Chris McDaniel is challenging incumbent Republican Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann to a series of debates ahead of the Aug. 8 GOP primary.
“Mississippi voters deserve the chance to hear directly from the candidates running to represent them in Jackson,” McDaniel, a four-term state senator, said. “… I hope Delbert Hosemann will join me and provide Mississippi voters with transparency on where his values and priorities are.”
Hosemann campaign spokeswoman Leah Rupp Smith in a statement responded: “We have already been to candidate forums, one with all lieutenant governor candidates, and others are planned in the future.”
Conventional campaign wisdom is for an incumbent frontrunner, particularly one with a wide-margin lead in fundraising and-or name recognition to shy away from debates that could give a little-known insurgent a toe hold. But McDaniel is well known to voters from unsuccessful but notable runs for U.S. Senate and he could make hay if Hosemann refuses to debate. Voters tend to expect debates in top-ticket races such as for lieutenant governor and governor.
Last cycle, Hosemann and his Democratic opponent, then-state Rep. Jay Hughes, had a televised debate in Hosemann’s successful first run for lieutenant governor.
News in the GOP primary race for lieutenant governor has thus far been dominated by Hosemann’s claims that McDaniel’s campaign and a PAC he created violated campaign finance laws with improper reporting and large donations from an out-of-state dark money group, most of which McDaniel has reported he returned.
McDaniel in a letter to Hosemann asked him to participate in debates — “a staple of American elections and key to the Democratic process.” He posted the letter on social media and said, “Enough of Delbert ‘the Democrat’ and his nonsense political games. It’s time to talk about the issues impacting Mississippi voters everyday.”
McDaniel is proposing holding televised debates in Jackson, Tupelo, Gulfport-Biloxi, the Pine Belt, DeSoto, and also having one at the Neshoba County Fair.
The Mississippi Hospital Association shrinks again as several hospitals dropped out of the state trade organization this week.
Ochsner Health System and North Mississippi Medical Center recently left the association. Merit Health also severed ties, according to multiple media reports.
The exodus began in late April, when the state’s largest public hospital, the University of Mississippi Medical Center, left the MHA. Memorial Hospital System in Gulfport, Singing River on the coast, George Health System and Forrest General Hospital followed soon after.
Almost none of the hospital’s letters announcing their departure cited a reason beyond doubts with the organization’s “leadership.” All of the hospitals’ leaders have declined to publicly expand on their decisions.
The separations, however, come on the heels of a major donation from the MHA’s political action committee.
The PAC contributed $250,000, its largest donation in history, to Democratic gubernatorial candidate Brandon Presley’s campaign just days before UMMC dropped out of the organization, MHA executive director Tim Moore previously confirmed to Mississippi Today.
Presley is an outspoken proponent of Medicaid expansion. Republican Gov. Tate Reeves, the incumbent candidate, has adamantly opposed the measure, though a recent poll shows most Mississippians support it.
Research shows Medicaid expansion would bring millions into Mississippi’s struggling hospitals. Moore previously told Mississippi Today that’s why the hospitals’ departures have bewildered him.
He said the donation to Presley’s campaign was made after the MHA board recommended the move. Though the PAC operates separately from the MHA, it’s also headed up by Moore, who serves on the MHA board.
Ochsner’s termination letter to the MHA, attributed to Chief Operating Officer and President Mike Hulefeld, reiterated previous hospitals’ concerns about the organization’s leadership.
“There is tremendous value in having a hospital association that serves as a strategic and thoughtful advocate on issues of importance to Mississippi’s hospitals and the patients we serve,” Hulefeld said in the letter, dated May 19. “Unfortunately, MHA’s current leadership and approach is preventing the association from accomplishing this goal.”
All of the hospitals that Ochsner operates in Mississippi will no longer be part of the MHA, the letter confirmed.
North Mississippi Medical Center declined to provide their termination letter to Mississippi Today, but a spokesperson confirmed that four of their facilities — in Tupelo, Eupora, Iuka and Pontotoc — would be leaving the organization.
Merit Health, which operates nine hospitals across Mississippi, confirmed to Magnolia Tribune that they, too, would be ending their relationship with the MHA. Spokespeople for the hospital system could not be reached by time of publication.
The state trade organization lobbies on behalf of Mississippi’s hospitals. As they continue to lose members, Moore said it would impact their finances and ability to successfully advocate.
The MHA is largely funded through member dues, and Moore in a previous interview said the departures would have to be accounted for when calculating funding for the next fiscal year, which starts in July.
Maternity health clinic owner and public health expert Getty Israel is still on a mission: to open Mississippi’s first freestanding, midwife-run birth center.
Should she be successful, Mississippi would join neighboring states such as Tennessee, Louisiana, Arkansas and Florida in providing an alternative to giving birth in a hospital setting for pregnant women who are low-risk. The birth center would also be a place for women to receive prenatal care from certified nurse midwives as well as postpartum support.
But after nearly a year working to secure funding for her nonprofit Sisters in Birth to open the center, she’s come up short – and she blames what she calls an unfair and unclear federal funding process funneled through the state’s members of Congress.
