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Thread: Curtis Giovanni Flowers - Mississippi

  1. #31
    Administrator Aaron's Avatar
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    Justice Thomas speaks as U.S. top court confronts racial bias in jury selection

    WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Supreme Court justices appeared poised to side with a black Mississippi death row inmate put on trial six times for a 1996 quadruple murder who accused a prosecutor of repeatedly blocking black potential jurors, though the court's only black member sounded skeptical.

    Justice Clarence Thomas, who had not posed a question during an oral argument in three years, asked several in the case involving Curtis Flowers, 48, who has argued that his constitutional right to a fair trial was violated.

    Thomas, an idiosyncratic conservative and only the second African American ever appointed to the court, signaled through his questions he might vote against Flowers, who otherwise drew broad support among the other justices, both liberal and conservative.

    The case is the latest to reach the nine-member court over allegations of racial bias against minorities in the American criminal justice system. Some prosecutors, including in Southern states like Mississippi, have been accused over the decades of trying to ensure predominately white juries for trials of black defendants to help win convictions.

    Prosecutors and defense lawyers can dismiss - or "strike" - a certain number of prospective jurors during jury selection without giving a reason. In 1986, the Supreme Court ruled that people cannot be excluded from a jury because of their race based on the right to a fair trial under the U.S. Constitution's Sixth Amendment and the 14th Amendment promise of equal protection under the law.

    Thomas focused on whether lawyers for Flowers sought to exclude white people from the jury in the most recent trial, which would indicate that both sides used race as a factor in selecting jurors.

    First Thomas asked whether the defense struck any jurors. Then he asked, "What was the race of the jurors struck there?" Sheri Lynn Johnson, Flowers' attorney, said the jurors the defense sought to block were white, but argued that what was relevant in the case was the motives of the prosecutor, not the defense lawyer.

    The other justices largely sounded supportive of Flowers' claim. "We can't take the history out of this case," conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh told the state's lawyer, Jason Davies.

    Another conservative, Justice Samuel Alito, said "the history of this case prior to this trial is very troubling" and noted that it was "cause for concern and certainly relevant" to how the justices decide the dispute.

    Liberal Justice Elena Kagan questioned why prosecutors excluded a black potential juror, Carolyn Wright, who had said she supported the death penalty and had an uncle who is a prison security guard.

    "Except for her race, you would think that this is a juror that a prosecutor would love when she walks in the door. Isn't she?" Kagan asked.

    A ruling is due by the end of June.

    QUESTIONS FROM THOMAS

    Thomas not had asked a question since a February 2016 gun rights case in which he voiced concern that people convicted of domestic-violence misdemeanors could permanently lose the right to own a firearm. In another 2016 case, Thomas was the sole dissenter when the court ruled in favor of a black Georgia death row inmate who made a similar jury claim.

    On race issues, Thomas has been a decisive vote to restrict affirmative action programs designed to help minorities overcome past discrimination. In 2013, he was part of the majority when the court struck down a key section of the Voting Rights Act, passed in 1965 to protect black voters in Southern states from ongoing discrimination.

    The justices heard Flowers' appeal of his 2010 conviction - in his sixth trial - on charges of murdering four people at the Tardy Furniture store where he previously worked in the small central Mississippi city of Winona.

    His lawyers accused long-serving Montgomery County District Attorney Doug Evans of engaging in a pattern of removing black jurors that indicated an unlawful discriminatory motive. Evans has given non-racial reasons for striking jurors.

    Flowers was found guilty in his first three trials but those convictions were thrown out by Mississippi's top court. Several blacks jurors participated in the fourth and fifth trials, which ended without a verdict because the jury both times failed to produce a unanimous decision. In the sixth trial, there were 11 white jurors and one black juror.

    The jury in the first trial was all-white. One black juror took part in each of the three other trials.

    Prosecutors said Flowers was upset with the store owner for firing him and withholding his paycheck to cover the cost of batteries he previously had damaged. He was convicted of killing store owner Bertha Tardy, 59; bookkeeper Carmen Rigby, 45; delivery worker Robert Golden, 42; and part-time employee Derrick Stewart, 16. All except Golden were white.

    https://www.google.com/amp/s/news.ya...152803006.html
    Don't ask questions, just consume product and then get excited for next products.

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  2. #32
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Mike's Avatar
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    Today the Supreme Court reversed and remanded the Supreme Court of Mississippi due to the use of prosecutor strikes. So Flowers is now up for a seventh trial.

