Mississippi

Mississippi isn’t following state supreme court’s new rule for protecting poor defendants, critics say

Three months after Mississippi’s Supreme Court directed judges in the state to ensure that poor criminal defendants always have a lawyer as they wait to be indicted, one of those justices acknowledged that the rule isn’t being widely followed.

Oct 20, 2023 9:17 AM CDT

Ban on lifetime voting for some felons violates Eighth Amendment, 5th Circuit rules

Mississippi’s lifetime ban on voting for felons convicted of some crimes serves no legitimate penological purpose and violates their rights under the Eighth Amendment, a federal appeals court has ruled.

Aug 8, 2023 8:08 AM CDT

Weekly Briefs: ‘State takeover’ of city policing challenged; lawyers sentenced in trip-and-fall scheme

NAACP sues over ‘state takeover’ of city policing, courts The NAACP has filed a lawsuit challenging two state laws that “represent a state takeover of Jackson,” Mississippi, a predominantly Black city, according to a press release. One law expands the jurisdiction of the Mississippi Capitol police to act as a…

Apr 28, 2023 2:49 PM CDT

Former Baker Donelson lobbyist pleads guilty for role in timber investment scheme

A former Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell & Berkowitz lobbyist pleaded guilty Wednesday to conspiracy to commit wire fraud for participating in a scheme to defraud investors in timber investments.

Apr 28, 2023 8:40 AM CDT

15-year-old who got 174 on LSAT looks forward to law school

A 15-year-old Mississippi youth is planning to attend law school this year after getting a 174 on the Law School Admission Test.

Mar 8, 2023 8:37 AM CST

Prisoner who can’t show ‘factual innocence’ isn’t entitled to habeas relief, 5th Circuit says

A Mississippi inmate’s habeas appeal is doomed because of U.S. Supreme Court decisions remarking that federal courts have discretion to deny relief as “law and justice require,” a federal appeals court ruled last month.

Jan 5, 2023 8:54 AM CST

‘Major questions’ doctrine applies to presidential authority, 5th Circuit says in federal contractor vaccine case

President Joe Biden didn’t have authority under the Procurement Act of 1949 to require federal contractors to mandate COVID-19 vaccines for their employees, a federal appeals court has ruled.

Dec 21, 2022 8:33 AM CST

2022 could be called ‘the year of the botched execution,’ new report says

Seven of 20 execution attempts in 2022 were “visibly problematic” in 2022, according to a year-end report by the Death Penalty Information Center.

Dec 16, 2022 10:25 AM CST

Weekly Briefs: Biden can’t grant student-debt relief, judge says; $32.3M malpractice award left in place

Judge strikes down student-debt relief U.S. District Judge Mark Pittman of Fort Worth, Texas, ruled Thursday that the Biden administration’s plan to forgive some federal student-loan debt was an unconstitutional exercise of legislative power. “In this country, we are not ruled by an all-powerful executive with a pen and a…

Nov 11, 2022 3:14 PM CST

Supreme Court should consider right to earn a living, 5th Circuit judge says in COVID-19 shutdown case

A conservative federal appeals judge suggested in a concurrence this week that the U.S. Supreme Court should consider whether the right to earn a living is a fundamental, unenumerated constitutional right.

Nov 10, 2022 1:22 PM CST

In ‘scorching’ opinion, federal judge considers appointing historian to help him in gun case

U.S. District Judge Carlton Reeves said he isn’t a trained historian, and neither are U.S. Supreme Court justices who ruled in June that gun regulations can’t be upheld unless they are consistent with historical tradition.

Nov 2, 2022 10:15 AM CDT

What is a writ of replevin? It’s being used by the DOJ against former White House adviser

Updated: Writs of replevin have been used by creditors to recover collateral, such as cars; by tenants or landlords to recover property taken by the other; by businesses to recover items taken by employees; and by people seeking the return of pets after a breakup. It’s also being cited by the U.S. Department of Justice in a lawsuit against a former senior White House adviser.

Sep 27, 2022 10:29 AM CDT

Barrett joined dissenting liberal justices as Supreme Court allowed execution of inmate seeking nitrogen death

Conservative U.S. Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett joined the high court’s three liberal justices to dissent Thursday, when it allowed the execution of an inmate who claimed that Alabama lost his request for execution by nitrogen hypoxia.

Sep 26, 2022 10:19 AM CDT

Mississippi scrubbed racial taint from its constitutional ban on voting by some felons, 5th Circuit rules

The lifetime ban on voting for some felons in Mississippi’s 1890 constitution no longer has a racist taint following later changes that added additional crimes to the list, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals at New Orleans has concluded.

Aug 26, 2022 10:10 AM CDT

Weekly Briefs: Legal sector gains 34,700 jobs in a year; judge unseals Trump search warrant

Legal sector adds 3,000 jobs or more, 3 months in a row The legal services sector added 3,100 jobs in July following a June gain of 3,300 jobs and a May gain of 3,000 jobs, according to seasonally adjusted, preliminary figures released Aug. 5 by the U.S. Bureau of Labor…

Aug 12, 2022 2:19 PM CDT