V14n52 The Curious Case of the DA the AG & Two Men In Jail by Jackson Free Press Magazine

vol. 14 no. 52

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August 31 - September 6, 2016 | daily news at jfp.ms

The Curious Case of

DA AG & the

the

Two Men In Jail

Ladd and Summers Jr. pp 14 - 20 Could Trump Lose Mississippi? Dreher, p 11

A Taste of Memphis Matthews, p 22

Lisbon Deathsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; New Life Taylor, p 27

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Imani Khayyam

JACKSONIAN Joshua Powell

oshua Powell, an actor and producer working with Action Talent Agency in Flowood, may soon be on his way to a theater near you. Powell does most of his work in and around Jackson, including producing short films with local filmmaker Wade Patterson of Blazewalker Pictures. This summer, Powell and Patterson debuted their latest project, “Bare Knuckle,” a film about bare-knuckle boxing in the 1880s in which Powell played the lead character, The Boxer. He also recently acted in the film “Eve’s Diary,” which will premier at Film Haven in Brookhaven on Sept. 10. One of the largest projects Powell has been a part of is “Mississippi Grind,” a film that stars Ryan Reynolds and Ben Mendelson and that made him eligible to join the Screen Actors Guild. The film showed at Sundance Film Festival in 2015 and is available on Amazon. Powell says his favorite thing about acting is the feeling of connection that he can achieve with his character and with the audience. “I like to both express and become characters, and I like to learn every aspect of the character for myself, as well, like all the training in boxing that came with working on ‘Bare Knuckle,’” Powell says. Powell grew up in Biloxi and moved to Clinton in 2004 to attend Mississippi College, where he initially intended to study music. While there, Powell did his first theater work as an adult, taking part in Shakespeare plays that

contents

the college puts on each spring. He also became involved in one-act plays the college’s directing students put on. By his junior year, Powell had switched his major to communications with an emphasis in theater and a minor in music, graduating with a bachelor’s degree in 2008. After graduation, another MC student, Wesley Caldwell, recruited him for his web series called “Bags and Boards,” which is about people who hang out in a comic store. After coming onto the project, Powell began learning about cameras and filming techniques from YouTube videos and other Internet resources. His current project is “Mudcat,” a dramatic comedy that follows two brothers whose uncle recently passed away. Powell plays the lead, Adrian, the brother of actor Miles Donald’s character, Dominic. The film is hosting a fundraising campaign at helpmudcat.com. Powell is co-writing the project alongside head writer, producer and co-creator Robert Jordan, co-writer Cat Wilks and creator Michael Brouphy, who will also serve as director of cinematography. “I do everything I can to make a project come to fruition. I also help local screenwriters, actors and directors build up their careers, so I can build out the local filmmaking community as well. It’s important to help cultivate the talents of those around you and to take initiative to make things happen with the people you know to best achieve your goals.” —Dustin Cardon

cover photos of Robert Smith (left) and Jim Hood by Imani Khayyam

11 Trumped in Jackson

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump visited Jackson last week and is leading Clinton in all polls conducted thus far in Mississippi. Could it be close?

13 Lessons on Race in Cuba

“Thank you to the people of Cuba, who reminded me that kindness and love translate to something well beyond words.” —Kevin Fong, “¡Chino!”

27 New Life in Lisbon Read about local pop band Lisbon Deaths.

August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

4 ............................. Editor’s Note 6 ............................................ Talks 12 ................................. editorial 13 ..................................... opinion 14 ............................. Cover Story 22 .......................................... food 24 ........................................ 8 Days 25 ....................................... Events 25 ...................................... sports 27 ........................................ music 27 ........................ music listings 29 ..................................... Puzzles 31 ........................................ astro 31 .............................. Classifieds

Derek Middlebrook; courtesy Kevin Fong; Imani Khayyam

August 31 - September 6, 2016 | Vol. 14 No. 52

editor’s note

by Amber Helsel, Assistant Editor

Look to Hattiesburg

almost hit someone with my car the other day. But it wasn’t because I or another driver was being stupid. It was a pedestrian. He was walking on the side of North State Street, and another car was in the lane beside me, so I couldn’t move over. Luckily, I saw the pedestrian and had enough time to slow down and go around him, but it could’ve easily been a lot different. I’ll admit that instead of walking on the road, he probably should’ve been walking in the grass. But those are the two choices: You walk on the road or walk in grass, and we all know you could get hurt doing either. I live about a quarter of a mile from my local grocery store, so occasionally, I’ll walk to it if I only need to get a couple of items and just don’t feel like going through the effort of getting in my car and driving. But most of Rankin County doesn’t have sidewalks, so just like the pedestrian in Jackson, I have to make a choice: Do I walk on grass, dirt and gravel, where cars still get too close for comfort, or do I walk on the road and risk my life? My mom tells me not to walk to the grocery store. And I’ll agree with her that it can be dangerous, and I have to be careful not to go when there’s heavy traffic. Sometimes, it’s just easier, though, and sometimes, I just want to get some exercise in. Our office is in downtown Jackson, which means we have several coffee shops and businesses that are about a five- to 15minute walk away. Except for the occasional aggressive driver who doesn’t yield at a crosswalk, I don’t worry about getting hit as a pedestrian as much. Why? Because downtown Jackson has sidewalks. It’s walkable. I can get to the bus station if I ever need to. I can go get a snack at Downtown Snack Shop if I’m in the mood. I can get coffee at Cups Espresso Café. I can walk to Wasabi and get some sushi for lunch. However, not all areas

of Jackson are pedestrian-friendly. Downtown Hattiesburg is a stark contrast to Jackson. I took a day off of work once and, on a whim, went to Hattiesburg. I’ve decided that I want to explore more of my home state, so that city was the first stop. The area is one of the smallest downtowns I’ve ever seen—it really only encompasses a few blocks. But it’s walkable. There are some tall buildings and cool little shops that I could get to by foot without any worry that walking might put me in danger. I didn’t know this until about a month

often run late or don’t come at all, which inconveniences people who depend on public transportation to get around. Head over to jfp.ms/uneasyriders to read a recent cover story to see what I mean. So we have a bus system that is often unreliable, and we don’t have enough sidewalks. Are there any bright sides? I like to think so. The Museum to Market Trail, which will run through downtown, Belhaven and Lakeland Drive, is expected to be completed by late 2017. Not only does it provide a walking trail, but it could also give

I wish I knew what the future holds for Jackson. ago, but once upon a time, a trolley line was one of the best ways to get around Jackson. Frank A. Brooks Jr.’s article “Travelling by Trolley in Mississippi: Jackson” on the website Preservation in Mississippi (one of my new favorite websites) says the first tracks appeared in Jackson in 1871 with mule-drawn cars. The lines traveled streets such as State, Fortification and West. By 1916, Jackson had 22 cars that spanned over 16 miles of track. But by 1924, it shrank to 20 cars and 13.5 miles of track, and in 1935, the city exchanged trolley lines for buses. With construction on many areas in the city, many of the trolley tracks have disappeared, though you can still see them in a few locations. And of course, there’s The Fondren Express, which runs routes in the Fondren neighborhood. We do have JATRAN, but the buses

the city an economic boost because it runs through the heart of downtown, near where the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum and Mississippi History Museum will be. And who knows? Maybe it will also become an easier way for people to get around or at least offer them a chance to get to the museums and the Mississippi Farmers Market. Meanwhile, JATRAN is looking into options such as buying used buses through the Federal Transit Authority. Only time will tell what happens, but at least transit authorities are seeing that something needs to change. In a TED Talk from 2013, urbanist Jeff Speck said that when he was growing up in the 1970s, a typical American would spend about 1/10th of their income on transportation. With the number of roads in the U.S. having doubled since then, we now spend

about a 1/5th of our income on transportation, which amounts to slightly more than we spent on housing. Speck used Portland, Ore., as an example of a city that has tried to minimize its traffic flow It instituted a “skinny streets” program, encouraging people to drive less, and invested in biking and walking. Portland citizens now drive about 20 percent less than the rest of the country, and they spend more money on recreation and home investment, which both go back into the community a lot of times, than the rest of America. Between the last two censuses before 2013, Portland also saw 50 percent more college-educated millennials move to the city—five times more than anywhere else. I could go on about his TED Talk, but watching Speck showed me one thing for certain: If we can make Jackson more walkable, we’d save money, we’d be healthier, and rather than just slowing brain drain, it might make our city a place that more young people actively want to move to. Jackson is far from perfect, but it’s at least a city that knows things needs to change—and for the most part, it seems to want to. I wish I knew what the future holds for Jackson. I hope it’s bright. I believe it’s bright, if the city can overcome all of its obstacles. But I also don’t think it’s only up to city officials to make that happen. It’s also up to us—the community. We all have a part in bringing Jackson into the future. And I think to do that, we also have to look toward cities such as Portland and Hattiesburg and make strides toward the future like they did. Assistant Editor Amber Helsel is a foodie-in-training and an artist, and her favorite pastime is people-watching. Her patronus charm is a cat. Email her story ideas at amber@jacksonfreepress.com.

August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

contributors

Donna Ladd

Tim Summers Jr.

Sierra Mannie

Arielle Dreher

Amber Taylor

Dustin Cardon

Imani Khayyam

Zilpha Young

JFP Editor and co-founder Donna Ladd is a Neshoba County native. A Mississippi State and Columbia grad, she has long dug into the shadowy corners of Jackson, especially the criminal-justice system. She co-wrote the cover story.

City Reporter Tim Summers Jr. enjoys loud live music, teaching his cat to fetch, long city council meetings and FOIA requests. Send him story ideas at tim@jacksonfreepress.com. He co-wrote the cover story and its sidebars.

Education Reporting Fellow Sierra Mannie is a University of Mississippi whose opinions of the Ancient Greeks can’t be trusted nearly as much as her opinions of Beyoncé. She wrote about a judge fighting the school-to-prison pipeline.

News Reporter Arielle Dreher is working on finding some new hobbies and adopting an otter from the Jackson Zoo. Email her story ideas at arielle@jacksonfreepress. com. She wrote about polls in Mississippi and mental health.

Freelancer Amber Taylor is a recent Murrah High School graduate and member of the JFP Youth Media Project. When not writing, she enjoys acting, costume design and volleyball. She wrote about indie-pop band Lisbon Deaths.

Web Editor Dustin Cardon is a graduate of the University of Southern Mississippi. He enjoys reading fantasy novels and wants to write them himself one day. He wrote about Jacksonian Joshua Powell.

Staff Photographer Imani Khayyam is an art lover and a native of Jackson. He loves to be behind the camera and capture the true essence of his subjects. He took the cover photo.

Zilpha Young is an ad designer by day, painter, illustrator, seamstress and freelance designer by night. Check out her design portfolio at www.zilphacreates.com. She designed ads for the issue.

August 31 - September 6, 2016 â&#x20AC;¢ jfp.ms

“My job is not to babysit, not to correct disruptions. My job is (helping) kids who commit delinquent acts. It’s been so much more pleasant working within the county now that we all know our limitations.”

The Mental-Health Conundrum p9

— Judge Sharon Sigalas, Jackson County Youth Court judge

Two Lawsuits Rock City of Jackson by Donna Ladd and Tim Summers Jr.

Imani Khayyam/file photo

Tuesday, August 23 The Jackson City Zoo drops its affiliation with a national accreditation agency in the wake of news that its yearly contribution from the City of Jackson is expected to drop by $250,000 for fiscalyear 2017. … The Southern Poverty Law Center, representing a group of Jackson residents, files a motion for summary judgment in a case over how Mississippi’s charter schools are funded and governed. Wednesday, August 24 Guy E. “Butch” Evans of Jackson is charged with paying bribes and kickbacks to former Mississippi Department of Corrections Commissioner Christopher B. Epps in exchange for exclusive access to sell insurance products to MDOC employees. … Donald Trump visits Jackson for a private fundraiser at the convention center and a rally at the Mississippi Coliseum. Thursday, August 25 Kimberly V. Bracey, Mayor Tony Yarber’s former executive assistant, files a complaint in federal court accusing him of sex discrimination, sexual harassment and a hostile workplace within City Hall, and of having several different work-related sexual liaisons at the same time. Friday, August 26 Lara Gill, a former attorney for the City of Jackson, files a lawsuit claiming that the city attorney’s office wrongfully terminated her and discriminated against her because she is white.

August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

Saturday, August 27 Rodney Earl Sanders of Kosciusko, Miss., is arrested and charged with capital murder after confessing to killing Sisters Margaret Held and Paula Merrill, two nuns found dead in their Mississippi home.

Sunday, August 28 Donald Trump announces that he will soon reveal his proposal to crack down on illegal immigration and whether he will use a “deportation force” to eject the estimated 11 million people in the U.S. illegally. Monday, August 29 A memorial Mass is held at the Cathedral of St. Peter the Apostle in Jackson for the two 68-year-old nuns who were killed in their Mississippi home. Get breaking news at jfpdaily.com.

Mayor Tony Yarber and the City of Jackson are involved in two lawsuits for discrimination: one by the mayor’s former assistant and another by an attorney.