    Thomas wrote a 42 page dissent on this.

    https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinion...-9572_k536.pdf
    "There is a point in the history of a society when it becomes so pathologically soft and tender that among other things it sides even with those who harm it, criminals, and does this quite seriously and honestly. Punishing somehow seems unfair to it, and it is certain that imagining ‘punishment’ and ‘being supposed to punish’ hurts it, arouses fear in it." Friedrich Nietzsche

  3. #33
    Senior Member CnCP Addict one_two_bomb's Avatar
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    Once again Kavanaugh proves to be the biggest judicial bust of the 21st century. And once again Clarence Thomas breaks down the simple, cold, hard facts that everyone loves to skew and overcomplicate for no reason.

  4. #34
    Senior Member Frequent Poster Ted's Avatar
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    What I want to know is, why can't they just get an independent prosecutor? I feel like removing Evans from the equation would put this to rest.
    Violence and death seem to be the only answers that some people understand.

  5. #35
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Mike's Avatar
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    Mississippi Supreme Court throws out Curtis Flowers' conviction, orders new trial

    By Jimmie E. Gates
    Mississippi Clarion Ledger

    The Mississippi Supreme Court has thrown out Curtis Giovanni Flowers' latest conviction and death sentence and sent the case back to Montgomery County for a new trial.

    In June, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Flowers' conviction and death sentence, citing prosecutor Doug Evans for excluding potential black jurors based on race in Flowers' last trial.

    Following the order of the U.S. Supreme Court, the state high court on Thursday vacated Flowers' conviction and death sentence and ordered a seventh trial for Flowers.

    Flowers has been tried six times. He is accused of the July 16, 1996, killings of Tardy Furniture owner Bertha Tardy, 59, and three employees, Carmen Rigby, 45, Robert Golden, 42, and Derrick Stewart, 16.

    Move off death row expected

    Now that the state Supreme Court has sent the case back to the Montgomery County Circuit Court, it's expected Flowers will leave death row at the Mississippi State Penitentiary at Parchman, said attorney Andre de Gruy.

    He will be moved to the Montgomery County Jail where he will kept as a pretrial inmate. He won't have bond, but his attorneys can file a motion for bond. It will then be up to a judge to decide.

    Evans has yet to say whether he will try Flowers a seventh time.

    Flowers' attorneys argued Evans eliminated black jurors from Flowers' trials. The U.S. Supreme Court agreed.

    Under the 1986 case, Batson v. Kentucky, prosecutors are barred from dismissing potential jurors on racial grounds. When defense lawyers raise a Batson objection, prosecutors are required to state aloud their reasons for those preemptory strikes.

    Flowers has been convicted of the murders after six trials, but his lawyers, APM Reports' "In the Dark" podcast, the Starz TV program "The Wrong Man" and others have raised questions about his guilt.

    Evans and family members of the victims are convinced Flowers is guilty.

    In five previous trials, the Mississippi Supreme Court had thrown out Flowers' conviction for prosecutorial misconduct.

    But the Mississippi Supreme Court in a 5-4 decision upheld the 2010 conviction and death sentence.

    https://www.clarionledger.com/story/...er/2154055001/
    "There is a point in the history of a society when it becomes so pathologically soft and tender that among other things it sides even with those who harm it, criminals, and does this quite seriously and honestly. Punishing somehow seems unfair to it, and it is certain that imagining ‘punishment’ and ‘being supposed to punish’ hurts it, arouses fear in it." Friedrich Nietzsche

  6. #36
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    2 hung juries? I think there should be a limit for how many times a prosecutor can pursue a case. It seems to me he had a real bone to pick with Flowers. I can sorta see why, a man who you believe killed 4 people, you don’t wanna let him just walk, especially with your reputation on the line. But at some point, it’s not fair to the accused to have to keep going through this. if you can’t convince 2 juries that this person is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, that’s reasonable doubt, IMO.

  7. #37
    Administrator Helen's Avatar
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    MISSISSIPPI MAN TRIED 6 TIMES FOR MURDER MOVED TO LOCAL JAIL

    By Associated Press

    GRENADA, Miss. (AP) – A Mississippi man tried six times for murder is back in a local jail, awaiting a possible seventh trial.

    Lawyer Rob McDuff says Curtis Flowers was moved Monday from the Mississippi State Penitentiary at Parchman to the Grenada County jail.

    The U.S. Supreme Court overturned Flowers’ conviction in June, finding racially biased jury selection. Prosecutors say Flowers killed four people in a Winona furniture store in 1996. He was sentenced to death in 2010’s sixth trial.

    McDuff has asked a judge to free Flowers on bail and throw out charges.

    McDuff argues Mississippi law requires bail after two capital murder mistrials. Flowers’ fourth and fifth trials ended in mistrials.

    He urges the judge to reject a seventh trial and quash charges, citing prosecutorial misconduct and arguing a limit to trials.

    https://www.wcbi.com/mississippi-man...ed-local-jail/
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  8. #38
    Administrator Helen's Avatar
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    Mississippi man tried 6 times in killings granted bond after 22 years

    By Bradford Betz
    Fox News

    A Mississippi man who was tried six times on multiple murder charges was granted bond Monday after his murder conviction was overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court for racial bias.

