The second in command of the Mississippi Department of Corrections may be without a job after his biography disappeared from the agency’s website and was replaced with that of a new commissioner.
Karei McDonald Jr., who began working for the department in February 2020, was the executive deputy commissioner and deputy commissioner of administration and finance.
Karei Mcdonald, , who began working for the Mississippi Department of Investigative Reportingin February 2020, was executive deputy commissioner and deputy commissioner of administration and finance. Credit: Courtesy of MDOC
His biography was removed from MDOC’s executive leadership page, and by Friday morning was replaced with that of Derrick Garner as deputy commissioner of administration and finance. Garner’s biography states that he was appointed to the position Thursday.
A spokesperson from MDOC did not respond to a request for comment Friday morning, including whether McDonald is still employed with the department.
But a memo from Commissioner Burl Cain to employees noted McDonald was no longer employed with the department and announced Garner’s appointment, Darkhorse Press reported.
“Please help us welcome (Garner) into his new position and give him your full support,” the memo reads.
Through the administration and finance division, McDonald oversaw department budgeting, a fiscal comptroller, procurement, property, human resources and agricultural enterprises, according to his biography that was on MDOC’s website.
McDonald previously worked for the state auditor’s office since 2004, and before that was chief fiscal officer for the Mississippi Department of Employment Security and a staff accountant for the Mississippi Department of Health, according to his biography.
Derrick Garner is th eas deputy commissioner of administration and finance.. Credit: Courtesy of MDOC
Garner, the new deputy commissioner for administration and finance, has worked for MDOC since July 2020 and previously served as chief fiscal officer and focused on budget operations, according to his biography.
“This is a unique organization and I wanted to help to make a positive impact for the state,” Garner said about his decision to join the MDOC, which is included in his biography. “It was a great challenge and opportunity to be a part of this team.”
He also worked for the state auditor’s office and before that for the Mississippi Gaming Commission, according to his biography.
Attorney General Lynn Fitch is asking the Supreme Court to set execution dates for two men on death row.
The Thursday motions are for 55-year-old Willie Jerome Manning, who has been on death row for nearly 30 years, and 60-year-old Robert Simon Jr., who has been there for over 30 years.
Fitch’s office wants the court to set execution dates within the next 30 days.
The state’s most recent execution was last year when Thomas Loden Jr. was put to death a week and a half before Christmas.
Willie Jerome Manning was convicted of shooting Mississippi State University students Tiffany Miller and Jon Steckler in 1994.
Manning has maintained his innocence. After a direct appeal, federal court proceedings, a motion for post-conviction relief and an attempt to have the U.S. Supreme Court to hear his case, the state asked for Manning’s execution date to be reset for May 2013.
That execution was stayed, and Manning was able to file another post-conviction relief petition, including having DNA evidence tested and expert fingerprint analysis performed in the trial court, according to court records.
The attorney general’s office has asked for the stay of execution to be lifted and for the court to dismiss a second successive post-conviction relief motion so that Manning’s execution date can be set.
“Manning’s pending motion is a blatant attempt to delay his lawful execution,” the AG’s motion states.
Manning’s second motion for post-conviction relief, filed in September, argues that the state pursued a weak case with no DNA or physical evidence to link him to the murders.
The Office of Post-Conviction Counsel, which represents Manning, said in a Friday statement that the state hasn’t resonded to the petition or considered the evidence.
“Executions are not the place to act first and ask questions later,” the office said in a statement.
The limited evidence had deteriorated, scientific developments have undermined previous analysis and identification used in the case and key witnesses have admitted that their testimony was fabricated in exchange for favorable treatment from the state, according to the statement.
“The brutal murders of these two young people were tragic. Their families deserve justice,” the office said in its statement. “However, a death sentence based on false forensic evidence and fabricated witness testimony is not justice.”
Manning has already been exonerated in another double murder case.
In 1993, he was accused of killing 90-year old Alberta Jordan and her 60-year-old daughter Emmoline Jimmerson in their Starkville apartment, and convicted for their murders in 1996. Manning was simultaneously fighting convictions in this case and the murders of the MSU students.
The Mississippi Supreme Court ordered a new trial in the case, and the Oktibbeha County District Attorney dismissed the charges, according to the National Registry of Exonerations.