Last week brought a legal one-two punch to Mayor Tony Yarber and his administration. On Thursday, Aug. 25, Yarber’s former executive assistant filed a complaint in federal court accusing him of sex discrimination, sexual harassment and a hostile workplace within City Hall, and of having different work-related sexual liaisons going at the same time. Kimberly V. Bracey, who went to work for Yarber on April 24, 2014, alleges that the mayor, who is married, was also having an affair with Jackson City Attorney Monica Joiner at the same time that

she was in a sexual relationship with him. Joiner was her roommate at the time. “Plaintiff did not make Ms. Joiner aware of this relationship as Ms. Joiner was also actively pursuing a sexual relationship (with) Defendant Yarber,” the complaint states. Louis H. Watson Jr. of Watson & Norris PLLC is representing Bracey. The complaint states that Bracey was aware that Yarber was having “numerous sexual relationships with other women during this time.” Bracey states that she believes two other city employees were terminated

because they refused the mayor’s sexual advances. Yarber released a statement this afternoon calling Bracey’s effort “vicious and scandalous,” and her “disgruntled.” “The City of Jackson has been made aware of a vicious and scandalous lawsuit filed by a former disgruntled employee, Kimberly Y. Vaunterice Bracey,” the mayor’s statement said. “Although the City has not been served with a copy of the complaint and summons, Mayor Tony T. Yarber and the City of Jackson stand ready to vigorously defend against each and every frivolous allegation made by Kimberly Y. Vaunterice Bracey.” City Hall also threatened to fire back legally at Bracey’s allegations. “When appropriate, the City of Jackson, Mayor Tony T. Yarber and City personnel will seek all available remedies against Mrs. Bracey and possibly others, for this egregious character assassination and political ploy,” the statement said. The plaintiff is asking for reinstatement or future wages in lieu of reinstatement; back pay; compensatory damages; punitive damages; costs and expenses; and attorney’s fees. The city attorney’s office did not return requests for comment. Lara Gill v. City of Jackson A former deputy city attorney is suing the City of Jackson for race discrimination, racial harassment, retaliation and more LAWSUIT, see page 8

What Are They Doing?

by JFP Staff It seems like state lawmakers don’t pay attention sometimes. So if they aren’t listening to vital information, what are they doing? We have some ideas. • Sleeping with their eyes open • Trying to get enough magikarp to make a gyarados • Playing paper football • Secretly reading the Jackson Free Press • Trying to see if they can lick their elbows • Wondering what’s for lunch • Plotting the demise of Jackson

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August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

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TALK | education

Youth Judge Fights School-to-Prison Pipeline by Sierra Mannie

Pascagoula High School

ASCAGOULA, Miss.—Just a few years ago, sagging dents referred to the criminal-justice system by their schools pants and disrupting instruction at school were almost has been declining. certain to land a kid in front of Jackson County Youth While Sigalas can’t take all the credit, the judge’s efforts Court Judge Sharon Sigalas. At that time, Sigalas says may be part of the reason. the school districts under her jurisdiction were in a pattern of At first, Sigalas says, her new rules for the schools were sending kids to her for what she calls “minor violations.” somewhat controversial. She says in the beginning, she got `Sigalas says the practice was a burden on the court sys- calls from nearly every superintendent claiming they couldn’t tem. “We don’t need to be the babysitter for kids the school keep “disruptive kids” in their classes. Most children came determines are disruptive,” she said. from Pascagoula or Moss Point schools—both districts that So the judge of 13 years took action. She wrote a letter have central offices in close proximity to the youth court. that she now sends out to the four school districts under her Once children arrived at the youth court, they would jurisdiction at the beginning of each school year. In the letter often end up staying far longer than needed. In the coastal she mandates the criteria that schools must use when deciding community of Pascagoula, many parents commute 35 whether they can send a student to the Jackson County Youth Court: possession of weapons or drugs on campus, assault on teachers or other students with serious injury, or committing any sexual offenses that constitute a crime. Everything else, like dress-code violations and behavior issues, the schools have to deal with themselves. Sigalas’ action comes at a time when school districts nationwide are under fire for sending youth, especially young men of color, into the justice system for seemingly minor offenses, creating a school-to-prison pipeline. Experts say exclusionary discipline policies such as out-of-school suspension and brushes with law enforcement at school only maintain Pascagoula High School principal Anthony Herbert says the pipeline; that is, sending young people into effective discipline policies that build trust between the students and faculty keeps kids out of juvenile detention. the system for minor offenses, oftentimes leading to their increased involvement with law enforcement and committing more serious crimes. A 2006 Justice Policy Institute report found that “de- miles to Harrison County to work in casinos or in the tention has a profoundly negative impact on young people’s shipyard, where they’re not allowed to have a cell phone. mental and physical well-being, their education and their Sigalas said youth-court employees would essentially end employment.” up babysitting kids until their parents came to get them In 2015, more than 10,000 minors in Mississippi, the late in the afternoon—and, if their parents showed up majority of whom were black, entered the juvenile-justice too late, the court was forced to detain kids it wasn’t even system. Schools referred about 6.6 percent of young people planning on incarcerating. in the system that year to the courts. “Once we hold them so long, they have to be booked in; Since Sigalas began sending off her letters, warning we can’t babysit them back there,” she said. schools to keep kids out of the courts unless absolutely neces- The new rules worked. Sigalas says that in the years sary, the statewide percentage of students local schools of stu- of implementation, her youth court rarely receives chil-

dren sent in from school anymore. Although still high compared to other counties, the overall number of minors referred to the youth courts in Jackson County from all sources, including schools, has also slowly declined, from 776 in 2009 to 490 in 2015. “The schools are (now) really receptive to the idea,” she said. “They understand that kids need to be in school, not in jail.” Pascagoula-Gautier Superintendent Wayne Rodolfich says the change has positively affected his district. “Initially, we had a high number of students we’d refer to youth court due to the actions of those students,” Rodolfich said. “We opened communication lines with parents of kids who are struggling. One of the things we do at each of our secondary schools is meet with those parents during registration and talk about how we can help their children stay out of trouble.” Rodolfich says they also emphasize a motto Dr. Hank Bounds promoted when he was state superintendent in 2005. “We tell the kids, ‘If you have a problem, or think you’re going to have a problem, come to the office and let us know,’” Rodolfich says. Anthony Herbert, principal at Pascagoula High School, says the school’s staff members work hard to build trust, not only among students, faculty and staff, but also parents and law enforcement. “We’re not going to cry wolf: If we need that assistance (with a student), we have that assistance. Otherwise, we can handle it in-house,” he said. Herbert says the culture at his school is one of trust, communication and accountability. Parents, students, faculty and staff constantly communicate, and it’s common for administration to even put their desks in hallways during the school day to better interact with the students. When everyone has clear expectations of how they’re supposed to act, he says, schools have safe and orderly environments. Sigalas says this approach has helped her, too. “My job is not to babysit, not to correct disruptions. My job is (helping) kids who commit delinquent acts. It’s been so much more pleasant working within the county now that we all know our limitations,” she said. Sierra Mannie is an education reporting fellow for the Jackson Free Press and The Hechinger Report. Email her at sierra@jacksonfreepress.com.

August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

LAWSUIT from page 6

violation of her First Amendment and due-process rights in federal court. It was the second lawsuit that involves City Attorney Monica Joiner, although the complaint does not mention her by name. In this lawsuit, Lara E. Gill, who is white, alleges that she was wrongfully transferred, demoted and ultimately terminated over the course of three days in December 2014 although she had worked for the City as a litigator since July 2008. The suit says she was first transferred out of the Litigation Division, although she

“was the most qualified litigator,” and was being transferred to an area where she had no experience. In addition, the complaint says, “African American deputy city attorneys with less litigation experience than Gill but municipal court experience were not transferred.” Reached on Friday, Gill told the Jackson Free Press, “I have no comment and must trust the legal process.” Gill alleges that she was not allowed to question the city attorney’s decision and

that Joiner did not “provide an explanation worthy of credence” for the transfer. City of Jackson spokeswoman Shelia Byrd has provided the JFP’s requests for comment in both lawsuits to the City’s legal department, she said in an email. A City statement in response to the Bracey lawsuit indicated that it will vigorously fight that lawsuit: “Mayor Tony T. Yarber and the City of Jackson stand ready to vigorously defend against each and every frivolous allegation made by Kimberly Y. Vaunterice Bracey. When appropriate,

the City of Jackson, Mayor Tony T. Yarber, and City personnel will seek all available remedies against Mrs. Bracey and possibly others, for this egregious character assassination and political ploy.” The Jackson City Council called a special meeting Tuesday, but neither Yarber nor Joiner attended, citing other commitments. Council members drilled James Anderson of the legal department, but he did not answer questions. Then, the council went into executive session. Follow this story at jfp.ms/citylawsuits.

TALK | health

Mississippi’s Mental-Health Conundrum

Most viral stories at jfp.ms:

1. Attorney Sues City of Jackson for Race Discrimination, ‘Malicious’ Termination” by Donna Ladd 2. Woman Sues Mayor for Sex Discrimination, Mayor Calls Her ‘Disgruntled’” by Donna Ladd and Tim Summers Jr. 3. “Zoo Backs Out of National Accreditation to Focus on Raising Funds” by Tim Summers Jr. 4. “The Art and Craft of Dak Prescott” by Donna Ladd 5. “Teach For America and the Retention Problem” by Sierra Mannie Join the conversation at jfp.ms

Most viral events at jfpevents.com:

1. Mississippi Craft Show, Aug. 27 2. PM Burger 4, Aug. 27 3. Roll In & Showing Out Explosion Car and Truck Show, Aug. 27 4. Third Annual Jackson All-Star Comedy Showcase, Aug. 27 5. Enchanted Evening, Aug. 27 Find more events at jfpevents.com.

with mental illnesses under ADA, in 2011 when then-Gov. Haley Barbour received a findings letter that said Mississippi has “the most institution-reliant system in the United States.” A September 2015 progress update report from the Department of Mental Health says that “the Attorney General and Jonathan Smith, chief of the Special Litiga-

Delaware received a letter in 2010, similar to Mississippi’s. “[W]e have concluded that the State’s current mental health system fails to provide services to individuals with mental illness in the most integrated setting appropriate to their needs as required by the ADA,” the 2010 DOJ letter to Delaware states. “This has resulted in needless prolonged institutionImani Khayyam File Photo.

he mood shift in the old Mississippi Supreme Court room was palpable last week when the Department of Mental Health faced a group of legislators tasked with evaluating the agency’s effectiveness and expenditures in upcoming months. That’s because the elephant in the room would not stay quiet: The U.S. Department of Justice has sued the State of Mississippi for failing to provide enough community-based services to individuals with mental illnesses and developmental disabilities, by over-relying on institutionalization. What baffled lawmakers was exactly why the State still managed to get sued after appropriating additional monies to the department (like increasing funding by $16.1 million each year since fiscal-year 2015) to increase the state’s offerings in communitybased mental-health services. Starting in 2008, the State began closing beds in the state psychiatric hospitals—close to 500—by not replacing patients’ spots after they were discharged, lawmakers recalled last week. This was before the DOJ even got involved in Mississippi’s mental health-care system. But by 2011, the State was still struggling to provide enough community-based services, and consequently, several mentally ill Mississippians began to cycle in and out of state hospitals. One 27-year-old man at Mississippi State Hospital in March 2015 had 22 prior admissions to the hospital, the Aug. 11 DOJ complaint says. The DOJ made the State publicly aware of its compliance issues with the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Olmstead U.S. Supreme Court ruling, which supports community-based services for those

Diana Mikula, the executive director of the Mississippi Department of Mental Health, said the state’s mental-health system is moving in the right direction— but not fast enough to avoid a lawsuit from the U.S. Department of Justice.

tion Section for DOJ, signed a letter outlining the next steps for…settling these alleged Olmstead/ADA violations.” The same 2014 letter is referenced in a May 12, 2015, PEER report that says that the letter did not constitute an admission to factual allegations from the DOJ on the state’s system but instead outlined actions, like the Legislature appropriating more money and expanding waiver options, to ensure more community-based mental healthcare for Mississippians. Something happened between September and this summer, however, because in his news release following the DOJ’s announcement, Jim Hood said his office had been negotiating for several years to avoid litigation. “The Attorney General refused to accept the federal government’s demands for a court-ordered consent decree that would bind the state to perpetual federal oversight,” the Aug. 11 press release states. Other states served with similar letters have entered consent decrees or settlement agreements with the DOJ to avoid litigation, which Hood said in his press release would be “a considerable cost to the state.” What Other States Do It’s not that Mississippi did not react when they received their findings letter in 2011, but other states put in similar circumstances at the time reacted quicker.

alization of many individuals with disabilities in DPC (Delaware Psychiatric Center) who could be served in the community.” Delaware is a smaller state than Mississippi with a population of around 935,000. DPC is its only state hospital for mentally ill patients, but even in a small state with one hospital, Delaware could have been doing more in 2010 to offer community-based care. The new secretary of the state’s Department of Health and Social Services, Rita Landgraf, knew it. Landgraf came from an advocacy background and knew a lot about the state’s problems with mental-health care, so when she received the notice from the U.S. Department of Justice, she wasted no time taking action. The state ended up with a court-sanctioned settlement agreement, signed in 2011, that lasted five years. Landgraf said she planned on working to change the state’s mental-health care system, but said the agreement with DOJ expedited the process and brought the problem to the attention of state lawmakers. “The settlement agreement gave us an opportunity to transform the system a bit quicker than if we didn’t have a settlement agreement,” Landgraf told the Jackson Free Press in an interview. Landgraf and her staff had the support of their governor, as well as the general as-

sembly, to appropriate more funding for the changes that were necessary in order to meet the requirements of the settlement agreement. Part of that support came from Landgraf’s ability to educate lawmakers on the importance of evolving the state’s system. “I think in any state that has this level of transformation, you can’t do it with the existing funds; it’s not going to happen,” Landgraf said. “Here’s what I would say, though. I had to educate them (lawmakers) not only on the settlement agreement but on that transformation … (and) the fact that we would invest in the system now and get a good return on investment in the future.” The Delaware Department of Health and Social Services has continued to downsize its psychiatric hospital since 2011, and Landgraf says that DPC has now cut its patient admissions in half. For every one person who receives services in the hospital, three are out in the community receiving services. “I’ve been able to downsize as I invest in the community,” she said. “I can take my budget that goes to these facilities, along with my community budget, and move some of those fiscal resources in to the community.” It’s not a perfect system, however, because some of the funds that go to the hospital are necessary to help keep the building up and functioning. Regardless, it’s cheaper to treat individuals with mental illness in the community versus in institutional care. Mississippi: ‘Not Fast Enough’ Diana Mikula, the executive director of DMH, addressed the DOJ lawsuit briefly at the capitol last week, telling lawmakers that even DOJ acknowledges that the state is offering the right types of community-based services, but that “they just want more, and that’s what I believe is going to happen.” “We are going to be addressing the need for more waiver spots, the need for more local crisis teams, the need for more PAC teams, community-treatment teams, crisisstabilization units,” Mikula told lawmakers. She said the state’s 14 community mental-health centers are doing an excellent job offering community-based services and that the State, including the Legislature with appropriations, made a good-faith effort in avoiding the litigation. “They (community mental-health centers) need more money, and it came down to we just didn’t do it fast enough,” Mikula said. The Olmstead ruling, as well as a 2003 national commission that then-President more MENTAL HEALTH, see page 11

