Mississippi Today
With clock ticking, Judge Wingate mulls a second injunction blocking appointments to separate Jackson court
A federal judge will decide whether to approve another injunction to prevent state appointments to a new, separate court system in Jackson set to go into effect in two weeks.
U.S. District Court Judge Henry Wingate said Tuesday he plans to rule on the injunction and other pending court motions before Jan. 1, 2024, which is when the Capitol Complex Improvement District court will be created through House Bill 1020.
Wingate heard arguments about the injunction in a NAACP lawsuit on behalf of Jackson residents that is challenging the court appointments required under the law. The injunction seeks to prevent Chief Justice Michael Randolph from appointing one judge and Attorney General Lynn Fitch from appointing two prosecutors to the Capitol Complex Improvement District court.
Brenden Cline, who is representing the plaintiffs, called HB 1020 “a comprehensive overhaul of the criminal justice system in Jackson” and a change in status quo for the city’s voters.
They won’t get to elect judges from their community who can be held accountable like other communities across the state do, he said. Plaintiffs also argue that the legislation dilutes the voting power of Jackson residents and stigmatizes them, sending the message that they are unfit to have a say in their own local government.
Cline also argued that HB 1020 has discriminatory impact on the majority Black city, had discriminatory intent by the Legislature and that the plaintiffs would suffer irreparable harm to their voting rights and their 14th Amendment rights.
He emphasized that the plaintiffs are challenging state officials’ appointments to, not the creation of, the CCID court.
The Mississippi Supreme Court ruled in September that creating the CCID court would be allowed under the state constitution. It also ruled that appointing four temporary judges to Hinds County Circuit Court was unconstitutional.
Rex Shannon, who is representing the defendants from the attorney general’s office, said the plaintiffs don’t have standing and the burden is on them to prove discriminatory intent and risk of actual, imminent harm.
Voting rights are not an issue in this case, he said, and nothing in HB 1020 affects the plaintiffs’ voting rights. Shannon added that the legislation doesn’t change the way judges are elected in Jackson and Hinds County, nor did it remove elected judge positions.
Shannon also emphasized that not every action or intent behind the legislation is racist, including how judicial appointments would be made and how the CCID court would function.
He also said the plaintiffs have assumed the Legislature was not acting in good faith when crafting and passing HB 1020. Shannon asked whether any legislative act relating to Jackson could be seen as discriminatory based on the city’s racial makeup.
Shannon argued that blocking creation of the CCID court would prevent lawmakers from addressing Jackson’s ongoing public safety and criminal justice issues.
The city is in need of additional resources, he said, and the Legislature is providing them by supporting the Capitol Police and establishing the court to handle the force’s increase in cases, rather than adding additional cases to the Hinds County Circuit Court, which is experiencing a backlog, he said.
“That shouldn’t be controversial at all,” Shannon said about the state’s interest in Jackson as the capital city and its efforts to address crime there.
In his rebuttal, Cline asked whether the state could have funded the existing Jackson and Hinds County criminal justice system rather than creating a new one. He said the assumption is that the Legislature would have to write a blank check, but the city’s delegation and local leaders over the years have requested funding that the Legislature has not approved.
Chief Justice Randolph’s place in the lawsuit was brought up again in court.
Randolph was a defendant in the lawsuit up until September when Wingate removed him under judicial immunity, paving the way for Randolph to proceed with judicial appointments. As of December, Randolph has not appointed any judges to the CCID or temporary judges to work in the Hinds County Circuit Court.
The plaintiffs proposed a workaround to block Randolph’s judicial appointments even though he is no longer part of the lawsuit.
Those motions and others, including a request from the U.S. Department of Justice to intervene, are awaiting a ruling from Wingate. He said Tuesday that he would address them in an elongated opinion.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
On this day in 1875
Nov. 2, 1875
The first Mississippi Plan, which included violence against Black Americans to keep them from voting, resulted in huge victories for white Democrats across the state.
A year earlier, the Republican Party had carried a majority of the votes, and many Black Mississippians had been elected to office. In the wake of those victories, white leagues arose to challenge Republican rule and began to use widespread violence and fraud to recapture control of the state.
Over several days in September 1875, about 50 Black Mississippians were killed along with white supporters, including a school teacher who worked with the Black community in Clinton.
The governor asked President Ulysses Grant to intervene, but he decided against intervening, and the violence and fraud continued. Other Southern states soon copied the Mississippi plan.
John R. Lynch, the last Black congressman for Mississippi until the 1986 election of Mike Espy, wrote: “It was a well-known fact that in 1875 nearly every Democratic club in the State was converted into an armed military company.”
A federal grand jury concluded: “Fraud, intimidation, and violence perpetrated at the last election is without a parallel in the annals of history.”
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
Mississippi Today’s NewsMatch Campaign is Here: Support Journalism that Strengthens Mississippi
High-quality journalism like ours depends on reader support; without it, we simply couldn’t exist. That’s why we’re proud to join the NewsMatch movement, a national initiative aimed at raising $50 million for nonprofit newsrooms that serve communities like ours here in Mississippi, where access to reliable information has often been limited.
In a time when trusted journalists and media sources are disappearing, we believe the stakes couldn’t be higher. Without on-the-ground, trustworthy reporting, civic engagement suffers, accountability falters and corruption often goes unaddressed. But it doesn’t have to be this way.
Here at Mississippi Today we act as watchdogs, holding those in power accountable, and as storytellers, giving a platform to voices that have been ignored for too long. And we’re committed to keeping our stories free for everyone because information should be accessible when it’s needed most.
Why NewsMatch and Why Now?
