Mississippi Litigation Review & Commentary : Mississippi Personal Injury Lawyer & Attorney : Phillip W. Thomas Law Firm : MS Litigation Review & Commentary

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Anderson had a note last week about the 7^th  Circuit's turkey ostrich case that included actual pictures of an ostrich and—presumably—an attorney with their heads in the sand.

Here is Judge Posner's 7^th Circuit opinion, in which he chastises lawyers for ignoring adverse dispositive precedent. Judge Posner writes:

When there is apparently dispositive precedent, an appellant may urge its overruling or distinguish or reserve a challenge to it for a petition for certiorari but may not simply ignore it. 

Where would a lawyer writing an appellate brief learn such a foolish practice as ignoring adverse precedent? My guess is that the lawyer routinely ignores adverse facts in trial court pleadings and briefs. I see that all the time. 

Much of responding to a defendant's motion for summary judgment is making a record of and pointing out to the judge all the facts favorable to the plaintiff that the defendant left out of its summary judgment motion. Many times, that is the entirety of responding to a defendant's summary judgment motion. The defendant can't get summary judgment when those facts are in play, so it ignores them. Fervently.

It's an interesting tactic. My fear is that the tactic sometimes works. Otherwise, why would you see it so much? 

Some trial court judges expose the hole in the party's argument during hearings and confront the attorney with the opposing facts. It can be uncomfortable to watch. Trial court judges who are poker faced and don't say much during hearings may cause anxiety for the side with the upper hand because they don't signal whether they “get it.”

Sometimes when a case makes it to trial, it's the defendant who has the “rest of the story” and the plaintiff has ignored bad facts. A commercial case where the documents are particularly good for the defendant are an example of a situation where this can happen.

But there is a big difference between ignoring harmful facts and ignoring dispositive precedent. Lawyers are supposed to disclose dispositive authority to the court. There is no such obligation with facts that help the opposing side. 

Update:

Above the law has the lawyer's response, in which he disagrees with Posner.            

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Should law schools change their curriculum? That was the focus of a New York Times editorial on Friday. The editorial states:

Instead of a curriculum taught largely through professors’ grilling of students about appellate cases, some schools are offering more apprentice-style learning in legal clinics and more courses that train students for their multiple future roles as advocates and counselors, negotiators and deal-shapers, and problem-solvers.

***

In American law schools, the choice is not between teaching legal theory or practice; the task is to teach useful legal ideas and skills in more effective ways. The case method has been the foundation of legal education for 140 years. Its premise was that students would learn legal reasoning by studying appellate rulings. That approach treated law as a form of science and as a source of truth.

That vision was dated by the 1920s. It was a relic by the 1960s. Law is now regarded as a means rather than an end, a tool for solving problems. In reforming themselves, law schools have the chance to help reinvigorate the legal profession and rebuild public confidence in what lawyers can provide.

My Take:

I agree that the law school teaching method is dated and wastes a lot of time. I'm all for updating the curriculum to place more emphasis on topics that will actually help students practice law. There is a catch, however, that editorials like this miss.

Although law schools don't do much to train students to practice law, they do a lot to help students pass the bar exam. Depending on their practice area, students may not need courses on property, UCC and bankruptcy. But substantive courses like that come in handy when it's time to study for and take the bar exam. Courses in negotiating, software coding and deal-shaping? Not so much.

So before schools and students jump whole-hog into revamping the curriculum, they need to keep in mind that there is a bar exam to take—and pass—before students can actually start practicing law.  

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On October 12, 2011 the Circuit Court of Rankin County, Judge John Emfinger, rendered a verdict and judgment of $333,319.08 against the Mississippi Department of Health. The actual trial was on May 10, 2011.

The case was filed by Mike French on behalf of the wrongful death beneficiaries of Sandra Kay French. Sandra French was a sixty-six year old resident of Jaquith Nursing Home. She had some mental disabilities and physical limitations.

In 1999 Ms. French was critically injured while being transported from the nursing home to a doctor's appointment. She was strapped into her wheelchair, but the wheelchair was not secured in the vehicle. The vehicle bounced severely (must have entered Jackson city limits) and she was thrown forward striking her head. She suffered head and spinal cord injuries and died a week later.

The Department of Health admitted liability and defended on the issue of damages.

The Court awarded the following damages:

• $52,040.75– medical expenses
• $6,278.33– funeral expenses
• $25,000– loss of companionship and society
• $250,000– pain and suffering.

It's my understanding that the defendant did not appeal and paid the judgment.

John Giddens of Jackson represented the plaintiff. Jim Bullock of Shell Buford represented the defendant.