August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

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TALK | 2016 election

Polls, Voter Turnout and Winning Mississippi by Arielle Dreher

George W. Bush put together, both echo what good research on mental-health care says: Individuals with serious mental illnesses can recover with access to treatment in their own communities, not institutions. The over-reliance on state hospitals is not unique to Mississippi; institutionalization had been the norm in this country until the 1960s, when there was a federal push to move toward community-based services for the mentally ill. States transitioned to behavioral-health treatment, and in Mississippi, behavioral-health programs are run in Mississippi’s state hospitals and regional centers. Four state hospitals and two residential programs make up DMH’s behavioral-health programs. The state also offers six centers for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Hospitals and residential centers, while necessary for some patients, do not

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump boasted of leading polls in lots of locations when he spoke in Jackson last Wednesday.

percent of the white vote in the state, as well as rely heavily on African American voter turnout. Clinton drew 87 percent of the African American vote in the Magellan poll, but this number could fluctuate depending on voter turnout. Traditionally, Mississippi has been a low-turnout state, but has grown in recent presidential elections. In 2008, when Barack Obama first ran for president, Mississippi posted the highest voter turnout numbers in the state’s history. Secretary of State data show that 1.289 million Mississippians voted in the 2008 November election out of 1.895 million registered voters or 68 percent. In 2012, 1.285 million Mississippians voted, setting another high level of voter participation—but not quite matching 2008. D’Andra Orey, a political-science professor at Jackson State University, said Mississippi turnout this year might increase due to Trump’s message resonating with conservative Republicans throughout the state. In this year’s Republican primary, Mississippi posted record numbers in terms of turnout with 416,252 Republicans voting in the primary election, secretary of state data show. NPR reported that this number is much higher than the 2012 primary. “Mississippi is one of the most conservative states in the union if not the most, and Trump has delivered at least

qualify as “community-based services.” More community-based services are available to Mississippians, offered through one of the state’s 14 community mentalhealth centers, as well as through community organizations and nonprofits that run programs and services funded by the DMH. However, the majority of state funds in the DMH budget in the past years have gone toward keeping state hospitals and regional centers open. For example, the DMH Central Office Service Budget of the department, which funds the state’s 14 community mentalhealth centers and providers who offer community-based mental-health care services, spent $69.6 million in fiscal year 2016. The Mississippi State Hospital alone spent $127.6 million of the state’s money in the same year. Landgraf echoed what Mikula told lawmakers last week at the Mississippi Capitol about transformational change in the men-

early on one of the most conservative set of messages … and I think that resonates with Republican Mississippi voters,” Orey said. “And that might be the impetus for increasing voter turnout for Republicans.” On Tuesday, Gov. Phil Bryant and other state Republican leaders were scheduled to announce the Trump campaign headquarters in Mississippi. Trump surprised the RNC earlier in August when he asked the party to themselves open field offices for him in all 50 states—an unusual strategy, Politico reported. Campaign offices are typically concentrated in battleground states. Two Reuters’ Ipsos polls, released recently, which are national in scope but included Mississippians, seem to match the Magellan poll’s results. Around 53 percent of those surveyed support Trump. It’s only August, and more polls will continue to roll out the political snapshot of this year’s election. Orey said he thinks this election could draw comparable numbers to past presidential election years like 2008 or 2012, but not necessarily for the same reasons. “Trump can increase turnout, and Hillary can increase turnout, but it would be because those turning out would be against (the other candidate). It’s more of a voting against a candidate than voting for a candidate,” he said.

tal-health care system: It takes time. “It’s an evolving system, even when you transform what you created today to have a really good system of care, in health, that you want it to continue to evolve,” Landgraf said. “What happens in government because we are a system, and we’re very bureaucratic, sometimes, we can’t respond to that level of transformation.” Community mental-health advocate and executive director of Families as Allies Joy Hogge, who attended last week’s working group at the capitol, said that not only lawmakers, but consumers also need to be educated in best practices in mental-health care, particularly that institutionalization should be used to stabilize patients who need it, but community-based services should be the goto service to help both patient and provider. “People will tell you what they need— that’s a wonderful way to start developing services,” she told the Jackson Free Press.

“We really haven’t done that in this state: We don’t develop the services, and I don’t think people have that information.” Delaware’s settlement agreement, five years later, seemed to work; the ninth court monitor’s report says “the State is on track to fulfill its overall obligations under the Agreement.” Landgraf asked the Delaware general assembly to create a commission to continue to monitor the state’s mental-health care system even after the settlement goes away. The State of Mississippi will now face litigation fees associated with the DOJ lawsuit, and for lawmakers in January, it means another budgetary consideration. As chairman of the House Public Health and Human Services Committee Sam Mims, R-McComb, said last week, “I’m very concerned about how it’s (the lawsuit) going to affect (the) appropriation process next session.” Email state reporter Arielle Dreher at arielle@jacksonfreepress.com. . 11 August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

MENTAL HEALTH from page 9

Imani Khayyam

“W

e had some tremendous polls come out today—we’re leading in a lot of locations.” That’s what Donald Trump told supporters in Jackson last week at the Mississippi Coliseum, but which polls is he leading, and if so, how accurate are they? And more importantly, which polls should voters pay attention to—if any? In Mississippi, so far, Trump looks like the favorite, but some pollsters have also speculated that with the right turnout formula, Clinton could give him competition, depending on several factors. National polling expert Nate Silver wrote in a recent article, “What A Clinton Landslide Would Look Like,” that if Clinton can pull 20 percent of Mississippi’s white vote, “the outcome could be close.” In 2008, only 11 percent of the white vote went to Barack Obama, however, and even with Mississippi’s high percentage of African Americans—the highest in the nation at 38 percent—the white vote would be equally important to make Clinton competitive here. FiveThirtyEight, weighing four polls (two national and two state) in Mississippi, estimates that Trump has around a 91 percent chance of winning the state. A Mason-Dixon poll, which polled registered voters in March, asked a question isolating Trump and Clinton as candidates in the election. Forty-six percent of people who were polled chose Trump, while 43 percent chose Clinton in that Mason-Dixon poll. These numbers led to Silver’s discussion because 20 percent of white voters in that poll chose Clinton. An August poll, which Y’all Politics, a conservative local blog, commissioned and Magellan Strategies conducted, polled likely voters, showing a wider spread between the two candidates. In a question that isolated Trump and Clinton as options for president, 54 percent of those polled chose Trump, while only 39 percent chose Clinton. In this poll, only 15 percent of white voters chose Clinton. Nathan Shrader, a political-science professor at Millsaps College, said the Magellan poll seemed to use a weighted sample that reflects actual voter participation in the state. He said the poll shows that for the Democratic candidate to have a shot in Mississippi, she would need to garner more than 20

Your Sanity Matters

iss Doodle Mae: “The summer of 2016 was a time of mean-spirited individuals escalating fear, apathy, bigotry, racism, xenophobia, homophobia and racial self-hatred. To soothe the nerves of staff and the community, Jojo, our compassionate leader, will organize a sales event focusing on mental-health issues called ‘Your Sanity Matters.’ Chief Crazy Brother, our store display manager, will assist Jojo in facilitating a six-week mental-health series in aisle 6-and3/5 of Jojo’s Discount Dollar Store. “During our daily early-morning staff meeting, Jojo expressed his opinion regarding the mental state of today’s society. He concluded that our society is at the brink of insanity. He noticed the despair and confusion in the faces of his employees and customers who looked like the man in that creepy Edvard Munch painting titled ‘The Scream.’ “To change the picture of doom and gloom in the Ghetto Science Community, Jojo called on psychologist Judy McBride and her psychoanalyst team to conduct weekly therapy sessions for customers and staff mentally affected by reality television, radio, film, social media, etc. Also, for individuals who suffered emotional trauma due to driving while black, brown or anything else, come receive the help you need. “After each mental-health session, Sister Encouragement, co-host of the ‘Rev. Cletus Cars Sales Church’ radio show, will give Jojo’s Discount Dollar Store customers a beautifully designed weekly reminder card of the ‘Serenity Prayer.’ Remember: At Jojo’s Discount Dollar Store, your sanity matters, and everything’s still a dollar.”

Mississippi, Time for More Women in Office

I SAFE “Look how bad it is getting! How much more crime, how many more shootings, will it take for African-Americans and Latinos to vote Trump=SAFE!”

August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

–@realDonaldTrump

Why it stinks: Donald Trump thinks he knows what the American people want, but he has no idea when it comes to what matters most to “minorities.” The Republican presidential nominee and businessman has repeatedly incited international political chaos and encouraged the normalization of hate groups. Whether he is declaring a “temporary” ban on Muslims immigrating into the country, isolating the United States from Mexico by building a wall, degrading an entire race by referring to Mexicans as drug dealers and rapists, tweeting false stats about black crime, or refusing entry to thousands of Syrian refugees, Trump does not make Americans in need feel safe. He makes those in power feel superior. CORRECTIONS: In the original version of last week’s cover story, “Beth Ann Fennelly: Why Poetry is Important,” we spelled Fennelly as Fennelley. Also, in the original version of the arts-preview blurb, “Grab a Pint, Get Painting,” we said that Meredith Gonzalez-Fernandez is an artist and a party hostess for Paint Nite Jackson. She’s actually the owner. The code “JFPlove” is for $20, not 20 percent, off the ticket price, and the photo credit should be courtesy Meredith GonzalezFernandez. The Jackson Free Press apologizes for these errors.

t’s 2016, a year that some would argue is historic in nature, as women around the country watch another woman heading a major political party’s campaign for the White House. But sexism is far from over, even within millennial circles, where being progressive is increasingly becoming the new norm. A February 2016 National Institutes of Health study of college biology students found that male students over-estimated the knowledge of their male colleagues compared to their estimation of their female counterparts—despite the women performing better as the class continued. Women in that study did not show preference in their perception of colleagues. A 2014 Harris poll found that only 41 percent of millennial men are comfortable with women engineers, and 43 percent of those men are comfortable with women being U.S. senators. What a time to be alive. The progress is not to be discounted, and Hillary Clinton’s historic nomination certainly stands on the shoulders of women whose names have been long forgotten but whose efforts have not been lost on the many women who run their own businesses, households, or hold political office in the country and in this state. In Mississippi, the progress is specific. Femaleowned businesses have grown tremendously in the past couple decades. Mississippi is at the forefront of encouraging and developing female entrepreneurs. Jackson was even counted on WalletHub’s list of the 100 best cities for opening a femaleowned businesses. But starting a business is different than hold-

ing office. Beyond business ownership, Mississippi drops out of the “progressive states for women” race due to the abysmal lack of representation in the statehouse and the inequity felt in employment and unemployment for women around the state. Out of 174 Capitol spots, Mississippi has only 23 elected senators or representatives who are women. That’s a little more than 13-percent representation for women in the statehouse, despite women making up 51 percent of the state’s population. Representation matters—most importantly because lawmakers have the power to change the law and activate the state’s purse strings. More women in the statehouse means more women paying attention to policy issues, from maternity leave to equal pay to domestic violence, that affect those women who own and run their own businesses and head up their own households. Female policymakers can help women in workplaces throughout the state who make less than their male counterparts, using law to effect change. While we celebrate and recognize the importance of those 23 women at the Capitol, we need more women in political positions of power and more voters who will put them there. As Republicans proved in the last legislative session, both a majority and a supermajority matter. Mississippians must put aside tradition and start to become comfortable with women both in management roles and in political office. The old adage “power in numbers” holds true, and it’s time for women to claim their place at the Mississippi political table. We’re all better for it.

Email letters and opinion to letters@jacksonfreepress.com, fax to 601-510-9019 or mail to 125 South Congress St., Suite 1324, Jackson, Mississippi 39201. Include daytime phone number. Letters may be edited for length and clarity, as well as factchecked.

Kevin Fong

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n July, I returned from an eye-opening trip to Cuba with the Kellogg Fellows Leadership Alliance. During our 10-day excursion, we met with scholars and local experts to learn about the countryâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s health, education, agricultural and political systems. An unexpected lesson, however, emerged as I encountered everyday people throughout the country. â&#x20AC;&#x153;ÂĄChino!â&#x20AC;? they called out, often accompanied by a smile or a giggle, as I walked past. â&#x20AC;&#x153;Donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t you find that offensive?â&#x20AC;? one of my travel mates asked. Not knowing the right answer, I turned to our leader, Evelyn Hu-DeHart, professor of history at Brown University and a scholar on the Asian diaspora in Latin America and the Caribbean. â&#x20AC;&#x153;They donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t mean any offense,â&#x20AC;? she responded. â&#x20AC;&#x153;Nowadays, we Chinese are rare birds in Cuba, and itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s just their way showing affection.â&#x20AC;? â&#x20AC;&#x153;Well, I find it offensive,â&#x20AC;? my travel mate said as she turned to me. â&#x20AC;&#x153;I mean, you wouldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t put up with that nonsense if we were in the States.â&#x20AC;? She was right. But we werenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t in the States, and I needed to consult with a cultural translatorâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;in this case Evelynâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;for guidance. We often turned to Evelyn for cultural translation. Were Cubans, for example, exhibiting micro-aggressions toward us as visitors from the U.S., or were we misreading their cues? â&#x20AC;&#x153;The best thing you can do is to take off your U.S.-tinted glasses,â&#x20AC;? said Marc Frank, author of â&#x20AC;&#x153;Cuban Revelationsâ&#x20AC;? and a Reuters correspondent. â&#x20AC;&#x153;Get off the beaten path and get to know the people.â&#x20AC;? Traveling with Evelyn, we did just that. We took an unplanned side trip to Havanaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Barrio Chinoâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;Chinatown. Little remains of the once-vibrant community that comprised 44 square blocks. We found remnants in intricately carved doors on some homes, a martial arts studio and the presence of Chinese fried rice as a popular street food among locals. We asked how the Chinese ended up in Cuba in the first place. â&#x20AC;&#x153;When slavery was abolished in the 1830s, the Cuban plantation owners started importing coolies from China,â&#x20AC;? Evelyn said. â&#x20AC;&#x153;The coolies toiled side by side with Afro-Cubans in the cane fields, and their fates became inextricably woven together. They not only worked together, but they also planned, dreamed and rebelled together. Struggling together made the Afro- and Chinese Cubans more resilient, and more interdependent.â&#x20AC;? Weaving continued as the Chinese

married local black and mixed-race (mulatto) women. The same dynamic occurred in the southern U.S. during Reconstruction, where Chinese coolies replaced the formerly enslaved African Americans in the cotton, tobacco and rice fields. One of my travel companions, an African American woman from the Mississippi Delta, shared that her great-grandmother was Chinese. We visited with Jorge Chao Chiu, vice president of Havanaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Min Chih Tong. For Chinese ex-pats, Tongs (benevolent associations) played a crucial role in getting established and maintaining a sense of community. Today, Jorge opens his doors to a handful of elderly Chinese Cubans who gather for a meal, receive social services and catch up on the news. In the U.S., black and Asian communities have been cordial at best, but rarely intertwine like I saw in Cuba. In Cantonese dialect, the term commonly used for African Americans translates to â&#x20AC;&#x153;black devil.â&#x20AC;? The targeting of Korean businesses in the Rodney King riots in Los Angeles, and more recently, the death of Akai Gurley by the hands of Officer Peter Liang in New York, have exacerbated the divide. But the story is changing. For example, more than 300 Asians and Pacific Islanders participated in a national â&#x20AC;&#x153;APIS4BLMâ&#x20AC;? conference call in the wake of the recent tragedies. In July, my 82-year-old mother told me to â&#x20AC;&#x153;work harder to bring healing for our black and brown people because the safety of our grandchildren is at stake.â&#x20AC;? A youth worker in San Franciscoâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Japantown shared that an Asian immigrant teen expressed that he didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t understand the Black Lives Matter movement. This led to a deeper conversation about how young Asians can talk to their relatives about racial tensions in the United States. Meanwhile, against the backdrop of violence and hatred at home, I wandered through Cuba, with the locals calling out â&#x20AC;&#x153;ÂĄChino!â&#x20AC;? Instead of being repelled, I chose to engage, if only with a smile or a wave. It was a small but important gesture to assure that our individual threadsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;U.S. citizen to Cuban citizen, Asian Pacific Islander to black and Latino, gay to straightâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;would result in a tapestry of fellowship and goodwill. Thank you Â to the people of Cuba, who reminded me that kindness and love translate to something well beyond words. Kevin Fong, who lives in San Francisco, is a facilitator, trainer and speaker in leadership and executive development, and organizational systems, philosophy and design.

