Mississippi Finally Ceases Prosecution of Black Man After 6 Failed Attempts at Conviction

After 6 failed attempts at conviction, Mississippi has finally dismissed murder charges against 50-year-old Curtis Flowers.

The failed prosecution of Mr Flowers was repeatedly marred by racial prejudice and bias. The District Attorney repeatedly demonstrated a determination to exclude Black jurors, and was finally rebuffed in a 7-2 decision written by Trump appointee Brett Kavanaugh.

Mr Flowers was initially charged for the 1996 capital murders of four people inside a furniture store in Winona. Prosecutors alleged that Flowers, who had previously worked for the store’s owner Beth Tardy, had shot her with a stolen pistol in an act of revenge, while proceeding to murder three other employees as they were witnesses to the crime.

At the time of these murders, Flowers was 26 years old, and according to one of Flowers’ attorneys, had no prior criminal history, nor did he have any inclination to commit one either. Much of Flowers’ convictions were believed to be determined through racial discrimination, a systemic issue that has been evident within the court system for years now.

Due to the number of trials in Flowers’ case, as well as the fact that many Black jurors were purposefully excluded from several of his trials as a result of the prosecutor’s Unconstitutional conduct, Mr Flowers’ case gained widespread attention. During Mr Flowers’ trials, 61 of the 72 jurors were white, and each of the six trials had either led to mistrials or reversed convictions.

Mr Flowers’ most recent trial in 2010 ended with him being sentenced to death. However, that conviction was reversed by the United States Supreme Court because of the diligent and tireless work of Mr Flowers’ lawyers. Finally, after reversal of that conviction, Mr Flowers was finally set free.

The Supreme Court, after reviewing the record of all 6 trials, concluded that Mr Flowers was the victim of systematic racial discrimination which deprived him of a fair and impartial jury, resulting from the prosecutor’s relentless campaign of excluding Black jurors.

Thus, Mr Flowers faced an unprecedented 7th trial as a result of the unconstitutional racial discrimination prosecutor Doug Evans’ had practiced throughout Flowers’ cases.

Finally, instead of proceeding to a 7th trial, the attorney general’s office decided to dismiss the charges, because there was very little evidence to prove that it was Mr Flowers who committed the crimes in the first place. One major witness in Flowers’ case has since died, and another had recanted their prior statements against Flowers’, claiming that he had lied. Odell Hallmon, the witness, spoke out about this mistake in the podcast, “In the Dark.”

Being wrongfully prosecuted for these crimes for over two decades, Mr Flowers had maintained his innocence from the very beginning. This is yet another case of a Black individual whose life was irreparably harmed due to prosecution founded on racial discrimination and bias.

Mr Flowers was eventually vindicated due to the hard work of his family, the power of social media, and his dedicated lawyers. Mr Flowers’ proceedings prove that justice can be achieved despite the implacable determination of the State to destroy a man based on Unconstitutional racial bias.