry Mitchell – 2024-12-21 07:00:00

Dec. 21, 1911

A colorized photograph of Josh Gibson, who was playing with the Homestead Grays Credit: Wikipedia

Josh Gibson, the Negro League’s “Home Run King,” was born in Buena Vista, Georgia.

When the family’s farm suffered, they moved to Pittsburgh, and Gibson tried baseball at age 16. He eventually played for a semi-pro team in Pittsburgh and became known for his towering home runs.

He was watching the Homestead Grays play on July 25, 1930, when the catcher injured his hand. Team members called for Gibson, sitting in the stands, to join them. He was such a talented catcher that base runners were more reluctant to steal. He hit the baseball so hard and so far (580 feet once at Yankee Stadium) that he became the second-highest paid player in the Negro Leagues behind Satchel Paige, with both of them entering the National Baseball Hame of Fame.

The Hall estimated that Gibson hit nearly 800 homers in his 17-year career and had a lifetime batting average of .359. Gibson was portrayed in the 1996 TV movie, “Soul of the Game,” by Mykelti Williamson. Blair Underwood played Jackie Robinson, Delroy Lindo portrayed Satchel Paige, and Harvey Williams played “Cat” Mays, the father of the legendary Willie Mays.

Gibson has now been honored with a statue outside the Washington Nationals’ ballpark.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.