Robert Simon Jr.was convicted with co-defendant Anthony Carr, who is also on death row, of murdering a Quitman County family in 1990: Parents Carl and Bobbie Jo and their children, 12-year-old Gregory and 9-year-old Charlotte.
Simon and Carr broke into the home, shot the family and set the residence on fire. Simon was separately convicted for the murder, kidnapping and sexual battery of Charlotte.
He had been scheduled to be executed in May 2011, but a federal appeals court ordered a stay to evaluate a claim that he was mentally incompetent due to a brain injury from a fall and resulting memory loss, according to court records. The court rejected Simon’s claim.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that those who are mentally disabled can’t be executed, but across the country those with an intellectual disability remain in prison or are put to death due to the action states have taken to define intellectual disability and set requirements, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.
Another 8,674 Mississippians lost their Medicaid coverage in the agency’s latest round of disenrollments in October.
Since unwinding disenrollments began in June, Mississippi Medicaid has removed more than 90,000 people from its rolls.
State Medicaid divisions started reviewing their rolls for the first time in three years this spring, when federal regulations that prevented them from disenrolling beneficiaries during the pandemic ended. Now, millions of Medicaid beneficiaries are losing their coverage in a process called “unwinding.”
In Mississippi, Medicaid dropped 29,460 people in June; 22,507 people in July; 16,659 people in August and 12,828 people in September.
More than half of the people dropped thus far in Mississippi have been children. Since June, almost 55,000 kids have been disenrolled by Medicaid, according to the agency’s monthly enrollment reports.
Kids are most at risk of losing benefits during unwinding, according to federal research.
The new numbers also reflect a continuing trend: Most of those people were not dropped because they were found to be ineligible. They were dropped because of issues with their paperwork – called “procedural disenrollments.”
Of the 8,674 people dropped in October, around 71% were procedural disenrollments. Mississippi reports an overall 76.5% procedural disenrollment rate thus far.
According to KFF, 71% of all people disenrolled were terminated for procedural reasons across all states with available data as of Nov. 8. This is problematic, according to experts, because many of those people dropped for procedural reasons could still be eligible for Medicaid coverage.
The numbers of people being dropped are steadily decreasing each month because fewer people are due for review and the agency’s backlog is growing.
Since July, the agency has been due to review a decreasing number of beneficiaries — from 75,110 to 70,069 in August, to 68,592 in September and 57,118 in October.
But the backlog has generally increased, except for this past month — 15,574 reviews went uncompleted in July, to 18,008 in August, to 24,215 in September to 18,041 in October.
The agency finally made a small dent this past month in its backlogs and decreased its number of uncompleted reviews by 3,058.
Mississippi Medicaid reached its highest enrollment in the agency’s history — more than 900,000 beneficiaries — the month before unwinding disenrollments began. Before the terminations began, children in low-income families made up more than half of the state’s Medicaid rolls.
Now, after October’s disenrollments, the agency covers 823,416 Mississippians, about 49% of whom are kids.
In the coming months, thousands more Mississippians will lose their Medicaid coverage during a statewide health care crisis. One report puts nearly half of the state’s rural hospitals at risk of closure, facing financial struggles caused in large part by uncompensated care, which is money hospitals lose providing care to people who are uninsured.
As of Nov. 8, at least 10,135,000 Medicaid beneficiaries have been disenrolled nationally, according to KFF. The organization predicts up to 24 million people could lose coverage during unwinding.
Trey Benson (left) and Dillon Johnson played in the same backfield for Greenville St. Joseph before becoming stars on two of the best teams in college football, on either side of the continent. Credit: Greenville St. Joseph
College football running backs Trey Benson of Florida State and Dillon Johnson of Washington have much in common, including that they are the leading rushers for undefeated teams very much in the national championship race.
Benson has run for 641 yards and eight touchdowns. Johnson has run for 686 yards and 10 touchdowns. Both average over six yards per carry. Both are big, strong backs with plenty of speed. Both have transferred once during their college careers.
Rick Cleveland
But you haven’t read anything yet. Four years ago, both ran in the same Mississippi high school backfield. That’s right: Benson and Johnson, both redshirt juniors and two of the best college running backs in the land, shared the football for Greenville St. Joseph High School back in 2019. You probably won’t be surprised to learn that Greenville St. Joe finished 13-0 and won the MAIS 3A state championship that season.