Kindness and love translate to something well beyond words.

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August 31 - September 6, 2016 â&#x20AC;˘ jfp.ms

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THE DA FILES

The Curious Case of

Mr. Smith, Mr. Butler and Mr. Hood

by Donna Ladd and Tim Summers Jr.

August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

working with the FBI, wants Butler prosecuted—and perhaps his testimony implicating the district attorney—and Smith wants him to go free. Rather desperately, it seems. ‘Cloak and Dagger Issues’ Throughout the exchange in Priester’s courtroom in March, Smith was “irrational, manic and virtually out of control,” as the judge told the Mississippi Bar later. The 45-year-old prosecutor could not stand still and kept moving back and forth from the seat to the podium, and then would stand up and down in his seat as other attorneys talked to the judge, all activity considered Imani Khayyam

inds County District At- present the case against Mr. Butler. And I torney Robert Shuler Smith personally would like to know what that is. walked into the courtroom I mean, I’m not trying to interfere with the on March 3, 2016, with a proceedings. I’m just wanting to see what clear goal—to help get Chris- this is about.” topher Butler, then 38, out of The judge seemed taken aback. “Perthe Raymond jail. sonally, you would like to know what?” Smith showed up in Hinds County “What the evidence is. I think they County Judge Melvin Priester Sr.’s court- are here to present evidence in this case,” room, even though he was not one of the Smith answered. prosecutors of record in State of Missis- “And you obviously have a problem sippi vs. Christopher Butler, in which the with this?” state attorney general had arrested Butler in “Well, we’ll get to—yes, sir.” January for embezzlement and wire fraud Smith, re-elected as district attorney that he allegedly committed while working last fall for the third time, actually has as a sales manager at Mega Mattress in west two problems with Butler’s situation: Jackson. The State contends that Butler falsified invoices for more Hinds County District Attorney than $500 to a Florida finance Robert Shuler Smith is going outside normal legal channels to try company. He was in the Hinds to get a Jackson man out of jail. County Detention Center with a $500,000 bond and is considered a habitual offender due to past convictions. In a separate county case, Butler is also facing drug charges for possessing more than an ounce of marijuana from earlier arrests. The Mississippi Bureau of Narcotics had arrested him for the most recent drug charges in 2012, which fell to Smith’s office to prosecute. With Butler out on bail for those charges, the old case has yet to go to trial; Smith attempted to delay the trial and then tried to drop the charges because, the DA claims, he has He doesn’t want the attorney general to evidence that can clear Butler. try him in his jurisdiction for the white But the case this March day be- collar crime, and he doesn’t believe Butler fore Priester is for a white-collar crime is guilty of the earlier drug crime, arguing not connected with the drug arrests. that the State of Mississippi, working with Still, the DA jumped in as soon as some local judges, is setting him up. Judge Priester told Butler’s attorney, San- Priester then threw the mic back to deford Knott, to move ahead with his mo- fense attorney Knott, who shared the same tions to bar the attorney general from try- concern as prosecutor Smith, arguing that ing a case in Smith’s jurisdiction. Hood’s office could not intervene, or go “I’m sorry. Let me interrupt for one around the DA, as he and Smith believe the second,” Smith said before Knott could attorney general is trying to “overrule the answer Priester. The DA then added, “Your district attorney’s office.” 14 Honor, I think the AG’s office is here to And, in effect, they are. The State,

inappropriate and disruptive in courtroom settings. When Smith got a chance to speak, he insisted that Shaun Yurtkuran and Patrick Beasley of the AG’s office, who had worked for him as assistant district attorneys in his first two years as DA starting in 2008, knew that Butler had been framed for the drug charges. With the two men listening, Smith promised that the Mississippi Bureau of Narcotics had a videotape that could clear Butler. “And that videotape was seized by that agency and obstructed justice so that no one would see what was on that video-

tape, which would show that Mr. Butler was framed twice,” Smith told Priester. “They know that.” The judge wasn’t buying it, though. “Well, I personally take issue with that in that I sat through watching that video for approximately 12 to 16 hours, and there was nothing to show,” Priester answered. “Well, we have an expert who corroborates the fact that it was tampered with,” Smith returned. “Well, that’s a little different from what you said,” Priester answered, referring to Smith’s previous statement that the contents of the tape would clear Butler. From there, the hearing transcript shows that Smith kept promising that he could clear Butler, presumably of the drug charges, and continued to make allegations against the AG’s attorneys in the courtroom. “I can prove every last one of them. Yes, sir,” Smith promised at one point about his accusations, after interrupting the judge. “Fine,” Priester answered. “But you know what? I don’t care. … I don’t care what you feel you can prove. What I care about is that there’s an initial appearance scheduled for today on this defendant for specific charges. “And I’m not going to inject myself into the cloak and dagger issues … . That’s way over my pay grade. OK.” Eleven days later, on March 14, Priester filed a report with the Mississippi Bar Association describing Smith’s frantic behavior. The judge said he was attaching the transcript, although it could not fully show the “emotional flavor” of Smith’s actions. He regretted having to file the report, he said, adding that “Mr. Smith’s behavior was so bizarre, I am required to do so.” ‘Straight from New Orleans’ Within three months, on June 22, the attorney general’s office indicted Smith as well, with several men in business suits, including AG investigator Leland McDivitt, showing up at the DA’s office on the top floor of the Hinds County Courthouse to arrest him. The charges, which came through affidavit rather than grand-jury indictment, charged that the DA “did will-

What Is Case

No. 16-120?

his Hinds County Circuit Court case, 16-120, serves as the central mystery to the ongoing legal morass surrounding District Attorney Robert Shuler Smith. Now sealed, the file is hidden behind the authority of Hinds County Circuit Court Judge Jeff Weill, who sequestered the file soon after Smith’s June 22 arrest and as of press time has not released his grip even as both sides say they have no opposition to opening the file. First mentioned in the affidavit used to arrest Smith, very little is mentioned in the filings for Smith’s case, 16-624, about this other case. In the attached emails between Smith, Weill’s clerk and representatives

themselves from handling the case against the man who tries cases in their courtroom; the Special Judge James D. Bell, of Brandon, is handling the case against Smith. Bell, incidentally, published a novel,

Wallace told the Jackson Free Press on Aug. 29 that he receives lots of mail from inmates and does not know Butler personally. Butler said he was caught up because the store he worked for—Mega Mattress— allowed people to finance purchases with-

Attorney General Jim Hood (pictured) indicted District Attorney Robert Shuler Smith for multiple counts of alleged inappropriate contact with men in jail.

“Vampire Diaries,” published by Sartoris Literary Group in Jackson. His protagonist, a trial attorney, takes on the “Butcher of Belhaven” in the novel. Letters from the Raymond Jail Through all the legal “cloak and dagger,” to use Judge Priester’s phrase, Christopher Dale Butler has sat in the less-thaninviting Raymond jail writing letters to try to get himself out of it. He wrote a handwritten letter to a “Mr. Wallace” last February, stating, “We’re come a long way from 833, huh? But let me get to the point” (Lanier High School is at 833 Maple St.; many graduates thus call it “833.”) Hinds County Circuit Clerk Zack

from the DA’s office, Weill’s clerk emailed Circuit Clerk Zach Wallace to ask him to place the request from the AG’s office for an appearance before the grand jury, despite protests from Smith, into this sealed file. “Judge Weill executed a sealed Order yesterday, which permits the Attorney General’s Office to present a matter to the Hinds County Grand Jury on April 7, 2016, at 9 a.m.,” Weill’s clerk wrote in the email to Wallace. “I will bring the Order down later for you to file in sealed cause number 251-16-120.” Soon afterward, the fight for the records began, including requests from both Smith’s attorney and even the AG’s office to unseal the file. They have, as of yet, gone unanswered from the court, prompting The Clarion-Ledger to use its deep legal pockets to file a series of motions to open 16-120, in addition to others related to Smith. There are clues to what resides within the sealed file in other proceedings. Smith’s attorney filed a motion in the

out a credit check or any money down. “So you know how that goes,” he wrote, then continued, “But anyway, they are trying to charge me for those peoples wrongs of not paying for their bill every month (sic),” Butler wrote. “Like I influence them not to pay. I know that there isn’t much you can do personally but I need help getting back on the court docket for a bond reduction. This half of a million is stupid. It’s people that’s down here with murder charges with cheaper bonds.” “[T]he condition that they have us under here in Raymond is unhuman,” Butler wrote to Wallace. “No mats, no towels, more curious, see page 18

Mississippi Supreme Court asking the court to toss out an administrative order from Weill temporarily barring Smith from participating in the work of his office. As a response, Weill filed a response, stating that 16-120 and other sealed documents “involve issues concerning the Hinds County Grand Jury, and are not subject to public disclosure absent some specific, compelling reason for the same.” Listed among other documents are two that specifically reside within 16-120: a transcript of the testimony of FBI Special Agent Robert Culpepper from a March 22, 2016, sealed hearing for 16-120; and a letter from Culpepper to the AG’s office, which was included as an exhibit to a sealed motion filed by the AG on February 19, 2016, in 16-120. Until the court rules on the CL’s motions, which they have not by press time, it will be hard to tell. –Tim Summers Jr. Follow the ongoing DA saga at jfp.ms/DAFiles.

August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

defense of Turner, who the Hinds County Sheriff’s Department said is also known as “Darnell Dixon.” Because Waide is now defending Smith against the June 22 charges that he is trying to help Butler, Hood’s Aug. 12 motions sought to remove the Tupelo attorney from the DA’s case due to a conflict of interest. Waide responded to Hood’s revelation that a confidential informant had taped the DA by filing a motion revealing the informant’s name—Ivon Johnson—and demanded that the State produce both Johnson and the secret tapes at an Aug. 18 hearing, which has since been postponed until the matter of the sealed documents can be resolved. Johnson is the former assistant district attorney under Smith who took a plea deal for federal charges for taking a bribe from Rev. Robert “Two Sweet” Henderson, 44, on behalf of unnamed defendants, who was then arrested on July 29. As the Jackson Free Press reported recently, Henderson has long been connected to high-powered men in Jackson, including former Mayor Frank Melton and former Councilman Frank Bluntson. Gov. Haley Barbour pardoned him of his previous crimes in 2011, based in part on recommendations by now-former Hinds County Sheriff Tyrone Hendrix and DA Smith. Johnson had apparently recorded Smith’s comments about Butler and Waide—which the prosecution argues disqualifies Waide from representing Smith, as Waide might be called as a witness. Waide said in an Aug. 17 motion that the same information that would be obtained from him could be found in testimony by Johnson or Butler but stated that both men seemed to be missing and that the State was holding them both in undisclosed locations. However, Judge Bell delayed the hearing, saying that a grand jury was likely to convene related to the cases, and that nothing “urgent” needed to happen that warranted a hearing before then. Recent filings also announced that all Hinds County judges have now recused

Imani Khayyam

fully and unlawfully consult, advise and counsel” two men under indictment, Butler and long-time Smith associate Darnell Turner—often called “ex parte” communication in the legal world. Five of the six counts charge Smith with trying to help Butler beat both his drug and wire-fraud/embezzlement charges and get out of jail, with much of the alleged “ex parte” activity happening since that “erratic” March day in Priester’s courtroom. In Butler’s case, the affidavit accused Smith of visiting Butler on May 9 and again on May 26 in jail, supported by copies of the jail’s visitation logs, and of sending Sanford Knott a May 21, 2016, letter advising the defense attorney “of various ways to attack the State’s pending case against Mr. Butler.” The attorney general contended that Smith met with Butler’s family between Jan. 14 and June 20 of this year, referred to Butler as “his client” and worked with defense counsel to get him released. It also accused him of trying to retain additional defense counsel for Butler. On Aug. 12, 2016, the attorney general alleged in court filings that his office and the FBI have Smith on tape telling a confidential informant that he was lining up high-powered Tupelo attorney Jim Waide to help Butler. “So we got Jim Waide,” Smith allegedly told the informant. The filing said he added that “(Waide) came down here straight from New Orleans when I called him.” Smith also allegedly told the informant: “Oh, we going to get (Butler) free now between me and Waide and all that, and then Dennis is doing his thing on the other one.” That likely means Dennis Sweet III, who is representing Darnell Turner, 39, a former campaign worker for Smith who is charged in several cases, indictments show: with aggravated assault for allegedly hitting Anthony Steel in the head with a gun; shooting at Anthony Young; and domestic violence against former girlfriend Kimberly Anderson. The AG also charged Smith with giving emails between the State, DA and the county judge to Sweet to help with his