My Take:

With a May trial date, you can bet that Giddens wore his lucky burlap suit.

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A few weeks ago I blogged about the plight of three Tate County youths who were arrested and strip-searched for allegedly walking across a neighbor's yard—they were later acquitted of the walking on the grass charges. Darby exhibited a God-complex after the teens' arrest by ordering drug tests and shipping the kids to the Alcorn County Youth Detention Center after a parent asked to talk to a lawyer.

It was pretty clear that Darby abused her power in order to show who was boss of youth in Tate County. The Tate County Board of Supervisors approved a “no confidence resolution” in Darby. It's also my understanding that there was wide-spread outrage about Darby's conduct and calls for her to be fired. Darby beat them to it.  

The DeSoto Times reported on Friday that Darby resigned in the wake of the controversy:

"Judge Darby indicated that distractions over the last month had severely reduced her effectiveness to serve and believed that she needed to resign. I appreciate her concern for the court and wish her the best in the future," Lynchard said.

My Take:

Darby had to go. I would have preferred that she be fired. But at least the people of Tate County no longer have to worry about her shipping their kids off to jail for walking on the grass.

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On November 4 a Northern District (Western Division) Federal Court jury awarded Michael Mathis $388,000 against Northeast Mississippi Electric Power Association. Here are the jury's special verdict forms.

Here is the plaintiff's complaint. The plaintiff alleged that NEMEPA fired him because he is black. The jury agreed.

The jury awarded $138,000 for back pay and benefits and $250,000 for non-economic damages. In addition, the jury found that the plaintiff should be awarded punitive damages, but could not unanimously decide on an amount.

Jim Waide and Rachel Pierce of Tupelo represented the plaintiff. Lawrence Little of Oxford and Dion Shanley of St. Augustine Florida represented the defendants. Judge Allen Pepper presided in the case.

My Take:

Is it just me, or does it seem like plaintiff verdicts are getting more common in employment cases, but it's harder than ever for a plaintiff to win a personal injury case? Maybe in these tough economic times, juries are placing more value in a person's job.

The jury's verdict on punitive damages is very interesting. Does this mean that the plaintiff gets a new trial on the issue of the amount of punitive damages?

We may not get an answer to that question. The Magistrate Judge is scheduled to mediate the case on Tuesday. Anyone want to bet that the case does not settle?

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To hear Republicans tell it, Attorney General Jim Hood (pictured) won re-election due to unprecedented support in North Mississippi. Here is an article on the race on LegalNewsline.com, an anti-consumer site funded by Big Corporations.

The article quotes a baffled Rep. Philip Gunn, who will be the Speaker of the House in January:

So how did Hood hang on to his position as the state's top lawyer?

"I really don't know what people were thinking," Gunn said. "I don't know why they would vote for him, to be honest."

Gunn, who was selected as the GOP's preferred candidate for House speaker on Monday, said some of it probably comes down to location.

"Jim Hood has been a very popular candidate in the state," he admitted. In 2007, Hood easily defeated Republican Al Hopkins.

"But you have to know the dynamics," Gunn said.

Northeast Mississippi traditionally has been a Democratic stronghold, he explained.

"And that's kind of his home base," Gunn said. "He has a lot of popularity there. The Northwest also is a solid Democratic base.

"Basically, in northern Mississippi he has home-field advantage."

My Take:

The A.P. website shows vote results by county. General Hood “hung on” with a 180,000 vote win—61% of all votes. Hood “hung on” by taking 77 of 82 counties, including Steve Simpson's home county (Harrison). Hood almost won Rankin County, losing it 51–49. If not for that pesky South Mississippi County of DeSoto (located just south of Memphis), Hood basically would have pitched a shut out. Hood's appeal was state-wide and he did not win because of a landslide in North Mississippi. It was a state-wide landslide.

And let's be honest, Steve Simpson is probably asking where Philip Gunn was before the election. I did not get the impression that state Republican leaders were lining up to stand in front of the Hood Train during the campaign.  

General Hood stands up for regular people against big corporations. He banged on insurance companies after Katrina and BP after the Gulf Oil Spill. His office goes after perverts trying to commit cyber-crimes against children and people exploiting the elderly. Every day folks appreciate that about Hood. But Republicans politicians hate Hood for it because they have to listen to their big corporation supporters whine about Hood.

Look for the Republican war on Jim Hood to now shift to the legislature. Republicans want to either stop the State actions against big corporations that Hood has championed or prevent Hood from hiring the outside lawyers who take the cases. Republican Legislators would rather assign the cases to their supporters.