“We were blessed, that’s for sure,” says St. Joseph coach John Baker said this week. “Both are great football players. Both are great students and people. Education comes first at this school and both were A students. Both were great with the little kids who follow our program. What they are doing right now is no surprise at all for those who saw them here.”
Consider this: The Greenville St. Joe Class of 2020 included 27 seniors. Two of those might be star players in the College Football Playoff.
“That’s what we’re hoping and praying for here in Greenville,” Baker said. “Wouldn’t it be something if two kids from such a small school who have been friends since peewee ball ended up playing against each other in the national championship?”
It would be. And it could happen.
Both play difficult games Saturday. Florida State, 9-0 and ranked No. 4 in the CFP rankings, plays Miami Saturday. Washington, ranked No. 5 in the CFP rankings, plays Utah Saturday. Both games start at 2:30 p.m. Mississippi time, which means there’s going to be a lot of channel flipping in Greenville.
Johnson, who began his college career at Mississippi State, has played his best football lately. Last week, against Southern Cal, he ran 256 yards, nearly a first down per carry and scored four touchdowns in a 52-42 Huskies victory.
Benson, who began his college career at Oregon, last week ran for 97 yards and a touchdown against Pitt. Earlier this season, he ran for 200 yards and two touchdowns against Virginia Tech. Back in September, he carried the ball just nine times against Southern Miss but scored three touchdowns.
Benson was the more lightly recruited of the two. In fact, he wasn’t recruited at all until after he attended a Nike football camp in New Orleans the summer before his senior season of high school.
Said Baker, “Trey went down there and ran several sub-4.4 40s at 215 pounds. The next week, coaches from all over the country were lined up to talk to him.”
Johnson’s recruitment was heavier and much earlier. Then-Mississippi State coach Joe Moorhead recruited him much harder than all the others, Baker said, and Johnson chose State where Moorhead promised him he would have plenty chances to run the ball.
When Mike Leach took over, the running game took a backseat at State. Johnson played three seasons for the Bulldogs but never reached the 500-yard mark rushing despite averaging more than five yards per carry. He made the decision to leave last December, before Leach died.
“Dillon said the NIL and the location didn’t matter to him,” Baker said. “He just wanted to run the football.”
Both Johnson and Benson are expected to declare for the NFL Draft after the current season. Indeed, NFL scouts already have been at Greenville St. Joseph doing background checks, Baker said. How’s that for due diligence?
Those scouts got nothing but glowing reports from coaches and faculty at the Catholic school where Johnson and Benson played in the same backfield their senior season.
“We moved Dillon to quarterback that season and ran a lot of read option,” Baker said. “They didn’t know who they were gonna have to tackle.”
Often, the opponents didn’t tackle either one of them. They combined for 54 touchdowns on a team that scored 48 points per game.
Said Baker: “I could coach for a hundred years and not have two like that at the same time.”
The Justice Department is now investigating the city of Lexington and the Lexington Police Department.
“No city, no town and no law enforcement agency is too large or too small to evade our enforcement of the constitutional rights every American enjoys,” said Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. “We are opening this investigation to determine whether the Lexington Police Department engages in a pattern or practice of discriminatory policing, excessive force or First Amendment violations.
“This investigation should send a clear message to small and mid-size police departments that they are not exempt from the obligation to provide fair, effective and non-discriminatory policing. We will leave no community behind, including underserved regions in the Deep South, in our quest to ensure lawful and constitutional policing in America.”
Todd W. Gee, whom the U.S. Senate recently confirmed as U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Mississippi, told reporters, “Police officers are trusted with the important duty to keep our communities safe. When police officers fail to respect constitutional rights, they violate that trust. Our office is committed to ensuring that everyone in Mississippi is treated fairly and lawfully by the police. Today’s announcement reflects that commitment. We will conduct a thorough and impartial investigation of the Lexington Police Department, and we will take decisive action to address any unlawful conduct.”
Civil rights attorney Jill Collen Jefferson, who was arrested by Lexington police nine days after meeting with Clarke, expressed her thanks to the assistant attorney general and the Civil Rights Division “for listening to this community. This is going to reinvigorate their belief in democracy and in justice, because honestly they have lost hope due to all the fear and terror they’ve had to endure.”