Israel applied for federal funds through a lesser-known program called Community Project Funding in which constituents can request their senator or representative recommend their projects for funding to the U.S. Senate Committee on Appropriations. Only nonprofits are eligible for the funds, and lawmakers must also certify that they and their immediate family members do not have a financial interest in the organization.
She said despite providing ample evidence of the benefits of birth centers and midwife care to mothers and babies, plus a letter of support from State Health Officer Dr. Dan Edney, Republican U.S. Sens. Roger Wicker and Cindy Hyde-Smith – whom she refers to as “so-called pro-life” – and Democratic 2nd District U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson did not refer her project for funding.
However, they did request funding for projects for nonprofits with millions in net assets and hired lobbyists – a point with which Israel, whose organization reported around $5,000 in negative net assets on its most recently available tax form, took issue.
Getty Israel, founder and CEO of Sisters in Birth, Inc., sits for a portrait at Sisters in Birth in Jackson, Miss., Friday, May 27, 2022. Sisters in Birth is a women’s health clinic that utilizes an integrative and holistic approach to women’s healthcare. Credit: Eric Shelton/Mississippi Today
“You should see the waste on the list. I identified 13 large, wealthy organizations, which primarily receive the bulk of this recommended funding for fiscal years 2023 and 2024 – they have total net assets of tens of millions of dollars,” she said. “Several of these organizations aren’t in Mississippi.”
She said small nonprofits in Mississippi desperately need funding but may not be aware of how to get it, much less successfully get on any congress member’s recommended funding list.
“There are thousands of nonprofit organizations in Mississippi; the majority are small and struggling to provide crucial services to Mississippians. These organizations likely have never heard of these federal earmark programs because our congressional members fail to promote it,” she said. “Consequently, only corporations with relationships to legislators or their staff will know to apply.”
Information about Community Project Funding is on each Congress member’s website, along with a page dedicated to information about applying for federal grants. General guidance for applying for Community Project Funding is online.
Neither Wicker nor Hyde-Smith responded to questions for this story. A spokeswoman for Thompson said no favoritism is given to particular applications but declined to answer specific questions.
“Each application stands on its own,” Alexus Hunter, press secretary for Thompson, said. “The federal government considers supporting a variety of federal programs. However, this application wasn’t selected through the (Community Project Funding).”
Wicker’s office requested $1.5 million for a D.C.-based group called Reading is Fundamental Inc. to implement a childhood literacy program in Mississippi. His office also recommended sending $997,000 to a group called Save the Children, also located in D.C., for a project that would provide learning resources to children and families in rural communities in the state.
Wicker is not the only Mississippian to steer funding to Save the Children – the well-regarded humanitarian organization also received TANF money from the Mississippi Department of Human Services in 2017. In 2021, Gov. Tate Reeves awarded the organization $460,000 in pandemic relief funds, and the organization also receives funding from the Mississippi Department of Education for literacy, nutrition and fitness programming in the schools.
Hyde-Smith’s requested projects for fiscal year 2024 included everything from $7 million for a road project in a wealthy area of Madison County to millions for training programs at universities and community colleges to $4 million for water supply improvements for the city of Byram.
In fiscal year 2023 – the year for which Israel first applied for funds through Thompson’s office – his office requested hundreds of thousands each to cultural projects like the Community Museums of African American History and Culture Project in Belzoni and the Catfish Row Museum in Vicksburg. Also on the list was $2 million for the construction of a new clinic in Greenville.
A 2018 evaluation of a federal study of health and cost outcomes for mothers and babies on Medicaid showed women who received care in birth centers had better outcomes – including lower rates of preterm birth, low birthweight and fewer C-sections compared to other Medicaid participants with similar characteristics. Those in the study who received midwife-directed care at a birth center also cost an average of $2,010 less than their Medicaid counterparts.
Israel believes such a clinic would improve maternal and infant health outcomes by minimizing medical interventions and reducing Mississippi’s first-in-the-nation C-section rates. Midwives’ holistic approach, she said, could also have a positive impact on the state’s high rates of preterm and low birthweight babies.
There are currently about 400 birth centers open and providing care in the U.S., according to the American Association of Birth Centers. Mississippi is one of only eight states that does not have a birth center.
Jill Alliman, a certified nurse midwife who is on the board of directors of the American Association of Birth Centers, said birth centers are especially equipped to handle pregnant women with social risk factors such as mental health challenges, lower education levels or a history of domestic violence – common challenges in a community like Jackson.
Alliman said the presence of a birth center and the midwife-centered care that comes along with it could be “life changing.”
“I think that in states like Mississippi that have so many challenges with maternal and infant health, there needs to be a big effort to increase access to the midwifery model of care and to offer options for birth center care because it’s part of the solution,” she said. “We can see that doing what we’ve been doing for so long is not working.”
Mississippi’s maternal mortality rate is worsening, the latest data shows. The rate increased from 33.2 deaths per 100,000 live births in the time span of 2013 to 2016 to 36.0 deaths per live births from 2017 to 2019.