    Curtis Flowers, 49, will be free -- at least temporarily -- for the first time in 22 years. A judge set a bond of $250,000 for Flowers but told him he will have to wear an electronic monitor.

    Flowers, who is black, has been tried six times for the July 1996 fatal shootings of four people in a furniture store in Winona, Mississippi. The victims were owner Bertha Tardy, 59, and three employees: 45-year-old Carmen Rigby, 42-year-old Robert Golden and 16-year-old Derrick "Bobo" Stewart.

    Flowers was convicted four times; two other trials ended in a mistrial. The convictions were overturned, but the original murder indictment is still active against him.

    Assistant District Attorney William Hopper had asked the judge to deny bond, citing several examples of evidence he said pointed to Flowers' guilt.

    Flowers was sentenced to death during his sixth trial in 2010. The U.S. Supreme Court overturned that conviction in June, finding that prosecutors had shown an unconstitutional pattern of excluding African American jurors throughout Flowers’ trials.

    After that decision, Flowers was moved off death row at the Mississippi State Penitentiary at Parchman and was taken to a regional jail in the central Mississippi town of Louisville.

    In mid-November, four black voters and a branch of the NAACP filed a federal lawsuit asking a judge to permanently order District Attorney Doug Evans and his assistants to stop using peremptory challenges to remove African American residents as potential jurors because of their race.

    His father, Archie Lee Flowers, said he has always believed in his son's innocence and frequently visited his son in prison, where they sang and prayed together.

    Supporters, who were among the more than 150 people packing the courtroom Monday, hugged Flowers after the judge announced his decision.

    A daughter of Tardy, one of the victims, was in court Monday. She sat across the aisle and one row back from Flowers' 26-year-old daughter, Crystal Ghoston, who sat in the front row.

    Ghoston, of Grenada, Mississippi, said she and her father will take their first-ever photo together and that he wants to take her and his granddaughter to Disney World.

    https://www.foxnews.com/us/mississip...s-granted-bond
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
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  9. #39
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    My god, what a time hope this must feel like! Being out in the world after being locked up for 22 years.

  10. #40
    Moderator Bobsicles's Avatar
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    Charges against Curtis Flowers dropped

    At long last, Curtis Flowers is free.

    The Mississippi man endured nearly 23 years behind bars, six trials, four death sentences and, most recently, months of house arrest for murders he always maintained that he didn’t commit, and for which the evidence of his guilt was weak.

    His legal odyssey ended Friday when the Mississippi Attorney General’s Office, which had been reviewing the case since February, submitted a motion to dismiss the indictments against him for the 1996 murders of four people in Winona, Mississippi. Judge Joey Loper then signed an order granting the motion. The move brought the State of Mississippi v. Curtis Flowers to a decisive close.

    “Today, I am finally free from the injustice that left me locked in a box for nearly 23 years,” Flowers said in a statement released by his attorneys. “I’ve been asked if I ever thought this day would come. … With a family that never gave up on me and with them by my side, I knew it would.”

    Flowers’ case became the focus of national attention two years ago after an investigation by APM Reports’ podcast In the Dark found that his conviction was based on unreliable evidence.

    District Attorney Doug Evans had tried Flowers an unprecedented six times for the murders at the Tardy Furniture store, which shattered the rural community of Winona. Evans couldn’t be reached for comment on Friday afternoon at his office or home.

    Flowers’ first three trials resulted in death sentences that were overturned by the Mississippi Supreme Court. His fourth and fifth trials ended in hung juries. Flowers’ sixth trial, in 2010, sent him back to death row at Parchman prison, where he might have remained had the U.S. Supreme Court not decided to take up his case.

    In June 2019, the High Court reversed Flowers’ conviction and death sentence, sending his case back to Montgomery County for a possible seventh trial and touching off a string of legal victories.

    In December, a judge granted his release on bail, setting Flowers, 50, free after he had spent nearly half his life behind bars. Then Evans, who had zealously pursued Flowers for a quarter century, recused himself from the case and handed it over to the Attorney General’s Office.

    But all the while that Flowers was out on bail, the specter of a seventh trial loomed. Friday — with Attorney General Lynn Fitch’s decision to drop all charges — that threat, and the possibility of being sent back to death row, are finally gone. Against incredible odds, Flowers is a free man.

    “People get exonerated from death row because of a combination of relentless persistence, good lawyering, strong evidence that they didn’t do it and just plain luck,” said Robert Dunham, Executive Director of the Death Penalty Information Center, which estimates that roughly 4 percent of death row inmates in the United States are innocent.

    “You can’t line up those elements. They happen or they don’t. You’re struck by providence,” he said.

    https://www.apmreports.org/episode/2...rs-are-dropped
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