Jefferson, who heads the nonprofit, JULIAN, named after her mentor, Julian Bond, remains cautiously optimistic. “This is just a first step,” she said. “I’ll be ready to celebrate the findings when they’re released.
“The people of Lexington have put their lives and their livelihoods at risk,” she said. “People have lost their jobs and people have been beaten in order to get justice. JULIAN is incredibly proud of this community.”?
Lexington, an 85% majority Black town on the edge of the Mississippi Delta, came into national focus in 2022 when the Mississippi Center for Investigative Reporting broke the story of a recording of then-Lexington Police Chief Sam Dobbins, who is white and can be heard on a recording filled with racist and homophobic slurs, bragging about killing 13 people in the line of duty.
In one case, he said, “I shot that n—– 119 times, OK?” In another part of the 17-minute recording, Dobbins can be heard saying, “I don’t give a f— if you have to kill a motherf—er in cold blood.”
A day later, the Lexington City Council fired Dobbins, but Jefferson and other residents said the harassment of Black residents has continued under the new chief, who is Black.
JULIAN, who shared the recording of Dobbins with MCIR, filed a lawsuit that said more than 200 Black residents had complained about unconstitutional treatment by the Lexington Police Department, but a federal judge rejected a request for a restraining order against the department.
National scrutiny continued when MCIR exposed that Dobbins had a long and checkered past in law enforcement, which included the 2012 killing of Ralph Winston, a Black man who was battling mental illness.
On the recording, Dobbins described the shooting: “I chased this motherf—er across the field. I got him. He was DRT [dead right there] in the field. The vehicle was shot 319 times, but he was hit 119 times by me.”
An investigation by the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation found 96 bullet holes and ricochet marks were recorded on Winston’s car and a “blood pool” covering the driver door, seat, floor and steering wheel.
Clarke said the investigation will seek to determine whether there have been violations of federal law and the Constitution.
She said the probe will focus on the police department’s use of force and its stops, searches and arrests as well as whether police are arresting those whose speech and conduct is protected by the First Amendment.
Gee said those with information can contact the Justice Department by email at Community.LexingtonMS@usdoj.gov, by phone at (833) 610-1232 or through the website, www.civilrights.justice.gov. He said other civil rights violations can be reported to the U.S. Attorney’s Office at USAMSS.civilrights@usdoj.gov or (601) 973-2825.
Justice Department officials plan to hold a public community meeting today, Nov. 8, at 5 p.m. at St. Paul Church of God in Christ Fellowship Hall, 17214 Highway 17 South, in Lexington, Mississippi.
Gee said everyone in Mississippi and throughout the nation “want to feel safe in our homes and in public. But we want that safety to be obtained fairly and legally, not through illegal force or abuse of power.
“Make no mistake: good police work is done legally and fairly every day in many places in America and in Mississippi. The investigation we announce today will ensure that the residents of Lexington, Mississippi are receiving the same from their police force.”
UPDATE 11/8/23: The story has been updated with an additional comment.
A pattern has developed for statewide Democratic candidates in Mississippi: They hit a ceiling of about 47% of the vote, no matter how hard they campaign or how much money they spend.
And populous DeSoto County and the Gulf Coast appear impenetrable for a Democrat. Even Northeast Mississippi, once a “yellow dog” stronghold, is becoming that way.
While election results still are trickling in, it appears that in Tuesday’s election for governor Democrat Brandon Presley performed at about the same level as Jim Hood did in 2019, despite raising and spending about at least $5 million more on his campaign.
Hood, a four-term state attorney general from northeast Mississippi, lost to Gov. Tate Reeves in 2019. And Presley, a four-term public service commissioner from northeast Mississippi, lost to Reeves on Tuesday. And that aforementioned pattern is not confined to just the governor’s elections. In 2020, Democrat Mike Espy lost to Republican U.S. Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith in an outcome that was eerily similar.
Democrats in those races bumped up against the 47% mark against their Republican foes, making the election close enough to be interesting. But close losses in elections do not reap many rewards.
The trend endured by Democrats in recent elections actually began in the watershed 2003 gubernatorial election, when many observers say that Haley Barbour, a Washington lobbyist and political operative from Yazoo City, brought modern campaigning to Mississippi and upended incumbent Democratic Gov. Ronnie Musgrove.