The worsening rate disproportionately impacts Black women, who had a rate of 65.1 deaths per 100,000 live births – more than four times the ratio for white women.
“The (maternal and infant health) outcomes are deplorable in Mississippi. Over the last 50 years, those numbers just seem to get worse,” Israel said. “ … Midwives put an intervention in place. She’s looking at the whole person and treating the whole person.”
State Health Officer Dr. Daniel Edney echoed Israel in a letter of support he wrote for Israel’s birth center, calling it “change that cannot wait” in Mississippi.
“As you know, many women in Mississippi are unable to access prenatal care and adequate labor and delivery options that are safe for both mothers and babies,” he said. “… The use of birthing centers, with affiliations with critical access hospitals, is one of those evidence-based options that has demonstrated success in improving health outcomes for mothers and babies.”
Officials with the Mississippi State Medical Association declined to respond when asked for the organization’s position on birth centers.
Israel has shifted her approach: she is now reaching out to private organizations for fundraising. She has also produced a documentary about birth disparities in Mississippi that she is promoting nationwide to raise awareness about the issues facing Mississippi and to let people know they can help by donating money to build a birth center.
She said she’s found an ideal location in the medical district in Jackson and plans to purchase it.
However, In the meantime, women are driving to Memphis and Baton Rouge for birth centers, she said.
“I’m done looking inside the state of Mississippi. I’ve knocked on many doors – corporations, foundations, city and local governments … There’s no (financial) support in Mississippi, but I know women want this. I’m not driven by these so-called leaders. I’m driven by what women want.”
In this episode of Mississippi Stories, Mississippi Today Editor-at-Large Marshall Ramsey sits down with outgoing WLBT Meteorologist Patrick Ellis. Ellis, who will still be seen by many Mississippi Today readers who live in the Memphis broadcast area, will be going to WMC as their weekday morning forecaster.
He talks about his love of weather, his six years in the Jackson market and what’s ahead for this talented forecaster. He overcame his childhood fear of thunderstorms to pursue a career in meteorology and broadcasting after graduating from Mississippi State University’s highly touted meteorology program.
A judge will not block the Harrison County School District from requiring a trans girl to dress as a boy for her graduation ceremony Saturday.
The order was given from the bench late Friday night after attempts to settle the matter in conference and a hearing Friday afternoon, according to court records.
The student, a 17-year-old senior at Harrison Central High School, has been openly transgender for her entire high school career and has “frequently and consistently worn dresses, skirts, and traditionally feminine clothing items and accessories to school and school-sponsored events and activities, without issue or repercussion,” according to the original complaint.
The ACLU sued the district Thursday after the student, referred to as L.B. in court documents, was told last week that she would not be able to wear a dress to graduation as she had been planning and would not be able to participate in the ceremony if she did wear a dress. Harrison Central High School Principal Kelly Fuller told L.B. in the course of the conversation that it was prompted by Harrison County Superintendent Mitchell King calling the school and asking what transgender students would wear to graduation.
The judge ruled that the case did not meet the standard to grant “extraordinary relief in changing the status quo in a short time period,” as reported by WLOX. The judge said there is limited case law regarding dress codes for transgender people and that similar cases did not exist.
The lawsuit alleged gender discrimination as a violation of constitutional rights and federal law, specifically Title IX, the First Amendment’s freedom of expression clause, and the Fourteenth Amendment’s equal protection clause. The response from the school district argued that L.B. does not have a federally protected right to attend a voluntary graduation ceremony.
The Harrison Central High School graduation is scheduled for Saturday, May 20, at 6:30 p.m.
Enrollment and spending on pre-K remained relatively stagnant in the 2021-22 school year, according to a new national report.
Newer state data shows that enrollment has increased significantly this school year because of recent investments from the Legislature.
State-funded pre-K in Mississippi is primarily the Early Learning Collaboratives, which are partnerships among school districts, Head Start agencies, childcare centers and nonprofit groups.
According to the 2022 State of Preschool Yearbook, published by the National Institute for Early Education Research, 2,807 students were enrolled in state-funded preschool last year, which amounts to 8% of the 4-year-olds in the state. The state has hovered at 8% access since 2020 when the institute previously said Mississippi had high-quality standards but lacked comprehensive access.
According to the Mississippi Department of Education, 6,800 students are being served in 37 collaboratives this year, up from 18 collaboratives last year.
The increase in the number of collaboratives, and subsequently the number of students being served, is the result of a $16 million increase in funding over the 2021 and 2022 legislative sessions. The state also allocated $20 million for state-funded pre-K in school districts separate from the Early Learning Collaboratives in the 2022 legislative session, which the education department allocated to 11 school districts in November of last year.
The report, using the older figures, ranks Mississippi 37th nationally for access to state-funded pre-k.
“Mississippi leaders should continue to move forward to address this ongoing lack of access and increase teacher pay to ensure that all children have access to the educational opportunities they deserve,” said the report’s lead author, Allison Friedman-Krauss, in a statement.
The report noted that nationally, state-funded preschool programs reported a shortage of qualified teachers. Additional data on pre-K teacher shortages in Mississippi was not available in the report, but the education department reported 66 pre-K teacher vacancies this year in its annual survey.
