Mississippi Lawyer Blog

In today's Clarion Ledger, Ed Peters' grand jury testimony was discussed. Peters was the long time Hinds County District Attorney whose office prosecuted all felony crimes in the county. After retiring as a prosecutor, Peters then went into private practice. He was hired by Dickie Scruggs who had a case pending in front of Hinds County Circuit Court Judge Bobby DeLaughter, a former long time assistant under Peters. (Peters and DeLaughter are in the picture to the left).

According to Peters' sworn testimony, he visited privately with DeLaughter on several occasions to discuss Scruggs' ongoing case. Peters was trying to influence DeLaughter to find in favor of Scruggs. This type of communication with a judge, known as ex parte communication, is prohibited by court rules. Peters also testified that DeLaughter longed to be a federal judge and that former Senator Trent Lott called DeLaughter to tell him his brother-in-law Scruggs had suggested his name for a federal judge position. Even thought DeLaughter didn't get the position, he was advised that Scruggs had put his name up for consideration.

We all know the rest of the story. Scruggs and his attorneys were caught up in this judicial bribery case as well as one in LaFayette County. Several lawyers and one judge (DeLaughter) plead guilty and were sent to prison. Of course, Peters somehow avoided a conviction by cutting a deal to testify against the others, including DeLaughter, with whom he said he had a "father son relationship". Gee, thanks Dad.

I started practicing in 1994 at a time when both Peters and DeLaughter were two of the top dog prosecutors in the state. I tried my first murder case against DeLaughter in February 1995 (my client was convicted of a lesser included offense). Both Peters and DeLaughter prosecuted Byron De La Beckwith, a case which my partner Merrida Coxwell was appointed by the court to defend Beckwith. Merrida also had several other high profile cases against Peters and DeLaughter over the years. Peters and DeLaughter seemingly had a habit of hiding favorable evidence which should have been turned over to the defendants. Most of the cases were overturned for these discovery violations on appeal with Beckwith being the notable exception. (Let's face it, no elected judge was going to vote to overturn Beckwith's conviction). The Mississippi Supreme Court even scolded Peters' office for repeated discovery violations.

When the Scruggs bribery scandal broke out, my mind immediately began to think that this is not the first time this has happened in Hinds County. How many other cases, civil and criminal, have been compromised? We know that Peters and DeLaughter have been accused of running a similar scam in the Eaton v. Frisby case in which it was claimed that Eaton hired Peters to influence DeLaughter. How many other cases were there? How many criminal defendants have been denied a fair trial by similar tactics? Did Peters and/or DeLaughter have similar ex parte communications with judges when they were prosecutors? Well, we'll probably never know because the investigation into these shady tactics went no further. It's as if no one really wanted to know.

Continue reading "Was Ex-Hinds County DA Peters Corrupt while he was a Prosecutor?" »

We have all seen them. The District Attorney or Assistant D.A. that just cannot wait to make a headline in the paper by trying their case in front of the jury. While all D.A.'s are not attention-seeking, all District Attorneys are elected in our state. Obviously, this fact has nothing to do with their constant desire to grandstand when the press is in the courtroom or around the courthouse. This type of behavior has been going on for as long as people have craved attention. In an effort to prevent certain types of behavior, all lawyers have been provided the "Mississippi Rules of Professional Conduct" to guide them along. In fact, you cannot even graduate law school without having taken a class in Professional Ethics.

Knowing that all attorneys should be aware of these rules, I become extremely offended when I witness attorneys violating these rules, usually because they are unaware they even exist. So why don't the attorneys know the rules? Well, it doesn't help when certain private attorneys are serving as "special prosecutors" for various cases. That's right; an attorney who was never elected by the residents of a particular county is serving as the prosecutor for various cases across our state. These "prosecutors" sometimes violate rules that are essential to any jury trial, and the most alarming trend is they don't even know they're doing it.

Take for instance, this case. Basically, a mistrial was declared after a jury couldn't agree whether a mentally ill woman was sane or insane when she fled from police and caused a fatal car accident. The special prosecutor in this case is a private attorney who made some interesting comments after the Judge declared a mistrial.

"Ogden said he made a plea offer of a 10-year sentence with credit for time served. Wilson served more than three years in jail until she was released on bond in January. She is charged with fleeing a law enforcement officer resulting in a death - a charge that carries a maximum 40 years in prison with a conviction.

"We plan to retry her if we can't work out a plea agreement," Ogden said."

This commentary on the case would be absolutely appropriate if it were not absolutely inappropriate. Rule 3.6 of the Rules of Professional Conduct states:

"A lawyer shall not make an extrajudicial statement that a reasonable person would expect to be disseminated by means of public communication if the lawyer knows or reasonably should know that it will have a substantial likelihood of materially prejudicing an adjudicative proceeding."

Furthermore, the Mississippi Rules of Evidence, Rule 410 declares statements related to pleas or plea discussions to be inadmissible in trial. The Rule mentions the prejudice a defendant may suffer by having these statements made public.

I, like anyone else out there, appreciate people willing to do something to assist our government in times of need. I am not a fan of people signing up to prosecute other people, and in the process violating rules they should already know and understand. We need to be more vigilant in our roles as advocates, and I am confident the attorneys at Coxwell & Associates understand this concept.