In that election, Musgrove lost 53% to 46% (there was an independent siphoning a few votes) in what is still the highest general election turnout in a state election in Mississippi history.
While Democratic presidential candidates have garnered more votes, it appears that in an election for a statewide office, Hood in 2019 is still the top vote-getter for a Democrat. He garnered 414,368 votes in 2019. In an incomplete and unofficial tally Wednesday morning, Presley was at 370,000, although thousands more votes are likely to be added over the next few days.
Republican Phil Bryant garnered the most votes for governor in the modern era with 544,851 votes against Hattiesburg Mayor Johnny DuPree in 2011.
In three races after the 2003 contest, Democrats fielded candidates with limited funding and not much statewide recognition. This dry spell culminated with Robert Gray, a truck driver who had never run a campaign and was not even in state to vote for himself in his victorious Democrat primary, being the nominee in 2015.
But in 2019, Hood, who had won four statewide campaigns for attorney general, gave Democrats hope. And Democrats went into this Tuesday’s election with optimism, hoping the charismatic and surprisingly well-funded Presley could build on Hood’s performance from 2019. After all, Presley, thanks in large part to the Democratic Governors Association, was able to outmatch Reeves’ fundraising prowess — a rare feat for a Democrat in Mississippi. And in 2019, Hood did win some majority white counties, which also provided hope for Democrats.
Hood, for instance, was the first Democrat since 1987 to win Madison County, a Jackson suburb. Hood also won Lafayette and Oktibbeha — two predominantly white counties, but homes of major universities that include a higher percentage of college-educated residents who are more likely to vote Democratic. On Tuesday, Presley lost Lafayette and Madison, albeit by narrow margins. He kept Oktibbeha in the Democratic column. He also picked up Lowndes, a county with a plurality white population that Hood did not win in 2019.
But in the end, the differences in the losses for Hood and Presley — just as the loss by Musgrove way back in 2003 — were differences without much distinction.
Some additional takeaways from Tuesday’s gubernatorial election:
Hinds County is fast becoming statewide Democrats’ last and only populous stronghold. Reeves took back Madison County on Tuesday after Hood won it in 2019. Take away Hinds County’s large Democratic vote, and a statewide Democrat stands no chance with today’s Mississippi electoral maps.
It would appear record levels of spending by both Reeves and Presley resulted in only mediocre voter turnout. Spending totals by the campaigns will likely top $20 million, and outside interests poured in millions more. Much of this went to mudslinging ads. This did not appear to motivate voter turnout greatly on either side.
The Trump effect is still there, but to what extent? Democratic and Republican polling leading up to the election showed the Reeves-Presley race much tighter than it played out, and Republicans were extremely worried about anemic turnout. But Reeves got a late endorsement by former President Donald Trump. Trump remains popular in Mississippi, and it’s certain this helped Reeves, but the extent will likely never be known.
A Democratic candidate could use help from a third-party one. Given that 46%-47% ceiling, pushing to a runoff might offer a Democrat a better chance. Many politicos believed Presley’s best chance at survival Tuesday night was for little-known independent Gwendolyn Gray (who had dropped out but was still on the ballot) to siphon votes from Reeves and force a runoff between the Republican and Democrat. But that math required Gray to pull around 3% of the vote, and take it mostly from Reeves. Instead, Gray earned 1.4%, and appeared to take quite a few votes from Presley as well — perhaps in protest to negative campaigning.
The Coast remains ruby red. Presley campaigned hard on the Coast, attempting to turn out Black voters particularly in Harrison and Jackson counties and a fairly sizable union shipyard vote. But Reeves still ran the tables there, picking up a nearly 19,000 vote margin, only slightly smaller than his Coast take in 2019.
Jason Coker, president of Together for Hope, discusses race and health during the Better Health Summit event at Duling Hall in Jackson, Miss., on Thursday, Oct. 26, 2023.
Mississippi health news you can’t get anywhere else.
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Tenth ranked Ole Miss plays at top-ranked Georgia Saturday in the biggest game involving a Mississippi football team in years. The Cleveland boys take a look at the game from a historical standpoint and at the various matchups. When it comes right down to it, how do you pick against 42 and 1? Other topics include Southern Miss and Mississippi State football, as well as the Saints and the high school football playoffs.