When looking at pre-K access more broadly, the institute’s report found 53% of Mississippi 4-year-olds enrolled in some type of publicly funded pre-K, including Head Start and locally administered programs.
The institute again found Mississippi to be one of the only states in the nation to meet all 10 of its quality standards, which the 2013 Early Learning Collaboratives Act was specifically designed to meet.
“Mississippi continues to be a national leader in early childhood education because of the quality of our Early Learning Collaborative program,” Mike Kent, interim state superintendent of education, said in a statement.
A legislative committee on Friday released a report about an LGBTQ+ clinic at the University of Mississippi Medical Center that came under fire last year after lawmakers were angered to learn it had provided gender-affirming care to trans youth.
UMMC leadership ultimately decided the “Trustworthy, Evidence-based, Affirming, Multidisciplinary,” or TEAM, clinic should stop seeing trans kids last fall even though gender-affirming care for minors was legal at the time, according to emails obtained by Mississippi Today.
It wasn’t until earlier this year that lawmakers passed House Bill 1125, which banned the provision of gender-affirming care to trans minors in Mississippi.
The purpose of Friday’s brief published by the Joint Committee on Performance Evaluation and Expenditure Review, or PEER, was to provide lawmakers with an overview of — and the sources of funding for — gender-affirming care at the TEAM clinic. The report also provides a summary of HB 1125.
It asks basic questions like “why did UMMC open the TEAM clinic,” “how does the TEAM clinic operate” and “what services are provided by the TEAM clinic?”
The answers paint a picture of a shoestring clinic without its own dedicated physical space that operated on private fundsand was staffed by the goodwill of 18 employees who had other primary responsibilities at UMMC. The TEAM clinic, founded in 2015, sought to provide a slate of health services in an inclusive environment for LGBTQ+ Mississippians. That included primary care and more specialized services like mental health and gender-affirming care.
Despite conservative lawmakers and blogs claiming that state funding was paying “for mutilation of children,” the TEAM Clinic mainly ran on patient revenue and grant funding from three sources: The Women’s Foundation of Mississippi, the LGBTQ Fund of Mississippi and the Manning Family Fund.
The TEAM clinic did not provide surgery to patients under the age of 18. For adults, surgical referrals to UMMC’s Plastic Surgery Department were provided.
Most of the patient revenue that supported the clinic over a roughly three-year period beginning in fiscal year 2020 came from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Mississippi ($55,051) and other commercial insurances. The Mississippi Division of Medicaid paid out $24,122 in claims, according to the report, about 17% of the amount billed by UMMC for services at the TEAM clinic.
A very small portion of state funding — an estimated $1,215 in fiscal year 2022 — paid for the few hours that providers spent at the TEAM clinic on the first Friday of every month.
The miniscule amount of state funding is similar to what PEER discovered when it also sent inquiries to Mississippi Medicaid to determine how much the agency paid out in claims associated with gender identity disorder or gender dysphoria.
All told, it took approximately $25,000 a yearto support the clinic’s operations, the PEER found.
The clinic saw less than 300 patients in the same three-year period, an estimate that might be “overinflated” due to the way UMMC maintained confidentiality in its patient count, the report found.
Just 221 people in that same period sought “gender transition services” at the TEAM Clinic, which the report appears to have counted as services ranging from “behavioral health” to prescriptions like puberty blockers and hormone therapy.
Over the three-year period, PEER estimated that just 53 patients under the age of 18 received gender transition services.
But the report says that “in FY 2024, the number of minors served in the Clinic should be zero.”
That number is due to HB 1125 but also to UMMC’s decision, made many months before the bill passed, to stop providing gender-affirming care like hormone therapy and puberty blockers to trans youth at the TEAM clinic. The PEER committee’s report may have been a factor in that decision.
The first inkling UMMC received of lawmakers’ interest in the clinic came on Aug. 31 when UMMC Vice Chancellor and Dean of the School of Medicine Dr. LouAnn Woodward was sent via hand mail a letter from the committee that was then forwarded to the TEAM clinic.
PEER’s letter requested “certain information regarding services provided by and payments provided to UMMC regarding gender transition services,” including how many services were provided to youth and adults and what amount had been subsidized by taxpayers or billed to Mississippi Medicaid.
Lawmakers had asked about the clinic in the past, but this time, PEER’s letter was followed by what Kristy Simms, UMMC’s point person with elected officials at the state and federal level, described as “dozens of inquiries,” according to emails obtained by Mississippi Today.
After Simms talked with lawmakers, emails show she proposed UMMC consider shutting down the clinic. She characterized her conversations with lawmakers, including Sam Mims, the chair of the House Public Health and Human Services Committee, as “hostile and slightly threatening.”
“It’s looking more and more like we have two options,” she wrote on Sept. 12.“Pause or shutter some/all of the work of the Center or be told to do so by the legislature in January.”
Staring in early October, the TEAM clinic began implementing leadership’s decision to stop providing gender-affirming care to trans kids, a move that impacted services across the hospital — and left parents and patients scrambling.