This year’s NewsMatch campaign runs from November 1 through December 31, giving us a special opportunity to make each dollar you give go even further. Through matching funds provided by local foundations like the Maddox Foundation, and national funders like the MacArthur Foundation, the Rural Partner Fund and the Hewlett Foundation, your gift will be matched dollar for dollar up to $1,000. Plus, if 100 new donors join us, we’ll unlock an additional $2,000 in funding, bringing us even closer to our goal. Boiled down: your donation goes four times as far.
Every dollar raised strengthens our ability to serve you with fact-based journalism on issues that impact your everyday life—whether it’s covering local election issues or reporting on decisions affecting schools, safety and economic growth in Mississippi. Your support makes it possible for us to stay rooted in the community, offering nuanced perspectives that help Mississippians understand and engage with what’s happening around them.
Special Event: “Freedom of the Press: Southern Challenges, National Impact”
As part of the campaign, we’re excited to host a special virtual event, “Freedom of the Press: Southern Challenges, National Impact.” Join Deep South Today newsrooms Mississippi Today and Verite News, along with national experts on press freedom, for an in-depth discussion on the unique challenges facing journalists in the Deep South. This one-hour session will explore the critical role local newsrooms play in holding power accountable, highlighting recent restrictions on press freedom such as Louisiana’s “25-foot law,” which affects journalists’ ability to report vital news.
We’ll examine what’s at stake if local newsrooms lose press freedoms and will discuss how you, as members of the public, can help protect it. This event is open to Mississippi Today and Verite News members as a special thank-you for supporting local journalism and standing with us in this mission. Donate today to RSVP!
How You Can Help
Make Your Gift Today
Together, let’s ensure Mississippi has the robust, independent journalism it needs to thrive. Your support fuels our ability to expose the truth, elevate marginalized stories and build a more informed Mississippi.
Thank you for believing in the power of journalism to strengthen the communities we love—not only during election season but year-round. With your help, we’ll keep Mississippi informed, engaged and connected for generations to come.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
Hinds County loses fight over control of jail
The Hinds County sheriff and Board of Supervisors have lost an appeal to prevent control of its jail by a court-appointed receiver and an injunction that orders the county to address unconstitutional conditions in the facility.
Two members from a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with decisions by U.S. District Judge Carlton Reeves to appoint a receiver to oversee day-to-day jail operations and keep parts of a previous consent decree in place to fix constitutional violations, including a failure to protect detainees from harm.
However, the appeals court called the new injunction “overly broad” in one area and is asking Reeves to reevaluate the scope of the receivership.
The injunction retained provisions relating to sexual assault, but the appeals court found the provisions were tied to general risk of violence at the jail, rather than specific concerns about the Prison Rape Elimination Act. The court reversed those points of the injunction and remanded them to the district court so the provisions can be removed.
The court also found that the receiver should not have authority over budgeting and staff salaries for the Raymond Detention Center, which could be seen as “federal intrusion into RDC’s budget” – especially if the receivership has no end date.
Hinds County Board of Supervisors President Robert Graham was not immediately available for comment Friday. Sheriff Tyree Jones declined to comment because he has not yet read the entire court opinion.
In 2016, the Department of Justice sued Hinds County alleging a pattern or practice of unconstitutional conditions in four of its detention facilities. The county and DOJ entered a consent decree with stipulated changes to make for the jail system, which holds people facing trial.
“But the decree did not resolve the dispute; to the contrary, a yearslong battle ensued in the district court as to whether and to what extent the County was complying with the consent decree,” the appeals court wrote.
This prompted Reeves to hold the county in contempt of court twice in 2022.
The county argued it was doing its best to comply with the consent decree and spending millions to fix the jail. One of the solutions they offered was building a new jail, which is now under construction in Jackson.
The county had a chance to further prove itself during three weeks of hearings held in February 2022. Focuses included the death of seven detainees in 2021 from assaults and suicide and issues with staffing, contraband, old infrastructure and use of force.
Seeing partial compliance by the county, in April 2022 Reeves dismissed the consent decree and issued a new, shorter injunction focused on the jail and removed some provisions from the decree.
But Reeves didn’t see improvement from there. In July 2022, he ordered receivership and wrote that it was needed because of an ongoing risk of unconstitutional harm to jail detainees and staff.
The county pushed back against federal oversight and filed an appeal, arguing that there isn’t sufficient evidence to show that there are current and ongoing constitutional violations at the jail and that the county has acted with deliberate indifference.
Days before the appointed receiver was set to take control of the jail at the beginning of 2023, the 5th Circuit Court ordered a stay to halt that receiver’s work. The new injunction ordered by Reeves was also stayed, and a three-person jail monitoring team that had been in place for years also was ordered to stop work.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
-
Kaiser Health News4 days ago
Vance Wrongly Blames Rural Hospital Closures on Immigrants in the Country Illegally
-
SuperTalk FM5 days ago
Tupelo teen Leigh Occhi declared dead after going missing 32 years ago
-
News from the South - Georgia News Feed4 days ago
Co-defendant takes plea deal in YSL RICO trial | FOX 5 News
-
Mississippi News Video4 days ago
Free Clinic of Meridian Celebrates 10 Years
-
Our Mississippi Home6 days ago
Nothing Is More Southern Than Black Eyed Peas
-
News from the South - North Carolina News Feed6 days ago
Wake County father killed in motorcycle crash
-
News from the South - Missouri News Feed6 days ago
Page warns seniors about property tax freeze sign-up events
-
News from the South - Texas News Feed7 days ago
NASA astronaut who was hospitalized after returning from space has been released