What has followed is Doug Evans’s relentless, Javert-like prosecution of Flowers. It has now consisted of six trials, making Flowers one of a handful of people in American history to be prosecuted six times for the same murder charges. The first two trials, both resulting in conviction, were overturned on appeal by the Mississippi Supreme Court, citing prosecutorial misconduct. A third trial ended in a conviction that was reversed by the higher court, now because “the state engaged in racially discriminatory practices during the jury selection process.” Evans had used similar tactics in the first two trials to ensure that those juries were predominantly white as well.
Curtis Flowers: Mississippi’s Marked Man
For the next two trials, Evans seated racially balanced juries reflective of Winona’s population. Both trials ended in mistrials, with all of the white jurors voting to convict and all of the black jurors voting to acquit. Indeed, Evans had consistently played up the case’s racial undercurrent, one that harked back to ghosts of the past: an angry young black man, compelled by what he perceived to be an affront—loss of employment and money—got his revenge by massacring his former (white) employer as well as three of her employees.
For the sixth trial, Evans returned to a predominantly white jury. The result was another conviction, this one handed down, on June 18, 2010, in less than half an hour. What should happen if the latest conviction is overturned on appeal, which could be handed down any day now? A defendant can be tried, Evans told local reporters after the sixth trial, “as many times as it takes.”
What is noteworthy, as the media again focuses on the Trayvon Martin killing, is how little national attention has been paid to the Flowers case, which is taking place within driving distance of where Oprah Winfrey was born and Morgan Freeman lives. Meanwhile, Curtis Flowers remains on death row, waiting.
Article Appeared @http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/06/29/curtis-flowers-mississippi-s-marked-man.html