Republicans believe that if they can cut-off Hood's power to hire outside counsel, then they can cut-off his campaign contributions and Republicans can take the A.G. position. That may have been the case 4 years ago, but at this point Hood is a force who will stay in the A.G. position for as long as he wants.    

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The Truth on the Market Blog had a nice post last week on the growing trend of corporations performing legal work in-house rather than hiring private firms. The post commented on this ABA Journal article.

The ABA Journal article opens:

Fed-up with “sky-high” fees at outside firms, Jones Lang LaSalle general counsel Mark J. Ohringer says he now spends 75 percent of his budget on non-law firm resources.

“I’m law firms’ biggest competitor,” Ohringer said during a program at the 2011 Futures Conference on Friday, “and I don’t think they see it that way.”

Jones Lang, a global real estate and investment management firm, has boosted its in-house capabilities by 60 lawyers in the past few years, and Ohringer says he won’t hesitate to add more as the company’s needs increase. Speaking at the conference held at Chicago-Kent Law School on the future of the legal profession, he noted the average cost to employ an experienced in-house lawyer—easy to come by these days given the tough legal job market—is $125 an hour, a bargain compared to many firm rates.

My Take:

You can't blame corporations for wanting to spend $125 an hour on in-house lawyers as opposed to $500–plus (at times) on outside lawyers. I agree that this is a growing trend that will cause further erosion to the legal market. I can't really say whether this trend is good or bad for the lawyers who end up working in-house who otherwise would have been in private practice.

On the downside, many lawyers will make less money working in-house. On the plus side, much of the pressure associated with private practice will be eliminated. You could make a case that the trade off is worth it. Particularly when you consider the fact that you don't see many in-house or public sector lawyers who are eager to move to private practice. Many of these lawyers feel like they have a quality of life advantage.      

Unfortunately, this is an understandable trend that is particularly harsh on Mississippi lawyers, since there are few major corporations with headquarters located in Mississippi. This trend would have been less troublesome looking for Mississippi lawyers about 15 years ago when we had more Mississippi-based corporations.  

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The Clarion-Ledger reports that Mississippi Supreme Court Presiding Justice George Carlson will retire at the end of his current term. The term runs through 2012. Chief Justice Waller spoke glowingly of Justice Carlson:

Chief Justice Bill Waller Jr. called Carlson “a tireless public servant whose life is characterized by hard work, attention to detail, fairness and collegiality.  

“No one worked longer hours or paid more attention to the work of the Court than Justice Carlson,” Waller said in the news release. “Above all, he demonstrates the highest ethical standards possible in his public and personal life. No person has positively shaped the image of the Court in the past 10 years more than Presiding Justice Carlson.”

Justice Carlson will have served on the bench for 30 years at his retirement (19 as circuit judge, 11 on Supreme Court).

My Take:

I heard a few weeks ago that Justice Carlson might retire, but was not going to blog about it until there was an official announcement. I probably shouldn't discuss Justice Carlson's legacy on the Court until his actual retirement date, since he will still be a justice for another year and I may have cases before the Court during that time period.

The timing of Justice Carlson's announcement and the fact that he will serve out the remainder of his term are classy moves. If Justice Carlson retired immediately, then whoever Governor Barbour (or Bryant) appointed to replace him would have a huge advantage in the election for the position. But now the candidates will be on a level playing as far as a perception of incumbency.

It will be interesting to see who throws their hat in the ring for the seat.    

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There was a lot of speculation in the comments to my Doomsday Post last week that the Republican controlled government in Mississippi will push for the Legislature to enact “loser pays” laws similar to what Texas recently enacted. Here is a link to an article in Inside Counsel Magazine that discusses the Texas “loser pays” law.

The article states:

The most significant feature of the 2011 Omnibus Tort Reform Bill is a modified loser-pays proposition that shifts fees to the loser when a case is disposed of on a motion to dismiss. While Perry has publicly touted the law as a landmark reform that will attract businesses to the state and allow employers “to spend less time in court and more time creating jobs,” the statute may prove to be a mixed blessing, and it certainly won’t deliver a deathblow to the plaintiffs bar.

I did not know that before this law, Texas did not have provisions that allow defendants to file a motion to dismiss that challenges the legal sufficiency of the allegations in the complaint:

Prior to passage of the latest tort reform bill, Texas was one of only eight states that didn’t permit parties to file motions to dismiss, which challenge the legal sufficiency of the allegations in the complaint. Not only does the new law create a motion-to-dismiss procedure, but it also makes it mandatory that the loser pays the winner’s fees for litigation of the motion. This has two advantages for businesses—courts can quickly dispose of meritless lawsuits prior to costly discovery, and a company can force the plaintiff who filed the case to foot the bill for the motion.