“Because it was such a welcoming environment, I couldn’t believe that they had just dropped patients like that,” Raymond Walker, a trans teenager who had sought care at the clinic, told Mississippi Today in April. “I was just completely blindsided.”
The emails also show UMMC leadership pondering if they should begin “dismantling” the TEAM in response to lawmakers’ inquiries.
The PEER report ends with a recommendation for a way UMMC could do that.
“UMMC could consider integrating services provided by the TEAM Clinic back into UMMC’s regular care setting, similar to the way it did with services provided to minors, and offer optional LGBTQ training courses to all staff and students,” the report says.
Now law, HB 1125 provides that any Mississippian, including doctors, can be held civilly liable for “conduct” that aids and abets the provision of gender-affirming care for trans youth, but advocates and attorneys have noted it’s unclear what that looks like.
UMMC has yet to answer that, but PEER notes the hospital’s attorneys are working to understand if its providers “will be allowed to refer patients to providers outside of the state, or if that would be considered aiding or abetting as provided in the law.”
Consider Jackson attorney Harry Rosenthal as the king of conservatorships.
By his own estimate, he has been a conservator for more than 100 vulnerable individuals. Hinds County Chancery Court records show he’s continuing to handle a dozen conservatorships.
Though it’s not known how much the attorney receives in each case, in Hinds County alone, Rosenthal’s income from being a conservator could be substantial.
The average salary for a non-family member conservator is $51,214 per year in Mississippi, according to the research blog salary.com. ZipRecruiter, which says it gets its salary estimates from employer job postings and third party data sources, puts the average salary in Mississippi at $47,787.
State Supreme Court Justice Dawn Beam, who helped craft changes to the conservatorship law, said most appointed conservators are family members, and they aren’t paid a lot of money.
The law allows a family member to be paid fees set by a judge for their service.
Professional conservators are entitled to reasonable fees, but the judge decides what is reasonable and must approve the amount before the conservator can be paid. Money for the conservator comes from the account of the person under a conservatorship. If a person under a conservator has little or no financial assets, the judge can appoint a public guardian/conservator who is paid from public funds.
Some attorneys say the new law makes it difficult for ordinary citizens to file conservatorship petitions without the assistance of attorneys.
Elder law experts say the cost of obtaining a conservatorship over someone can be expensive with the hiring of attorneys or attorneys to represent the individual, family members and interested parties. There are also court and other fees involved with a conservatorship petition.
Rosenthal told the Mississippi Center for Investigative Reporting, a part of Mississippi Today, that most of the wards for whom he has served as conservator were once clients in criminal cases.
More than 30 years ago, the attorney provided $12,000 in bail money to try to help white supremacist Byron De La Beckwith get out of jail after he was indicted and arrested for the third time in the assassination of Mississippi NAACP leader Medgar Evers.
Although Jewish, a group of people Beckwith disparaged, Rosenthal, 82, has said he provided the money to Beckwith because he believed his speedy trial rights were being violated after two previous trials in 1964 ended in hung juries.
In 1994, 30 years after his previous trials, Beckwith was convicted in Hinds County Circuit Court of Evers’ murder and sentenced to life in prison. Beckwith died in 2001 in custody.
Thirty-four years ago, Rosenthal filed the petition to become conservator for Gary Gordineer in Hinds County Chancery Court.
“I’ve had him for more than 30 years and I still have him,” Rosenthal said recently. In February, Rosenthal filed an annual accounting report of Gordineer’s assets, a court docket report shows.
Rosenthal said he knew Gordineer, Gordineer’s father and other family members. He said the younger Gordineer had been a criminal client. Rosenthal said he once had Gordineer, who is a veteran, in a home with his mother but now has him in a nursing home.
No family member of Gordineer could be reached for comment.
Rosenthal is also listed as conservator in another case, dating to 1989 involving Howard Ruffin Jr.
Ruffin’s niece, Erica Porter, said she has been his caregiver for the 100% disabled veteran the last four years. Other than her, Ruffin has little or no family alive, she said. “I’m all he has.”
In her four years of caring for Ruffin, she said she had never heard from Rosenthal until recently when she went to his office to request more money than the $700 a month she receives for Ruffin’s care.
Porter said Rosenthal denied her request.
“My first time talking to him was actually last week,” Porter said recently of Rosenthal. “We haven’t heard from him or nothing.”
Rosenthal said everyone wants to spend a ward’s money.
“If you are a conservator or guardian, the money belongs to the person you are trying to protect, and the laws of the state of Mississippi say you are supposed to conserve and build upon the money, if possible,” he said.
Most of Rosenthal’s conservatorship cases in Hinds County occurred before an updated law went into effect three years ago.
About 2,500 conservatorship cases have been filed in Mississippi since then.
The updated law, known as the Mississippi Guard and Protect Act, seeks to protect the rights of those unable to take care of themselves, said Beam, who co-chaired the 26-member committee that came up with the recommendations. It was the first update of the guardian and conservatorship law in 30 years.