THE DA FILES

from page 15

“So as I parked, I proceeded to get out of the vehicle, going to the back—it’s a fourdoor truck. I went to the back door on the driver’s side to get my daughter out, and I heard an individual kind of, you know, running, stepping, talking about freeze, freeze, pistol drawn,” Ledford said. Ledford said he had visited the house, which he said he had previously helped do work on, that morning to pick up a birthday present for his little girl. His then-wife and Hilliard both gave birth in the same hospital and had become friends during their time together, he said. The agents detained him, searching him, finding an undisclosed amount of

Ledford said, is that Butler and Hilliard had 15 cameras installed in the house. Those 105 hours of videotapes, Smith maintains, prove that Butler was set up. The attached timeline of the tape states that the forced entry of the house took place at 12:32. Shortly thereafter, at 12:41, “an officer goes straight to the (ottoman) in the foyer, lifts the cover and finds the marijuana.” The officers then removed the marijuana, and throughout this time, Ledford and his daughter remained in the kitchen, where he was questioned for the next 30 minutes, or so he told the unnamed interviewer. Ledford states that the officers continued looking through the house, finding

rests), and Robert Smith, Hinds County DA, found evidence of that. With that information he decided to file a motion to dismiss and my lawyer did also,” Butler wrote to Stokes. Hinds County Circuit Judge Jeff Weill did not dismiss the case, however, denying Smith’s motions on May 8, 2015. Butler said that 10 days after he appeared in Weill’s courtroom, he was picked up for alleged fraud and false pretense from his job at Mega Mattress. The first thing the AG investigators asked him about, he said: “What is your relationship with the Hinds County DA?” “They said if I tell them then all

August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

Finding the Marijuana Josh Ledford asked the Mississippi Bureau of Narcotics officer several times if he could check on his 14-month-old daughter, who sat crying in the backseat of his truck, as he stood handcuffed Christopher Butler (left), Darnell Dixon/Turner (center) and Hinds County District Attorney Robert Shuler Smith are all under in front of Christopher Butler’s arrest in the tangled web of cases roiling the Hinds County judicial system. Smith was arrested for conferring with the first two. house in on April 19, 2011. “They were questioning me about do I know who Mr. Butler is, or do I know the name of the individual cash, and running his identification, he what he said appeared to be wrapped up charges would be dropped, but if I don’t that lives at the house,” Ledford said in an claims. The cash raised the officers’ suspi- money. then they would set a bond so high that I Waide’s Bar response also revealed couldn’t make bond and they would come interview transcript that was sent to the cion that he was there to buy drugs, and he Mississippi Bar on Aug. 15. It was attached asked the unnamed agent to let him get his more handwritten jailhouse letters from with new charges,” Butler wrote to Stokes. to Waide’s response to counter Judge Mel- daughter from the back, where she sat cry- Butler, trying to gain his freedom. (County records show that he was indicted “I don’t claim to be some innocent guy for two counts for the alleged Mega Matvin Priester Sr.’s complaint that Smith had ing. Eventually, the officer let him go over acted “erratically” in his courtroom during a next to the car, then finally let him get her that has never done anything wrong but I tress activity in April 2016 and another four March 3, 2016, hearing with the AG’s office out of the car. The officer led the father and do believe in justice and that justice should counts a month later.) be fair,” Butler wrote in a letter to an un- about Butler’s 2016 white-collar charges. In his letter to Stokes, as well as others, daughter into the house. The transcripts were among docu- In the house, Ledford said the police named recipient. “If I’m being prosecuted Butler maintained that he is in no way close ments that for the first time publicly details berated him, asking if he knew of any secret for some thing it should be for that and that to DA Smith. “I’ve only mete (sic) him in Smith’s promised evidence that the State compartments in the house. As he was be- only. Not for what you and anyone else feel court,” he said. “I’m stuck in jail with a rihad framed Butler during drug busts in ing questioned, Ledford said he could see that I wasn’t prosecuted in my past.” diculous bond and some ridiculous charges 2011 and 2012, which Smith had alluded police “scurrying” about the house. only because the A.G. office and the D.A. to in Priester’s courtroom. Waide’s office office has an issue with each other.” He said Ledford states that although drug dogs Stokes, Please Help On May 6, 2016, Butler wrote one he was enclosing a letter from Smith provhad transcribed the recording Smith pro- went through the house, they never hit on vided, he told the Jackson Free Press. anything. He said that while he was there of his letters to Ward 3 City Councilman ing his rights are being violated. Ledford is a white male from Pearl during the search, he never saw any mari- Kenneth Stokes, asking for his help. In that Butler ended by pleading for help. who happened to visit Butler’s house in juana or drugs, although the police ques- letter, Butler indicated to the man who “I’m losing everything I earn in my life,” he south Jackson, back when the accused lived tioned him often about whether Butler had represents Georgetown, where Butler grew wrote. “I have custody of my kids, and my up and still lives, that he is a pawn stuck 73-year-old mom is with me. I don’t want with Hilliard, on the same day MBN raided any hiding spots. it after a tip from a confidential informant Butler’s friend also accused the agents, in the middle of a battle between the State to lose my home. That’s all we got. Please that Butler was selling drugs out of his girl- only one of whom Ledford said was black, of Mississippi and Hinds County and that help me.” friend’s home. Ledford had a pocketful of of throwing around the n-word liberally, in- his constitutional and civil rights are being violated. “I was set up and framed by the cash when he arrived because he had just cluding about Butler, who is black. more CURIOUS, see page 18 16 cashed his check, he told the interviewer. What the 10 MBN agents didn’t know, MBN back about 5 years (in the 2012 ar-

courtesy Hinds County Sheriff Dept

medical slow, it’s cold, and they give us one blanket sleeping on metal. If there is anything you can do, Mr. Wallace, anything that’s within your power, please help me. This treatment isn’t for any man especially a good guy. These charges are nonsense!!!” It doesn’t help Butler’s case for a lower bond that he is considered a habitual offender. Starting in 1996, he was arrested for a series of drug possession and sales crimes, and then motor-vehicle theft from J.D. Quality Cars on West Northside Drive in 1999, then cocaine possession again in 2002, a case that was dropped after he paid a $5,000 bond, records show. It wasn’t until 2012 that Butler was arrested again for possession of more than an ounce of marijuana after the Mississippi Bureau of Narcotics investigation; his thengirlfriend Kwanza Hilliard was listed as a co-defendant. He put up a $10,000 bond and went home. That is the case that Smith promised Judge Priester he can prove was an MBN set-up of Butler, but until Aug. 15, that evidence was pretty much hidden from public view.

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THE DA FILES

from page 16

ity is the problem,” Diaz said. Still, Cooper-Stokes recused herself, as have the other Hinds County court judges, leaving the case in the hands of Judge Bell, the novelist in Brandon. Call My Mom, Please The day after Judge CooperStokes recusing over Butler’s letter, the Mississippi Bar Association filed a complaint against the district attorney, revealing another handwritten note—this one written by Smith and slipped under the door of a different judge back in February, asking her to call his mother. The Feb. 9, 2016, note to Hinds Senior Circuit Judge Tomie Green was short and sweet: “Judge Green, I am trying to set an appointment for my mother, Alice Smith. She would like to speak to you about some matters. Thanks. Robert S. Smith.” Smith’s maternal context is important to explain the setting for the note. Alice Thomas Smith is a wellconnected, strong-willed woman, who helped Smith run his defense law firm in the Washington Addition, and then was a primary driver of his initial campaign for district attorney, often taking calls on behalf of the campaign. She helped raise Robert Smith’s son after his mother returned to her native country outside the U.S., and it is her and his father’s Jackson home that the DA lists as his primary address on campaign reports. The note came under the door after Imani Khayyam

On July 27, not long after Smith’s ar- that they dropped into the bed of Butler’s He also said that the AG did not indict rest, Stokes’ wife, Hinds County Court Chevrolet Avalanche when they saw police Smith but arrested him by affidavit—a Judge Larita Cooper-Stokes, went behind coming down the road. Butler, they both choice Smith is challenging in court filings. closed doors with the DA, his attorney testify, drove off before they could remove Former Mississippi Supreme Court Waide, three attorneys from the AG’s of- the drug-laden bag. Justice Oliver Diaz Jr. said during an Aug. fice, a county staff attorney and a bailiff, “I later learned that Christopher But- 23 interview that if the AG is trying to cut and gave them copies of the letter. “[W]e think under Canon 3 of the Code of Judicial Conduct that the Court should recuse herself from the case,” AG attorney Bob Anderson said. The transcript of the meeting indicates that the DA’s attorney wanted Cooper-Stokes to stay on the case. “It is inconceivable that any judge in Mississippi would not have some knowledge about the substance of what is going on here,” Waide said. Because the records were being sealed “for some reason,” he said, “it has never been clear exactly what is going on, but the heart of it is this … they are claiming Mr. Smith is inappropriately advising— illegally advising Mr. Butler.” Hinds County Court Judge Larita Cooper-Stokes recused after a letter Christopher Butler sent to her husband, Ward 3 City Councilman Kenneth Stokes, went public. Waide then waded back into what Smith had tried to talk about in Priester’s courtroom back in February. “The other side of this, which has never been disclosed, is Mr. Smith’s ler was stopped, and the police found the Smith off at the pass, they might be overevidence that he has gathered and his assis- bag in the back of the truck,” Stanley Smith stepping their authority. tants have gathered that drugs were possibly said in his April 13, 2012, statement. “I am “Yeah, it is something that doesn’t planted on Mr. Butler, a very serious mat- very sorry that this has happened but I must come up very often or ever has come up beter, on two different occasions, once at his be responsible for my property.” fore,” Diaz said. “It seemed like if that were home and again in an Avalanche truck.” Waide then implied that Smith was the case, the proper procedure would have The truck incident had occurred a arrested to try to stop him from blowing been, if Smith had already done something year later in April 2012, Waide’s Bar ex- up the State conspiracy. “Mr. Smith was ar- wrong, to go ahead and get the indicthibits showed. He included affidavits from rested the day before he was about to make ment.” brothers Stanley and James Earl Smith, a presentation to the grand jury essentially “I think that they are trying to act pewho both put drugs in a black backpack concerning the Butler matter,” Waide said. remptorily, and they don’t have that author-

more CURIOUS, see page 20

The Legacy of Williams v. State

August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

by Tim Summers Jr.

uring his objections to Attorney General Jim Hood’s prosecution of Christopher Butler at a hearing in Hinds County Judge Melvin Priester Sr.’s courtroom on March 3, 2016, Hinds County District Attorney Robert Shuler Smith referenced the Supreme Court decision of Williams v. State. The Hinds County Grand Jury indicted Harvey Williams in 2003 the murder of Calvin Johnson in a Jackson nightclub. After a trial in 2007, under the direction of then-District Attorney Faye Peterson, a jury convicted Williams, sending him away with life in prison, and in 2010 the Mississippi Court of Appeals affirmed the lower decision. Then, in 2011, the Mississippi Supreme Court granted a new trial for the Williams case after the court “found that Williams’s defense was prejudiced by the exclusion of testimony from a witness” that would have

shown that Johnson had a weapon in his possession earlier in the evening. Following the remand, Smith as the DA filed a “nolle prosequi,” a formal notice of abandonment by the prosecutor, which included evidence that he believed proved Williams acted in self-defense. The presiding Hinds County Circuit Judge Breland Hilburn signed the order, effectively ending the case, but two days later the same judge signed an order rescinding his previous decision. Hilburn claims that his order approving Smith’s nolle prosequi was “erroneously entered.” Nine months later, on March 13 and 14, 2012, Hilburn signed two orders effectively moving the case to the AG’s office, stating that because the original prosecuting attorneys were now with the AG that they should be the ones to prosecute Williams. The defense responded that Smith’s nolle prosequi, when approved, intitially brought the case to an end.

The case was then reassigned, eventually falling in 2012 in the lap of Circuit Judge Jeff Weill, the same judge who has recently sealed numerous documents related to the charges Smith now faces. Weill ruled on Feb. 14, 2013, that although Hilburn ended the case against Williams when the nolle prosequi was signed, the AG’s office was free to do so because the DA’s office would not prosecute. The Supreme Court disagreed, concluding that “Mississippi law does not permit a trial court to disqualify a duly elected and serving district attorney and replace him with the attorney general where the district attorney has decided, in the lawful exercise of his discretion, not to prosecute a criminal case.” Whether that case is applicable in the current case will be seen as the legal drama unfolds. Read more on the DA cases at jfp.ms/DAFiles.

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THE DA FILES

from page 18

August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

‘The Butler Matter’ Two days later, Smith held a press conference accusing Green of improper communications with former Hinds County District Attorney Faye Peterson, who is now a defense attorney. Peterson, who was not available for comment, and Smith have a rocky history; he defeated her in 2007 in his campaign supported by former District Attorney Ed Peters and then-Mayor Frank Melton; Peterson had indicted and tried Melton for carrying firearms illegally and for leading his bodyguards and teenagers to destroy a duplex in the Virden Addition with sledgehammers. Smith successfully defended one of Melton’s bodyguards in the trial. Ironically, it was Melton who held press conferences lambasting Peterson while she was investigating him, including having 20 a young felon he was supporting, Christo-

pher Walker, spread rumors about her sex life in 2006.) Green was furious about Smith’s press conference. “Your conduct was intentional, retaliatory and improperly coercive at a time when I had under advisement an issue

unethical as district attorney. You were deceptive and dishonest.” Smith has made no public retraction of his accusations of Green or Peterson and has not returned messages left for comment for this story. Waide, however, told the Bar File Photo / Ward Schaefer

Smith had fired back at the attorney general’s investigation of Butler, and presumably his role in it that case, by filing subpoenas for some of Hood’s staff to appear before a grand jury. Green told the Mississippi Bar in a Feb. 24, 2016 (misdated 2015), that the attorney general, as well as the Mississippi Department of Corrections head Marshall Fisher, formerly of MBN, were challenging the subpoenas. Green had appointed Amy Whitten as a special master over the case, and “[t]he DA attempt(ed) to contact and harass her.” Thus, Green “issued a clarification order prohibiting ex parte contact by him or any other party. He never ceased,” Green told the Mississippi Bar. Then, the afternoon of Feb. 9, 2016, Smith apparently slipped the note about his mom under her office door. “I know of his mother but have no personal relationship with Alice Smith,” she wrote. I emailed him to let him know the note and request was odd and improper.” That evening, she emailed Smith about the note. “… I am puzzled about why you would want me to meet with your mother. Such a request is quite odd, to say the least.” And, she added, it is “improper” for to meet with his mom “about specific or unspecified matters.” The next day, the DA’s mother left a voicemail for Green. “She was a bit irate and demanded respect, and said she knew ‘what to do.’” Green did not call her back, opting instead to alert the Mississippi Bar and the Mississippi Supreme Court. In his response to the Bar on Smith’s behalf, Waide dismissed the communication. “Smith’s note to Judge Green was not related to any pending case,” he wrote. “It was written because Smith’s mother had requested to meet with Judge Green, since she wanted Smith and Judge Green to ‘get along.’” Waide did not address the phone call directly.