But the Texas “loser pays” provision goes both ways:

The flip side is that the loser-pays provision goes both ways. If a defendant files a motion to dismiss on which the plaintiff ultimately prevails, the defendant will be paying plaintiffs counsel’s bills. Many think the provision ultimately favors the plaintiffs bar.

The Texas provision also affects offers of judgment:

Finally, the reform attempts to encourage both sides of a dispute to settle cases before trial by clarifying the rules for making an offer of judgment. Similar to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 68, the Texas law permits a party to protect itself from incurring additional legal fees early on by making a reasonable settlement offer or demand.

Under the new rule, if a plaintiff obtains a jury verdict of 80 percent or less of the settlement offer made by the defendant prior to trial, the defendant is entitled to its legal fees incurred after the date of the settlement offer, up to the total amount of the verdict. Likewise, if the plaintiff obtains a verdict of 120 percent or more than his settlement demand, the plaintiff is entitled to recover fees incurred after the demand was made. The statute also permits the prevailing party to recover costs associated with taking depositions, such as court reporter fees.

My Take:

I haven't formed an opinion yet on the offer of judgment aspect of the Texas rule. But how in the name of God's green earth could a state not have a rule that allowed a defendant to file a motion to dismiss? That's about as screwed up feature of litigation as I have ever heard. An early motion to dismiss allows a defendant to obtain dismissal in a case that does not state a viable claim. You've got to have that rule in the books.

In my opinion, this provision in the Texas form of “loser pays” would not hurt good plaintiff lawyers and their clients, so long as it does not change the legal standards for deciding a motion to dismiss. That standard is that the court must assume that all allegations in the complaint are true. Good plaintiff lawyers will hardly ever—if ever—lose a motion to dismiss with that standard.   

If I am on the defense side of a case, I do not want this law on the books. If I am defending a case I want to be able to file a motion to dismiss without having to pay attorney's fees to the plaintiff lawyer if I lose.

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The WSJ reported this morning on the SEC investigating the compensation of executives of oil-driller Nabors Industries, including CEO Eugen Isenberg. Nabors is about to pay Isenberg $100 million to leave the company. The Journal reports that Nabors executives frequently used corporate jets to fly to resort destinations for the wealthy, such as Palm Beach and Martha's Vineyard.

I know what you're thinking: "this does not affect me.” That's where you are wrong. The systemic reallocation of wealth from the middle class to top executives affects virtually all Americans.

Take Nabors, for example. While Nabors executives empty the corporate vault into their own pockets, the company pays 0 to shareholders in the form of a dividend. Don't think you own shares in Nabors? Think again. If you have a 401k, you probably are invested in a mutual fund that owns shares in Nabors.

Participate in PERS? Same goes for you. As PERS flounders and lawmakers begin to confront projected short-falls, corporations sitting on piles of cash pay hundreds of millions to top executives and little or nothing to shareholders in dividends. If corporations increased dividend payouts by just 2%, PERS would be on much safer footing.

But top executives are not thinking about how to get money to shareholders. They are focused on getting the money into their own pockets. At your expense. And these guys absolutely control the Richublican (Republican) party by making massive contributions to Republican candidates and PAC's. Contributions paid for by the corporation. Shareholders' money being used to ensure that America's top-level graft can continue unabated.

You may think you fit into the Richublican world. But you don't. They let you think you do. You don't. Do you have a mansion in Palm Beach, homes in Martha's Vineyard and Aspen and an apartment in Manhattan? No you don't. These guys view people who make $500,000 a year as lower middle class. And they're coming for everyone. Yes, that means you doctors. How's it going to feel when Medicare and Medicaid get massive cuts to free up even more cash for the CEO elite?  

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Ya'll Politics is reporting that in yesterday's election Republicans won enough House of Representative races to take the majority in the House. Republicans now control both chambers of the state legislature and the executive branch. This is the realization of the doomsday scenario for Mississippi lawyers that I wrote about in August in this post.

On one hand I have to tip my hat to Republican politicians, who flat-out play the political game better than Democrats. But the results give me a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. So much so that I am not going to write much about what this means until I am less upset. 

Suffice it to say that more tort reform is likely on the way that will make the 2002 and 2004 reforms look pro-plaintiff. When that happens, many people working in the legal industry in Mississippi will lose their jobs. I'll write more about who and why later. But when some of you who are reading this get laid off in 3 years, you should point back to this election as the cause.