The law distinguishes guardianship of the person from conservator of the estate, clarifies the role of a guardian/conservator in a ward’s life, specifies the basis for appointing a guardian/conservator through improved medical evaluation forms, encourages individualized planning and use of the least restrictive alternative. It also creates accountability between the guardian/conservator and the courts to prevent fraud and abuse.
The law also mandates wellbeing reports.
The updated law applies to cases filed after Jan. 1, 2020, but a judge has the authority to apply the new law to older cases if no rights are violated.
In a 2021 state Supreme Court appeal, Hattiesburg attorney Carol Bustin said that, for decades, courts have treated conservatorships as mere ministerial actions and the imposition of conservatorships as matters of petitioners’ rights.
Unless someone is a party in a conservatorship case, court records in cases like those of Gordineer and Ruffin are sealed, except for the brief descriptions placed on the court docket.
Rosenthal said some things in the new law look good on paper, but accountability isn’t being strictly enforced.
The sister of one of Rosenthal’s wards questions the lawyer’s accountability.
“I think the rule, or unofficial rule, should be to talk to family members before they put people into a court-appointed conservatorship to make sure there is no one who can take over the responsibility,” said Linda Taylor of Memphis, whose brother, Edward Redmond, was one of Rosenthal’s wards.
Marine veteran Edward Redmond died in 2019 of natural causes after being a ward of his conservator for decades.
At one point, Rosenthal had Redmond living in a facility in south Mississippi, according to Taylor.
But Rosenthal was forced by court order to move Redmond to Jackson to be closer to family.
Taylor said her brother initially was able to spend time with family.
“In August 2019, however, Rosenthal forbade us to take him away from his assisted living residence to spend time with him. He even claimed he had a warrant out for my brother Robert’s arrest because he had violated that order and picked Edward up once, anyway.”
Redmond, a Marine veteran, was diagnosed as paranoid schizophrenic in the 1980s and became addicted to drugs. He was determined to be 100% disabled by the VA hospital. Redmond’s parents became guardians over his military and Social Security benefits.
In 1994, Redmond’s parents agreed to let Rosenthal become his guardian without fully understanding what they were consenting to, according to Taylor. She said she and another sister in Texas didn’t know anything about what was going on with their brother until after Rosenthal had already been court appointed guardian/conservator.
At one point, Redmond was allowed to live with Taylor and her husband in Memphis on a trial basis. During that time, Redmond overcame his addiction for a while. He had a great testimony about his victory over drugs. Rosenthal forced Redmond to move back to Jackson for unexplained reasons.
Prior to his death in 2019 under conservatorship, Edward Redmond showed the condition of his teeth. His sister believes he wasn’t getting the care he deserved.
Taylor said her brother was moved over the years to different locations throughout the state of Mississippi, and that all of those places Rosenthal chose were not approved by the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Rosenthal said he won’t apologize for the care Redmond received in Jackson. Taylor wanted too much money for keeping Redmond, he said. “I’m not ashamed of what happened. I had a tremendous problem with her trying to get his money.”
Taylor said the family requested to have guardianship over Edward while allowing Rosenthal to continue being conservator over his money.
“Rosenthal refused,” she said. “The record speaks for itself.”
This project was produced by the Mississippi Center for Investigative Reporting, now part of Mississippi Today, in partnership with the Fund for Investigative Journalism.
Opal K. Smith celebrated her 93rd birthday in March under a conservatorship that for the past eight years has left her with no control over her finances or where she lives.
She is one of the 1.3 million people in the United States living under a legal system that allows someone else, often unrelated, to make personal, financial and medical decisions for them.
Her conservator has her living in an assisted living facility in Hattiesburg, about 35 miles from her home of Columbia.
When reached via phone, Opal wouldn’t comment on the matter. However, in a court affidavit, she said: “I want out of this conservatorship now and into a home of my own in or near Columbia, Mississippi.”
Opal wants to go home and live with a sitter, and so do some family members, including her daughter, Nancy DeVoe, and Nancy’s husband, John. But Smith’s two other daughters filed the initial conservatorship petition in 2015 after her husband died, saying Smith was experiencing memory decline.
The fight over her conservatorship stretches from Mississippi to England.
In their petition to create a conservatorship over Opal, Nancy’s two sisters — Jill Kendrick Weber, then of Columbia, and Elizabeth Houser of Little Rock — blamed her for initiating the conservatorship. Neither could be reached for comment.
But their 2015 conservatorship petition said that, for approximately the last five years of their father’s life, Weber provided assistance and care for her parents as needed, and was motivated by their best interest.
Subsequent to their father’s death, the sisters said Nancy traveled to Mississippi from her residence in the United Kingdom in an attempt to control Opal and her assets.
They alleged Nancy engaged Opal in conduct and activities out of character for her and not in her best interest. They said Nancy procured a debit card in Opal’s name and compelled her to execute contracts and documents she was not capable of understanding.
Further, they said a physician had indicated Opal was unable to make informed decisions regarding her personal finances, health care, or other serious decisions pertaining to herself or her family.
“Accordingly, the petitioners contend that the Ward, Opal K. Smith, by reason of mental weakness, is incapable of managing her own estate,” the petition said.