Hinds County Court Judge Melvin Priester Sr. (pictured) filed a Bar complaint against District Attorney Robert Shuler Smith after the DA disrupted a hearing for Christopher Butler, claiming the State had framed him in drug cases.

dealing with the impropriety of subpoenas you issued. … I demand that you publicly retract your allegations…,” the judge wrote to the district attorney in a hand-delivered letter on Feb. 17, 2016. The judge added, “Further, I demand that you retract accusations that I dismissed criminal cases ‘behind your back.’” She named several professional and ethical rules that he had violated, in her opinion. “I charge that your actions were also

that Smith’s press conference was legitimate. “Smith admits that he did have a press conference because the public has a legitimate interest in knowing about unlawful conduct,” Waide wrote to the Bar. On July 26, the Mississippi Bar filed a formal complaint about Smith through the Mississippi Supreme Court. The Bar’s general counsel, Adam B. Kilgore, cited Smith’s behavior in Priester’s courtroom in March as part of “the Butler matter” as the first count.

The second was Smith’s actions with Judge Green. Both instances involved disrupting a tribunal and ex parte communication; in Green’s case, Smith acted in ways that could materially prejudice a court proceeding and made statements about Green “that the layer knows to be false or with reckless disregard as to its truth or falsity concerning the qualifications or integrity of a judge.” But how far can a DA go to pursue justice? Diaz said that the system gives the DA “a great deal of discretion,” especially whether or not to prosecute, but that in this case, the test for whether Smith’s actions are warranted does not exist. “There’s not a lot of tests of that. Most people don’t even walk up to that line,” Diaz said. “So it is very rare and unusual that this allegation is even being made.” In the meantime, Christopher Butler’s location is unknown as the cloak-and-dagger drama unfolds around him, leaving the open question of whether he will be the next witness the attorney general tries to bring forward against Smith. His latest charge came on Aug. 18 for possessing a black Tracfone cell phone while incarcerated there. The indictment cited his two earlier felony convictions for selling and possessing cocaine. Butler says, through his letters, that he just wants to go home. “Does not justice work both ways?” Butler wrote. “Is a person not innocent until proven guilty? I ask these questions because for some reason in Mississippi just because you are arrested for a crime that some how you must be guilty. As if the police couldn’t have gotten it wrong. Or as if there isn’t a thing called corruption.” Follow the ongoing DA saga at jfp.ms/ DAFiles. Email tim@jacksonfreepress.com and donna@jacksonfreepress.com with info.

What the Heck is ‘Ex Parte’?

common denominator in the myriad of charges Attorney General Jim Hood has leveled against Hinds County District Attorney Robert Shuler Smith is his alleged use of “ex parte communications.” Black’s Law Dictionary says the Latin roots of “ex parte” mean “from one party.” Blacks defines it in today’s world as “a legal term that most often refers to instances where a judge makes a legal decision without all parties to the case being present.” It often translates into communication between parties on a different side of a case outside the purview of the judge. Hood is accusing Smith, the county’s top prosecutor, of various inappropriate communications with defendants Christopher Butler and Darnell Dixon/Turner, seemingly to try to help them beat their charges, including meeting with each of them himself in their jail cells with no one else present. The Mississippi Rules of Professional Conduct, which the Mississippi Bar follows for lawyers, states that “a lawyer shall

not seek to influence a judge, juror, prospective juror or other official by means prohibited by law; communicate ex parte with such a person during the proceeding unless authorized to do so by law or court order.” Judges are also prevented by certain communications with attorneys outside of the courtroom as well. Former Mississippi Supreme Court Justice Oliver Diaz Jr. said that there were few, emergency-centered exceptions to the rule barring ex parte between attorneys and a judge. “There really should be no ex parte communication with a judge that’s presiding over a case that you are currently involved with,” Diaz said, adding that any communication that involved scheduling or other administrative issues should be done with a member of their staff. Diaz added that communication between any parties to a case—such as a prosecutor meeting directly with a defendant—is generally not allowed unless for specific emergencies, such as illness. —Tim Summers Jr.

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August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

lthough Lee Williams Jr. already owned his company, Rehoboth Homes and Investment Properties, which is an investment company he founded in 2007, the retired staff sergeant set his sights on new opportunities. Williams, a Jackson native, desired to create a business where he could combine two things he loved: food and sports. “I felt that would be more ideal to what I was looking for,” he says. The answer? Purple Diamond Sports Bar and Grill. He opened the restaurant in Jackson in 2011 as a collaborative effort from him and business partner, Elnora Newson. The partnership merges his entrepreneurial background with her food-industry background. “I had always wanted to do something in the food industry, and she had the background for it, so I knew it would be a great combination,” Williams says. “We were fortunate to be able to incorporate our two personalities together and establish the sports bar and grill.” The business is located off of Highway 80 and is a popular neighborhood spot in that area. “We’re a small mom-and-pop business,” he says. “We’re an up-andcoming sports bar, but we have a lot of loyal customers.” Because Williams currently works in Memphis as an engineer, he acts as a financial investor to the restaurant and is mostly responsible for marketing and product distribution. But Williams says he does not al-

low the distance to interfere with his time at Purple Diamond. The majority of her days, Newson spends her time at the restaurant. The restaurant’s Memphis-style seasoned wings are deep-fried and tossed in a liquid-based dry rub seasoning. The restaurant has other food options such as burgers and Mississippi Delta farm-raised catfish and pan trout. Williams and Newson are currently working to add more menu options, including a new hot-plate special, which consists of a meat, two vegetables and bread, available on Wednesdays and Thursdays. On the regular menu, customers can choose a wide variety of dishes at the restaurant, including chopped steak, smothered pork chops, candied yams and rice with gravy. “We know that no one is going to eat just wings everyday, so we are happy to now capture people who may not just want wings, a burger or anything fried,” Williams says. He says all of the company’s products are purchased and shipped from Memphis and may be hard to find locally, which Williams says adds another element to the menu. “We try to make the way we process our food different so that our customers can taste it in the finished product,” he says. Purple Diamond Sports Bar and Grill (3190 Highway 80 W., 601-9493300) is open Monday through Friday from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. For more information, find the restaurant on Facebook.

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THURSDAY 9/1

SATURDAY 9/3

SUNDAY 9/4

Fondren’s First Thursday is in Fondren.

Mogul Minds & Mimosas is at Liquid Light Café.

Cars & Coffee is at CC’s Coffee House in Ridgeland.

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Mississippi painter Martin Arnold’s “Gypsy” is one of the pieces in the ﬁfth annual Cedars Juried Art Show, which opens Thursday, Sept. 1, at The Cedars Historic Home.

Farm to Table 100 is at 6:30 p.m. at Table 100 (100 Ridge Way, Flowood). Enjoy live music, cocktails, and eight interactive food stations featuring a local chef and a local farmer at each one. Proceeds benefit Farm Families of Mississippi. $95; call 601-933-2720; tableonehundred.com.

MARTIN ARNOLD

WEDNESDAY 8/31

THURSDAY 9/1

The Fifth Annual Cedars Juried Art Show Opening Reception is from 5 to 8 p.m. at The Cedars Historic Home (4145 Old Canton Road). See this year’s carefully selected works in various mediums. This year’s judge is sculptor and Mississippi professor Dr. Samuel M. Gore. Show hangs through Sept. 23. Free; call 601-981-9606; fondren.org. … The River Kings Tour Live is at 9 p.m. at Offbeat (151 Wesley Ave.). Marco Pavé is a hip-hop artist from Memphis, Tenn., and Alfred Banks is a hip-hop artist from New Orleans. $10; call 601-376-9404; offbeatjxn.com. COURTESY ALFRED BANKS

archive collection. Also see contributions from fashion photographers, makeup artists, shoe cobblers and designers. Free; call 601-960-9250; jsums.edu/gallery1arts. … Ben Ricketts performs at 8:30 p.m. at Big Sleepy’s (208 W. Capitol St.). Ricketts is an experimental pop artist from Oxford, Miss. Nossiens and May Queen also perform. For all ages. $5 in advance, $7 at the door; call 601-863-9516; bigsleepys.com.

SATURDAY 9/3

The James Meredith Institute for Citizenship and ReBY MICAH SMITH sponsible Action Volunteer Introduction is from 10:30 a.m. to noon at the Smith Robertson JACKSONFREEPRESS.COM Museum and Cultural Center FAX: 601-510-9019 (528 Bloom St.). The purpose DAILY UPDATES AT of the meeting is to introduce JFPEVENTS.COM the community to the work of the James Meredith Institute. Learn how you can serve the community through the organization. Free; call 662-483-0656; meredithcitizen.org.

August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

EVENTS@

New Orleans-based hip-hop artist Alfred Banks performs with Marco Pavé as part of the River Kings Tour on Thursday, Sept. 1, at Offbeat.

FRIDAY 9/2

Fashion Week: Patrick Kelly’s JSU Homecoming closes after today at Gallery1 (One University Place, 1100 John R. Lynch St., Suite 4). See seven of JSU Alum and Vicks24 burg native Patrick Kelly’s pieces that are going into JSU’s

SUNDAY 9/4

Leon Kroll: Terminal Yards and Artists from the Armory Show closes after today at the Mississippi Museum of Art (380 S. Lamar St.) in the McCarty Foundation Gallery. See works from American artists who contributed work to the pivotal 1913 Armory Show in New York City. Free; call 601960-1515; msmuseumart.org. … The Grill King Cook-Off

is at 6 p.m. at World Famous Bar & Grill (2605 Robinson St.). Comedian LL is the emcee. Sample food from four grill masters. A panel of judges will choose a winner. Admission TBA; call 601-317-3190; find the event on Facebook.

MONDAY 9/5

The Kettle Bell Run: Labor of Love 10K and 5K is at 8 a.m. at Harper, Rains & Knight (1052 Highland Colony Parkway, Ridgeland). The Salvation Army Women’s Auxiliary is the host. Check-in is from 7-7:45 a.m. Proceeds benefit the Salvation Army’s Emergency Assistance Program. $35; call 601-982-4881; salvationarmyalm.org/jackson.

TUESDAY 9/6

The Third Annual Marian Wright Edelman Lectureship is from 9 a.m. to noon at University of Mississippi Medical Center (2500 N. State St.) in the Student Union, rooms A-C. The topic is food and food systems as social determinants of health. The speaker is former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Mike Espy. RSVP. Free; call 601-815-9544; email swagner2@umc.edu; eventbrite.com.

WEDNESDAY 9/7

History Is Lunch: Dr. Wilma Mosley Clopton is at noon at the William F. Winter Archives and History Building (200 North St.). The filmmaker shows her documentary, “Elport Chess and the Lanier Bus Boycott of 1947.” Free; call 601-576-6998.

FOOD & DRINK

CONCERTS & FESTIVALS

Fondren’s First Thursday Sept. 1, 5 p.m., in Fondren. Studio Chane hosts the mostly monthly neighborhood event. Includes shopping, food vendors, live music, open houses, a pet adoption drive and more. Free; call 601-720-2426; fft.city.

Farm to Table 100 Aug. 31, 6:30 p.m., at Table 100 (100 Ridge Way, Flowood). Enjoy live music, cocktails and interactive food stations featuring a local chef and farmer at each. Benefits Farm Families of Mississippi. $95; tableonehundred.com.

Fondren Covered Sept. 1, 7 p.m., at Duling Hall (622 Duling Ave.). Enjoy cover sets including music recorded in Muscle Shoals, Ala. Proceeds benefit the Shelby Neese medical fund. $20; fondrencovered.com.

Mogul Minds & Mimosas Sept. 3, 11 a.m.-2 p.m., at Liquid Light Café (224 E. Capitol St.). The networking event is for women interested in moving forward with school and career goals. $20-$40; eventbrite.com.

The River Kings Tour Live Sept. 1, 9 p.m., at Offbeat (151 Wesley Ave.). Marco Pavé is a hip-hop artist from Memphis, Tenn., and Alfred Banks is a hip-hop artist from New Orleans. $10; call 601376-9404; offbeatjxn.com.

Grill King Cook-Off Sept. 4, 6 p.m., at World Famous Bar & Grill (2605 Robinson St.). Comedian LL is the emcee. Sample food from four grill masters. A panel of judges will choose one winner. Admission TBA; find the event on Facebook.

Ben Ricketts Sept. 2, 8:30 p.m., at Big Sleepy’s (208 W. Capitol St.). Ricketts is an experimental pop artist from Oxford, Miss. Nossiens and May Queen also perform. For all ages. $5 in advance, $7 at the door; call 601-863-9516; bigsleepys.com.