Nancy said she never attempted to control her mother or her assets, nor did she engage her mother in any activities or conduct that a reasonable person could contend were out of character for her or not in her best interest. She also said she didn’t compel her mother to execute any contracts or documents.
John and Nancy DeVoe said the constitution mandates no one be deprived of liberty or property without due process of law. A conservatorship decree, they said, always deprives the individual of property and, in many cases, of liberty.
“Opal never had a chance to testify, present evidence, confront her accusers, or call witnesses,” they said in court papers opposing the ongoing conservatorship.
Conservatorships are responsible for $50 billion in assets, according to a 2018 report by the National Council on Disability.
The Mississippi Administrative Office of Courts reports that 2,481 conservatorship petitions were filed between January 2019 and this past February. The figures include conservatorship petitions for both minors and adults.
In Mississippi, some court records appear to show prior to a 2020 update in guardian and conservatorship laws, that some judges didn’t expend much effort investigating conservatorship cases before approving petitions.
The Mississippi Center for Investigative Reporting viewed court dockets from multiple counties, and records show in some cases, conservatorship petitions were approved the same day they were filed.
Attorney George Dickerman, an elder law expert and author in Riverside, California, said conservatorships should be a last resort, only when no reasonable alternatives are available.
Dickerman said sometimes an older person will need assistance but will not voluntarily agree to accept it. He said a conservatorship can be necessary when a perpetrator manipulates an older person and wrongfully takes money or property.
But Dickerman also said some unscrupulous individuals will use conservatorships as a license to steal.
Across the country, there is a hodgepodge of state laws when it comes to conservatorships, and often there are no requirements to record all financial transactions through a state’s software application. And there is no national database tracking the number of conservatorships in the country.
The data available on conservatorships and the conditions them varies from state to state. And there is no mandate on a state or federal level for standardized requirements to become a conservator.
Mississippi Supreme Court Justice Dawn Beam, a former chancery judge, played an integral role in updating the state guardian and conservatorship law that took effect Jan. 1, 2020.
Beam told the Mississippi Center for Investigative Reporting there was a time when conservators — often family members of the person under conservatorship — would seek court approval to spend money on such things as swimming pools, four-wheelers and lavish vacations.
She said the goal of the updated law is to protect people with large estates as well as those with only Social Security benefits. It covers minors, older people and other adults unable to care for themselves.
There is a computer system now that allows courts to better manage cases, she said.
“It’s a lot easier to control money going out than trying to claw it back.”
The FBI elder fraud report for 2022 said total losses reported by those 60 and older were $3.1 billion, an increase of 84% from 2021. Although the average loss per victim was $35,101, more than 5,400 victims each lost more than $100,000.
“Our oath is to administer justice regardless of rich or poor,” Beam said. “We want to make sure we administer justice. We are doing what we have to do to protect an individual’s assets. We used to just focus on assets. We now have a wellness report that the court can require for the elderly.”
In most states, a judge decides whether to establish a conservatorship after a petition is filed stating why a person can’t manage his or her financial affairs or make appropriate decisions concerning personal care.
The Family Caregivers Alliance says a conservatorship is supposed to provide a higher degree of protection than alternatives, such as powers of attorneys, trusts and health care directives, due to court oversight.
Government agencies and human rights organizations report older people are more likely to experience neglect, both mental and physical, and more likely to have their assets broken up and sold off piece by piece.
In Mississippi, the Department of Human Service reported 4,252 cases to its adult protective services. Of those, it initiated 4,110 investigations in 2022. August had the highest number — 407.
Opal Smith on her 93rd birthday in March at the facility in Hattiesburg where she is assigned as part of her conservatorship. Credit: Photo courtesy of Nancy DeVoe
In September 2015, when Smith was put under a conservatorship, all three sisters were in town to see their father before he died. After his death, Nancy and her sisters disagreed about what to do about their mother. Nancy said any discussion should include their mother and opposed the conservatorship.
Her sisters initially were appointed co-conservators for their mother. However, a Lamar County chancery judge later replaced them with a third-party conservator because of a dispute.
Smith’s conservator has changed three more times, and, since 2015, the fees drawn from her account to pay conservators total more than $160,000, according to the DeVoes. In court records, Smith’s estate was valued at almost $900,000 in 2021.
The DeVoes’ opposition to the conservatorship has led to a contentious court fight that could almost mirror that of Brittany Spears, who was under a conservatorship from 2008 until 2021.
In 2016, John and Nancy were ordered to post $10,000 bonds each before they could file any additional opposition to the conservatorship.
On. Jan. 30, Lamar County Chancery Judge Chad Smith, no relation to Opal Smith, ordered John DeVoe to pay $8,397.43 into Opal’s conservatorship account, fined Nancy $10,000 for contempt, and fired Opal’s lawyer because he said it was a conflict for the lawyer to represent both Nancy and Opal.
Nancy DeVoe had opposed the approval of $43,747,82 from Opal’s account to her conservator and ex-conservator in a January order. Chad Smith said in court papers that he had ordered and reiterated she was prohibited from seeking relief until she had posted the bond, which led to her being fined for contempt “due to her contemptuous conduct,” Judge Smith wrote in the Jan. 30 order.