COMMUNITY Frozen Treat Animal Enrichment Days Sept. 3-5, 9 a.m.-4 p.m., at Jackson Zoo (2918 W. Capitol St.). Watch the animals enjoy frozen treats, and chat with zookeepers. Included with admission ($10.25, discounts for seniors and children, members free); call 601-352-2580; jacksonzoo.org. Cars & Coffee Sept. 4, 8 a.m.-noon, at CC’s Coffee House (344 Highway 51, Suite 100, Ridgeland). See vintage, sports and custom cars and purchase coffee beverages. Free admission; find the event on Facebook. History Is Lunch: Dr. Wilma Mosley Clopton Sept. 7, noon, at William F. Winter Archives and History Building (200 North St.). The filmmaker shows her documentary, “Elport Chess and the Lanier Bus Boycott of 1947.” Free; call 576-6998. Third Annual Marian Wright Edelman Lectureship Sept. 6, 9 a.m.-noon, at University of Mississippi Medical Center (2500 N. State St.). In the Student Union, rooms A-C. The topic is food and food systems as social determinants of health. The speaker is former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Mike Espy. RSVP. Free; call 601-815-9544; email swagner2@umc.edu; eventbrite.com. All 4 Children Consignment Fall/Winter Jackson Sale Sept. 7, 5:30-8 p.m., Sept. 8, 10 a.m.-7 p.m., Sept. 9, 9 a.m.-7 p.m., Sept. 10, 8 a.m.noon, at Mississippi Trade Mart (1200 Mississippi St.). $10 pre-sale admission Sept. 7, free admission Sept. 8-10; all4childrenconsignment.net. 1 Million Cups Jackson Wednesdays, 9 a.m., at Coalesce Cooperative Work Environment (109 N. State St.). Entrepreneurs meet to network, pitch ideas, and get information on scaling and improving their businesses. Presenters must register. Free; call 985-7979; 1millioncups.com/jackson.

KIDS Youth Fishing Rodeo Sept. 3, 8:30 a.m., at Mayes Lake at LeFleur’s Bluff (115 Lakeland Terrace). The Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks hosts the event for ages 15 and under. Bring fishing gear, catfish bait and stringers. Free; call 601-987-3923 or 601-432-2200; mdwfp.com. Events at Mississippi Children’s Museum (2145 Highland Drive) • 529 Day Sept. 3, 10 a.m.-2 p.m. The event is centered around programs such as Mississippi Affordable College Savings and Mississippi Prepaid Affordable College Tuition. Included with admission ($10, children under 12 months free); call 601-981-5469; mschildrensmuseum.org. • Visiting Artist—Benjamin Morris: The Power of Words Sept. 4, 1:30-5:30 p.m. Discover the power of words in his poetry workshop that incorporates literacy and the arts. Included with admission ($10, children under 12 months free); call 601-981-5469; mschildrensmuseum.org. Story Time with Uncle Story Sept. 6, 10-11 a.m., at Mississippi Agriculture and Forestry Museum (1150 Lakeland Drive). The puppet show on the first Tuesday of each month features guest readers with stories that relate to agriculture, forestry and animals. For ages 2-5. Included with admission ($5, $4 seniors, military and ages 3-18, children under 3 free); mdwfp.com/museum.

SLATE

the best in sports over the next seven days by Bryan Flynn

The long wait is finally over. College football is back, as the first full week of action starts around the country. Thursday, Sept. 1 College football (9 p.m.-1 a.m., Online): Tune in for the start of the Tony Hughes era, as the new head coach leads Jackson State against UNLV in a road game, which will stream online at CampusInsiders.com. Friday, Sept. 2 College football (5-9 p.m., ESPN3): Mississippi Valley State hits the road to take on Eastern Michigan out of the Mid-American Conference. Saturday, Sept. 3 College football (11 a.m.-3 p.m., SECN): Mississippi State starts a new quarterback at home against South Alabama out of the Sun Belt Conference. … College football (6:30-10 p.m., ESPNU): Watch coach Jay Hopson’s first time behind the reins at Southern Miss as the Golden Eagles take on Kentucky in an away game. Sunday, Sept. 4 College football (noon-4 p.m., ESPN): The Fred McNair era begins at Alcorn

SPORTS & WELLNESS Kettle Bell Run: Labor of Love 10K and 5K Sept. 5, 8 a.m., at Harper, Rains & Knight (1052 Highland Colony Parkway, Ridgeland). The Salvation Army Women’s Auxiliary is the host. Check-in is from 7-7:45 a.m. Proceeds benefit women and children through the Salvation Army’s Emergency Assistance Program. $35; call 601-9824881; salvationarmyalm.org/jackson.

STAGE & SCREEN “Rob Zombie’s 31” Sept. 1, 7 p.m., at Tinseltown (411 Riverwind Drive, Pearl). The film is about carnival workers who are kidnapped and forced to play a terrifying game. Also includes music videos and behind-the-scenes footage. $14, $13 seniors and students, $12 children; cinemark.com.

State, as the Braves meet BethuneCookman in the MEAC/SWAC Challenge. Monday, Sept. 5 College football (7-11 p.m., ESPN): The first full weekend of college football ends with the UM Rebels and the Florida State Seminoles battling it out on Labor Day. Tuesday, Sept. 6 Soccer (7-9 p.m., FS1): The road to Russia continues with the World Cup qualifier between host U.S. and Trinidad and Tobago. Wednesday, Sept. 7 MLB (7-10 p.m., ESPN): The only baseball team to reach 80 wins, the Chicago Cubs, close out a series against the Milwaukee Brewers. Enjoy a great, long weekend of college football with some exciting matchups. Next week, the NFL returns with week one of the regular season. Follow Bryan Flynn at jfpsports.com, @jfpsports and at facebook.com/jfpsports. Lucky Town Labor Day Battle of the Bands Sept. 3, 2 p.m., at Lucky Town Brewing Company (1710 N. Mill St.). All styles of music welcome. Bands must register by Aug. 28. $15 band registration, $10 vendor registration; call 201-0988; email dwalls51@gmail.com; squareup. com/store/lucky-town-brewing. Julia Lucille Sept. 3, 8 p.m., at Soul Wired Cafe (111 Millsaps Ave.). The Austin, Texas-based singer-songwriter performs. Free with purchase of meal; call 790-0864; find the event on Facebook.

CREATIVE CLASSES Paint & Pint Nite Tuesdays, 7-9 p.m., at Fenian’s Pub (901 E. Fortification St.). Paint Nite hosts the event featuring painting and drinks. Early arrival suggested. $45 (use coupon code JFPLove for $20 off); paintnite.com.

Paint Nite at Biaggi’s Thursdays, 7-9 p.m., at Biaggi’s (970 Highland Colony Parkway, Ridgeland). Paint Nite hosts the event featuring painting and cocktails. For ages 21 and up. $45 (use coupon code JFPLove for $20 off); paintnite.com.

EXHIBIT OPENINGS Fifth Annual Cedars Juried Art Show Opening Reception Sept. 1, 5-8 p.m., at The Cedars Historic Home (4145 Old Canton Road). See this year’s carefully selected works in various mediums. This year’s judge is sculptor and Mississippi professor Dr. Samuel M. Gore. Show hangs through Sept. 23. Free; call 601-981-9606; fondren.org. Fashion Week: Patrick Kelly’s JSU Homecoming Mondays-Fridays through Sept. 2, at Gallery1 (One University Place, 1100 John R. Lynch St., Suite 4). See seven of JSU Alum and Vicksburg native Patrick Kelly’s pieces that are going into JSU’s archive collection. Also see contributions from fashion photographers, makeup artists, shoe cobblers and designers. Includes fashion-related workshops. Free; jsums.edu/gallery1arts. Events at Mississippi Museum of Art (380 S. Lamar St.) • Art & Coffee Sept. 3, 10-11:30 a.m. Join museum staff to look at and discuss current and upcoming exhibitions. Includes coffee and pastries. Free; call 960-1515; msmuseumart.org. • Leon Kroll: Terminal Yards and Artists from the Armory Show Tuesdays-Saturdays through Sept. 4. See works from American artists who contributed work to the pivotal 1913 Armory Show in New York City. Free; call 601-9601515; msmuseumart.org. Marie Hull: Visions of Color and Light Mondays-Saturdays through Sept. 3, at Belhaven University, Bitsy Irby Visual Arts and Dance Center (1500 Peachtree St.). Free; call 601-968-8937; email jkyle@belhaven.edu; belhaven.edu. The Art in Us All: Community Exhibition Series Mondays-Saturdays through Sept. 4, at St. Catherine’s Village (200 Dominican Drive, Madison). See works from the Perfect Palette Art Group series, which includes works from residents of St. Catherine’s. Free; msmuseumart.org. James Howard Meredith: Am I or Am I Not a Citizen? Mondays-Saturdays through Oct. 30, at Smith Robertson Museum and Cultural Center (528 Bloom St.). The exhibit is a chronicle of Meredith’s admission into the University of Mississippi in 1962 and the March Against Fear of 1966. $4.50, $3 seniors (ages 62 and up), $1.50 children under 18; call 601-960-1457.

BE THE CHANGE Statewide Recovery Month Kick-off and Resource Fair Sept. 2, 9 a.m.-noon, at Smith Park (302 E. Amite St.). Includes speakers, proclamations, raffles and a resource fair. Free; call 601-5661934; engagedrecovery.com/recoverymonth. James Meredith Institute for Citizenship and Responsible Action Volunteer Introduction Sept. 3, 10:30 a.m.-noon, at Smith Robertson Museum and Cultural Center (528 Bloom St.). The purpose of the meeting is to introduce the community to the work of the James Meredith Institute. Learn how you can serve the community through the organization. Free; call 662-483-0656; meredithcitizen.org. Check jfpevents.com for updates and more listings, or to add your own events online. You can also email event details to events@jacksonfreepress.com to be added to the calendar. The deadline is noon the Wednesday prior to the week of publication.

August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

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DIVERSIONS | music

MUSIC | live

New Life in Lisbon Deaths

Aug. 31 - Wednesday

“I had attempted drums, but I was never good at them,” she says. “I ended up taking guitar lessons because that’s what my dad does. He plays guitars and sings. That ended up being a big influence.” Morrison says there is no set person who makes decisions about how something should sound in the group. Because of their desire to always try something new with Lisbon Deaths, the band mates accept Courtesy Lisbon Deaths

(Left to right) Derek Middlebrook, Sarah Grace MacInnis, Chris Morrison and Lacy Ellinwood perform as Jackson indie-pop quartet Lisbon Deaths.

guitarist and vocalist Sarah Grace MacInnis, and drummer Derek Middlebrook first began playing together in synthpunk band No Man in 2015. While the musicians enjoyed playing in the group, they ultimately chose to disband No Man in favor of the freedom that came with creating Lisbon Deaths. “In our last group, we were very stuck to what we would play, but here, we all are very collective people,” Morrison says. “We like stuff that’s on the radio and weird stuff, as well.” While the band has worked to create a cohesive sound in a short time, taking inspiration from artists such as The Smiths, The Cranberries and Talking Heads, each member of Lisbon Deaths has a unique musical background. Morrison says he always had his hands on instruments, even before he could walk, and he also played drums, piano and bass for previous bands. He and Middlebrook met through playing various venues through Jackson well before No Man. Ellinwood’s first instrument was a tuba, but she says she got tired of being the “brass baby” and switched the “cooler” bass guitar. Likewise, MacInnis is committed to guitar these days, but it wasn’t her first foray into music.

ideas from the other members without anyone getting too offended about whether it makes it into the final song or not. “The fact that no one has a clear idea is one of the best things,” he says. “It’s kind of a like hodgepodge.” Although the music is best described as indie pop, the members of Lisbon Deaths aren’t dead set on becoming the coolest band nor a massive, mainstream hit-making machine. Ellinwood says they simply want give the audience a story that they can relate to, a catchy tune they can dance to or maybe a little of both. “I think that the collaboration of all our weirdness creates something that sounds a little bit different that you can play (for) different types of people,” MacInnis says. “I don’t know when it became a bad thing to have people to dance and sway to your music.” While listeners can check out Lisbon Deaths’ first two demos, “The News” and “Soft Chew Rodeo,” on the group’s Bandcamp page, they won’t have to wait long for more music. In December, the quartet will begin work on a yet-to-be-titled fulllength record with producer Misha Hercules of Olympic Records. For more information, visit lisbondeaths. bandcamp.com.

SEPT. 1 - Thursday Burgers & Blues - Jesse Smith 5:30 p.m. Cerami’s - Robert King Char - Tommie Vaughn 6 p.m. Duling Hall - Fondren Covered: Muscle Shoals 7 p.m. $20 Fenian’s - Emerald Accent Fitzgerald’s - Don Grant 7:30 p.m. Georgia Blue, Flowood - Brandon Greer Georgia Blue, Madison - Jason Turner Iron Horse Grill - Jimmy “Duck” Holmes 6 p.m. Kathryn’s - Gator Trio 6:30 p.m. free Kemistry - Skratchin’ Jackson 9 p.m. Offbeat - Marco Pave & Alfred Banks 9 p.m. $10 Pelican Cove - Acoustic Crossroads 6:30 p.m. Shucker’s - Sofa Kings 7:30 p.m. free Sylvia’s - Thursday Night Live feat. The Blues Man & Sunshine McGhee 9 p.m. free Table 100 - Charles Scott 5 p.m.; Andy Henderson 6-9 p.m.

SEPT. 2 - Friday Ameristar Bottleneck Blues Bar, Vicksburg - BB Secrist 8 p.m. Big Sleepy’s - Ben Ricketts, Nossiens & May Queen 8 p.m. $5 advance $7 door bigsleepys.com Burgers & Blues - Travelin’ Jane 6 p.m. Char - Ronnie Brown 6 p.m. F. Jones Corner - Stevie J Blues midnight $10 Fenian’s - Jonathan Alexander Georgia Blue, Flowood - Jason Turner Hal & Mal’s - Swing de Paris 7-10 p.m. free Iron Horse Grill - Lady Elle 8 p.m. Kathryn’s - Rhythm Masters 7 p.m. free Kemistry - Skratchin’ Jackson 9 p.m. M Bar - Flirt Fridays feat. DJ T. Lewis free Martin’s - The Stolen Faces 10 p.m.

Kathryn’s - Silverado 6 p.m. free Pelican Cove - May Day 2 p.m.; Hunter Gibson 7 p.m. Pop’s Saloon - Jason Miller Band, Trademark & Burnham Road 9 p.m. Shucker’s - The Chill 4 p.m. free Sombra Mexican Kitchen - John Mora 11 a.m. Table 100 - Raphael Semmes Jazz Trio 11 a.m.-2 p.m.; Dan Michael Colbert 6-9 p.m. Wellington’s - Andy Hardwick 11 a.m.

SEPT. 3 - Saturday

SEPT. 5 - Monday

Ameristar Bottleneck Blues Bar, Vicksburg - BB Secrist 8 p.m. Burgers & Blues - Candice Moore & Jim Hartner 6 p.m. F. Jones Corner - Stevie J Blues midnight $10 Fenian’s - War Possum Georgia Blue, Flowood - Brian Jones Iron Horse Grill - 19th Street Red 9 p.m. Kathryn’s - The Sole Shakers 7 p.m. free

Char - Tommie Vaughn 6 p.m. Kemistry - Karaoke Contest Pelican Cove - Dirt Road Cadillac noon; The StoneCoats 5 p.m. Shucker’s - Hunter Gibson & Chris Link 3:30 p.m. Table 100 - Andrew Pates 6-9 p.m.

SEPT. 6 - Tuesday Char - Tommie Vaughn 6 p.m. Fenian’s - Open Mic Kathryn’s - Scott Turner Trio 6:30 p.m. free Last Call Sports Grill - Top-Shelf Tuesdays feat. DJ Spoon 9 p.m. Margarita’s - John Mora 6 p.m. Pelican Cove - Brandon Greer 6:30 p.m. Table 100 - Chalmers Davis 6-9 p.m.

Sept. 7 - Wednesday John Papa Gros La Nueva Finca - Montez de Durango & Los Amos de Nuevo Leon 9 p.m. $35 Lucky Town Brewing Co. - Labor Day Battle of the Bands 2-6 p.m. M Bar - Saturday Night Live feat. DJ Shanomak free Martin’s - Lucidea & Jugala 10 p.m. Pelican Cove - Dirt Road Addiction 2 p.m.; Travelin’ Jane 7 p.m. Pop’s Saloon - Radio Mojo Reed Pierce’s, Byram - Aaron Coker Band 9 p.m. free Shucker’s - Greenfish (deck) 3:30 p.m. free; Faze 4 8 p.m. $5; Jonathan Alexander (deck) 10 p.m. free Soul Wired Cafe - Julia Lucille 8 p.m. free with purchase of meal Table 100 - Tommie Vaughn 6 p.m. WonderLust - Drag Performance & Dance Party feat. DJ Taboo 8 p.m.-3 a.m. free before 10 p.m.

SEPT. 4 - Sunday Char - Big Easy Three 11 a.m.; Tommie Vaughn 6 p.m. Fenian’s - Kevin Ace Robinson The Hideaway - Mike & Marty’s Jam Session

9/1 - Ying Yang Twins - Zydeco, Birmingham 9/2 - Styx - Horseshoe Tunica Hotel & Casino 9/2 - Drake w/ Future - Smoothie King Center, New Orleans 9/3 - Baroness - New Daisy Theatre, Memphis 9/3 - Kenny Wayne Shepherd - IP Casino, Resort & Spa, Biloxi 9/5 - Nicole Lynn Foxx - House of Blues, New Orleans 9/5 - Maroon 5 w/ Tove Lo - Smoothie King Center, New Orleans

Big Sleepy’s - Pumpkinseed w/ Die With Nature & Alex Thiel 7 p.m. $5 Char - Tommie Vaughn 6 p.m. Fitzgerald’s - Johnny Crocker 7:30 p.m. Kathryn’s - Jeff Maddox 6:30 p.m. free Kemistry - Open Mic Night 9 p.m. 601-665-2073 Pelican Cove - Brenda West 6:30 p.m. Shucker’s - Lovin Ledbetter 7:30 p.m. free Table 100 - Charles Scott 5-9 p.m.

Send music listings to Micah Smith at music@ jacksonfreepress.com by noon Monday. For more music, visit jfp.ms/musiclistings. August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

f you haven’t heard of Jackson’s guitarbased pop quartet Lisbon Deaths yet, don’t feel too bad—the band is only about six months old. However, the musicians are no strangers to the local music scene. Instead, they are returning to it with the hopes of bringing a different sound and a different perspective. Guitarist and vocalist Chris Morrison, bassist and vocalist Lacy Ellinwood,

Char - Tommie Vaughn 6 p.m. Fitzgerald’s - Johnny Crocker 7:30 p.m. Hal & Mal’s - Slow Motion Cowboys 7-10 p.m. Kathryn’s - Larry Brewer & Doug Hurd 6:30 p.m. free Kemistry - Matt Nooe Band 9 p.m. Kristos, Madison - Jason Turner 6 p.m. McB’s - Josh Journeay 8 p.m. Pelican Cove - Shaun Patterson 6:30 p.m. Shucker’s - Silverado 7:30 p.m. free Table 100 - Charles Scott 5-9 p.m.

Ole Tavern - Lydia Bains & Co. 9 p.m. free Pelican Cove - Redeau 7 p.m. Pop’s Saloon - Hairicane Shucker’s - Crocker & Reynolds 5:30 p.m. free; Snazz 8 p.m. $5; Brian Jones (deck) 10 p.m. free Soulshine, Ridgeland - Andy Tanas 8-11 p.m. Table 100 - Charles Scott 5 p.m.; Tommie Vaughn 6-9:30 p.m. WonderLust - DJ Taboo 8 p.m.2 a.m.

Courtesy John Papa Gros

by Amber Taylor

Music listings are due noon Monday to be included in print and online listings: music@jacksonfreepress.com.

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Last Week’s Answers

BY MATT JONES 51 LPGA star ___ Pak 52 Abbr. after a lawyer’s name 53 He was “The Greatest” 54 Clothe, with “up” 56 Triple ___ (orange liqueur) 57 *Arsenio Hall’s rapper alter ego with the song “Owwww!” 59 *Two-time Grammy winner for Best Comedy Album 61 Buddies, in Bogota 62 Not just by itself, as on fast-food menus 63 Fixed up 64 Land attached to a manor house

41 Like a small garage 42 Message on a dirty vehicle 43 Like mercury at room temperature 45 Cover in the kitchen 47 Hammer mate, on old ﬂags 49 “Family Ties” mother 50 Not even me 53 R&B singer with the ﬁve-album project “Stadium” 55 “Where America’s Day Begins”

For answers to this puzzle, call: 1-900-226-2800, 99 cents per minute. Must be 18+. Or to bill to your credit card, call: 1-800 655-6548. Reference puzzle #787

Down

“They Took Their Vitamins” —all six are represented. Across

1 Overlooked, as faults 8 Drink in 14 Take for granted 15 More Bohemian 16 *”Do the Right Thing” actress 17 *Singer/percussionist who collaborated with Prince on “Purple Rain” 18 “Ew, not that ...” 19 French 101 pronoun 20 This pirate ship 21 Commingle 22 They’re taken on stage 24 Like pulp ﬁction

26 Mata ___ (World War I spy) 27 Boost 29 Friend-o 30 Actress Kirsten 31 “Hello” singer 33 Carved pole emblem 35 *”Full Frontal” host 38 ___ umlaut 39 Small towns 41 Silicon Valley “competitive intelligence” company with a bird logo 44 Exercise count 46 Wise advisors 48 Brand that ran “short shorts” ads 49 Bankrupt company in 2001 news

1 Cone-bearing evergreen 2 Bitter salad green 3 Internet enthusiasts, in 1990s slang 4 “Gangnam Style” performer 5 Car company with a four-ring logo 6 Sense of intangibility? 7 Gets ready to drive 8 Reacted with pleasure 9 “Uncle Remus” character ___ Rabbit 10 HPV, for one 11 J.R. Ewing, e.g. 12 Shows again 13 Portmanteau in 2016 news 17 Brangelina’s kid 23 Kind of trunk 25 Danger in the grass 26 Shoulder-to-elbow bone 28 “I’m hunting wabbits” speaker 30 Fix up, as code 32 Word between dog and dog 34 Bar accumulation 36 Wardrobe extension? 37 Fancy ways to leave 40 “You betcha I will!”

BY MATT JONES Last Week’s Answers

“Sum Sudoku”

Put one digit from 1-9 in each square of this Sudoku so that the following three conditions are met: 1) each row, column, and 3x3 box (as marked off by heavy lines in the grid) contains the digits 1-9 exactly one time; 2) no digit is repeated within any of the areas marked off by dotted lines; and 3) the sums of the numbers in each area marked off by dotted lines total the little number given in each of those areas. Now do what I tell you—solve!! psychosudoku@gmail.com

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tanzania Peaberry zanzibar MUSIC WRITING Interested in interviewing musicians, reviewing albums and networking within Jackson’s music community? The Jackson Free Press is looking for

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August 31 - September 6, 2016 • jfp.ms

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Play a joke on your nervous anxiety. Leap off the ground or whirl in a circle five times as you shout, “I am made of love!” Learn the words and melody to a new song that lifts your mood whenever you sing it. Visualize yourself going on an adventure that will amplify your courage and surprise your heart. Make a bold promise to yourself, and acquire an evocative object that will symbolize your intention to fulfill that promise. Ask yourself a soul-shaking question you haven’t been wise enough to investigate before now. Go to a wide-open space, spread your arms out in a greeting to the sky, and pray for a vision of your next big goal.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22):

The Illuminati do not want you to receive the prophecy I have prepared for you. Nor do the Overlords of the New World Order, the Church of the SubGenius, the Fake God that masquerades as the Real God, or the nagging little voice in the back of your head. So why am I going ahead and divulging this oracle anyway? Because I love you. My loyalty is to you, not those shadowy powers. Therefore, I am pleased to inform you that the coming weeks will be a favorable time for you to evade, ignore, undermine or rebel against controlling influences that aren’t in alignment with your soul’s goals.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21):

The dictionary says that the verb “to schmooze” means to chat with people in order to promote oneself or make a social connection that may prove to be advantageous. But that definition puts a selfish spin on an activity that can, at least sometimes, be carried out with artful integrity. Your assignment in the coming weeks is to perform this noble version of schmoozing. If you are offering a product or service that is beautiful or useful, or both, I hope you will boost its presence and influence with the power of your good listening skills and smart conversations.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21):

If you are attuned with the cosmic rhythms in the coming weeks, you will be a source of teaching and leadership. Allies will feel fertilized by your creative vigor. You’ll stimulate team spirit with your savvy appeals to group solidarity. If anyone can revive droopy procrastinators and demonstrate the catalytic power of gratitude, it’ll be you. Have you heard enough good news, Sagittarius, or can you absorb more? I expect that you’ll inspire interesting expressions of harmony that will replace contrived versions of togetherness. And every blessing you bestow will expand your capacity for attracting favors you can really use.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19):

The fictional character known as Superman has one prominent vulnerability: the mineral kryptonite. When he’s near this stuff, it weakens his superpowers and may cause other problems. I think we all have our own versions of kryptonite, even if they’re metaphorical. For instance, my own superpowers tend to decline when I come into the presence of bad architecture, cheesy poetry and off-pitch singing. How about you, Capricorn? What’s your version of kryptonite? Whatever it is, I’m happy to let you know that you are currently less susceptible to its debilitating influences than usual. Why? Well, you have a sixth sense about how to avoid it. And even if it does draw near, you have in your repertoire some new tricks to keep it from sapping your strength.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18):

It’s quite possible you will receive seductive proposals in the coming weeks. You may also be invited to join your fortunes with potential collaborators who have almost fully awakened to your charms. I won’t be surprised if you receive requests to share your talents, offer your advice or bestow your largesse. You’re a hot prospect, my dear. You’re an attractive candidate. You appear to be ripe for the plucking. How should you respond? My advice is to be flattered and gratified, but also discerning. Just because an inquiry is exciting doesn’t mean it’s good for you. Choose carefully.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20):

Would you like to become a master of intimacy? Can you imagine yourself handling the challenges of togetherness with the skill of a great artist and the wisdom of a love

genius? If that prospect appeals to you, now would be a favorable time to up your game. Here’s a hot tip on how to proceed: You must cultivate two seemingly contradictory skills. The first is the capacity to identify and nurture the best qualities in your beloved friend. The second is the ability to thrive on the fact that healthy relationships require you to periodically wrestle with each other’s ignorance and immaturity.

ARIES (March 21-April 19):

Truth decay is in its early stages. If you take action soon, you can prevent a full-scale decomposition. But be forewarned: Things could get messy, especially if you intervene with the relentless candor and clarity that will be required for medicinal purification. So what do you think? Are you up for the struggle? I understand if you’re not. I’ll forgive you if you simply flee. But if you decide to work your cagey magic, here are some tips. 1. Compile your evidence with rigor. 2. As much as is humanly possible, put aside rancor. Root your efforts in compassionate objectivity. 3. Even as you dig around in the unsightly facts, cherish the beautiful truths you’d like to replace them with.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20):

Are you willing to lose at least some of your inhibitions? Are you curious to find out what it feels like to cavort like a wise wild child? If you want to fully cooperate with life’s plans, you will need to consider those courses of action. I am hoping that you’ll accept the dare, of course. I suspect you will thrive as you explore the pleasures of playful audacity and whimsical courage and effervescent experiments. So be blithe, Taurus! Be exuberant! Be open to the hypothesis that opening to jaunty and jovial possibilities is the single most intelligent thing you can do right now.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20):

What’s the current status of your relationship with your feet? Have you been cultivating and cherishing your connection with the earth below you? The reason I ask, Gemini, is that right now it’s especially important for you to enjoy intimacy with gravity, roots and foundations. Whatever leads you down and deeper will be a source of good fortune. Feeling grounded will provide you with an aptitude for practical magic. Consider the possibilities of going barefoot, getting a foot massage or buying new shoes that are both beautiful and comfortable.

CANCER (June 21-July 22):

A woman in the final stages of giving birth may experience acute discomfort. But once her infant spills out into the world, her distress can transform into bliss. I don’t foresee quite so dramatic a shift for you, Cancerian. But the transition you undergo could have similar elements: from uncertainty to grace; from agitation to relief; from constriction to spaciousness. To take maximum advantage of this blessing, don’t hold onto the state you’re leaving behind—or the feelings it aroused in you.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22):

In one of my dreams last night, a Leo sensualist I know advised me to take smart pills and eat an entire chocolate cheesecake before writing my next Leo horoscope. In another dream, my Leo friend Erica suggested that I compose your horoscope while attending an orgy where all the participants were brilliant physicists, musicians and poets. In a third dream, my old teacher Rudolf (also a Leo) said I should create the Leo horoscope as I sunbathed on a beach in Maui while being massaged by two sexy geniuses. Here’s how I interpret my dreams: In the coming days, you can literally increase your intelligence by indulging in luxurious comforts and sensory delights.

Homework: All of us are trying to wake up from our sleepy delusions about the nature of life. What’s your most potent wake-up technique?

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