“Nancy shall reimburse the conservatorship $10,000 in attorney’s fees. The amount represents the fees expended by the conservator litigating meritless opposition by Nancy during the time period requested,” he wrote.
Chad Smith warned that any future unsuccessful legal challenge resulting in the conservator incurring legal fees will result in the fees and expenses being imposed against those presenting an unsuccessful challenge.
The DeVoes, who live in England, have filed a court motion seeking to remove Chad Smith from Opal Smith’s case.
Chad Smith is the second judge to handle Opal Smith’s conservatorship case. The previous judge, M. Ronald Doleac, retired in 2018 after not seeking reelection.
The DeVoes maintain in court papers that Doleac granted a conservatorship petition on Smith despite insufficient process and without notice, evidence, or opportunity to defend. And they said the conservatorship letter was issued the same day, naming Opal’s daughters, Houser and Weber, co-conservators, which they say was a violation of the law.
A typical docket report of a successful Mississippi conservatorship case should show, before the judgment or decree is filed: a sworn petition, summons issued to the target of the conservatorship and a relative, two sworn certificates from licensed physicians or a physician and a licensed psychologist and an entry showing a hearing was held at least seven days after the petition.
After the decree, the docket report should show the letters of conservatorship were issued and entry of a bond securing the performance of the fiduciary duties owed by the conservator to the target and an inventory of the newly created conservatorship estate, to be filed once each year during the term of the conservatorship.
Most conservatorship records in Mississippi are sealed from viewing for anyone not a party to the case. A judge has the discretion whether to make public any documents in a case.
According to a transcript from a July 2022 hearing in Opal’s case, attorney Carol Bustin of Hattiesburg, representing Nancy and Opal, argued that “due process requires fairness. It requires that everybody have their day in court, and Opal Smith never had her day in court. There was never any testimony. She never testified as to whether she wanted this conservatorship or whether she agreed with it, or why she didn’t agree with it.”
Attorney Larry Buffington of Collins, a former chancery judge, represented Opal’s other two daughters. Buffington said at the July hearing, “Maybe I did it wrong for 20 years, but I don’t know that I ever conducted a hearing unless there was a request from somebody on a conservatorship. Most of those actually were done in chambers.”
In a court order, Chad Smith said Doleac initially set the matter for a hearing on Aug. 10, 2015, but continued it until Sept. 15, 2015. Doleac then scheduled a trial for Nov. 3, 2015.
What occurred isn’t documented. Chad Smith said state law doesn’t require a record to be made of the trial and that a judge has the discretion to decide what evidence to hear.
In August 2016, Doleac replaced the daughters, without their opposition, as conservators, replacing them with attorney Derek Arrington. Seven months later, Doleac appointed Arrington’s law partner, G. Neil Rogers, as substitute conservator.
Judge Smith, who took over the case in 2019, granted Rogers’ request in 2021 to withdraw as conservator and appointed attorney William Andrews III as his substitute. He also named Andrews to serve as Opal’s guardian, meaning he was given responsibility for Smith’s care and wellbeing as well as control of her finances.
Doleac wouldn’t address the Opal Smith case specifically but said there is a process for the DeVoes to appeal the case, which they did in 2021. A three-judge panel of the state high court denied the request in January 2022 without comment.
John DeVoe said that with them being in England, it has been difficult to find a lawyer to handle their appeal. He said some lawyers they contacted expressed reservations about taking the case since it would be going against a judge.
The DeVoes filed the paperwork themselves seeking Smith’s removal from the case to the state Supreme Court. The motion was filed with the court April 18. It has yet to be decided.
“You can’t be on the bench and not be criticized,” Doleac said in a phone interview. “We have an excellent judiciary in the state. I have never seen anyone take a shortcut.”
This project was produced by the Mississippi Center for Investigative Reporting, now part of Mississippi Today, in partnership with the Fund for Investigative Journalism.
In this 1963 photo, civil rights leader Malcolm X speaks to reporters in Washington. Credit: Associated Press
Malcolm X was born Malcolm Little in Omaha, Nebraska. When he was 14, a teacher asked him what he wanted to be when he grew up and he answered that he wanted to be a lawyer. The teacher chided him, urging him to be realistic. “Why don’t you plan on carpentry?”
In prison, he became a follower of Nation of Islam leader Elijah Muhammad. In his speeches, Malcolm X warned Black Americans against self-loathing: “Who taught you to hate the texture of your hair? Who taught you to hate the color of your skin? Who taught you to hate the shape of your nose and the shape of your lips? Who taught you to hate yourself from the top of your head to the soles of your feet? Who taught you to hate your own kind?”
Prior to a 1964 pilgrimage to Mecca, he split with Elijah Muhammad. As a result of that trip, Malcolm X began to accept followers of all races. In 1965, he was assassinated. Denzel Washington was nominated for an Oscar for his portrayal of the civil rights leader in Spike Lee’s 1992 award-winning film.