If you are a lawyer working for a firm and your work load is currently low, then you probably will not have a job with your firm in 5 years. Good luck getting a job somewhere else or convincing the bank to loan you the money to start your own practice. 

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Jones Walker announced today that its merger with Watkins Ludlam (“WLS”) was effective on Friday. That will not stop the endless local speculation about the lawsuit filed against WLS and the seven WLS partners who led the negotiations with Jones Walker.

When talking about this lawsuit, many people talk about the unusual nature the Jones Walker– WLS merger. What lawyers expect to see in this situation is one of two things. One common scenario is when the larger firm (Jones Walker in this case) cherry-picks select lawyers from an existing firm to start a local office. That is what happened when Baker Donelson cherry-picked WLS lawyers to start the Baker Donelson Jackson office in 1995. But there are many other examples of this happening.

The second common scenario is for the larger firm to take all of the existing firms' lawyers and then weed-out the ones who it does not want over the next few years. Doing it that way would probably prevent a lawsuit like this, be better politically and give the firm time to evaluate which lawyers are worth keeping. A lot of people still expect to see this happen at the former WLS over the next couple of years.  

Word on the street is that Jones Walker made WLS terminate a certain number of lawyers before the merger. I'm not that familiar with WLS. But one criticism I've heard is that WLS terminated laterals with superior numbers at the expense of poorer-performing lawyers who were at WLS their entire careers. People supporting this contention point out that the plaintiffs (Hall Bailey and Vikki Taylor) where both laterals. If true, this suggests a politicization of the culling process that will be hotly-debated in the lawsuit.

Regardless of the opinion lawyers hold about the prospects of the lawsuit, most seem to be scratching their heads about why Jones Walker decided to merge with WLS the way it did. At this point, you can't yet say that Jones Walker avoided getting sued. The plaintiffs in the Bailey v. WLS case will undoubtedly conduct discovery of email between the WLS defendants and Jones Walker attorneys. If the plaintiffs find evidence to support a claim against Jones Walker, then they are likely to amend the complaint to name Jones Walker as a defendant.

Opinions on the prospects of the lawsuit differ. Defense lawyers seem to like the plaintiff's case more than plaintiff lawyers. Defense lawyers focus on the factual allegations and more naturally conclude that the plaintiffs were screwed by WLS. Plaintiff lawyers tend to focus on the entire case and question how the plaintiffs will prove damages.  

I believe that this difference in focus is attributable to the fact that defense lawyers practice in the firm environment and believe that their job is secure even if they have some bad years number-wise. Even defense lawyers without their own book of business feel like they have a lot of security in their job.  

Conversely, plaintiff lawyers typically practice alone or in small groups and view their job as having very little security. “Sure I just settled a case”, the plaintiff lawyer thinks, “but I may never make another dime.” Fear is the constant companion of plaintiff lawyers. Many defense lawyers, on the other hand, are not fearful about their job security even when they should be.

Personally, I still think that the case boils down to the allegations in paragraph 39 of the Complaint that the individual defendants negotiated sweet-heart deals for themselves at the expense of other WLS partners. If the plaintiffs can prove this, then the case is factually viable. But damages are a separate issue that will be hotly contested even if plaintiffs win on liability.

One thing I don't expect is a quick settlement. Very few cases settle quickly in today's litigation environment. And lawyers who are defendants are less likely to settle quickly than others. That might be counter-intuitive. But its true.              

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A day off from a trial that is almost over gives me an unexpected opportunity for a Fun Friday look at the Game of the Century: LSU vs. Alabama. One of these two schools has been my team since the famed Bama vs. Notre Dame 1973 Sugar Bowl. That is my earliest memory of watching football on TV and it was some game. Notre Dame's players were so much bigger than Bama's it seemed like cheating.

I was a huge Bear Bryant fan and his biography The Last Coach is one of my favorite sports books. They don't make them like Bryant anymore. Among other things, Bryant always insisted that he make less money than the school president. Think any of today's coaches would do that?   

I was a Bama fan until I enrolled at LSU in 1985. I'm nowhere near as devoted of a LSU fan as I used to be, but I've seen in person both schools play some big and historical games. Saturday's tilt in Tuscaloosa is unquestionably the biggest between the two in my lifetime.

Earlier this year I thought Bama was the better team. But LSU has continued to improve and looked like the better team in its last two games. It's really hard for me to compare the teams since neither has been challenged in 8 games. That in itself is amazing. Both have played good SEC teams and destroyed them. 

Some people see a defensive struggle. If that happens I give the edge to the Tigers. LSU's punter Brad Wing is the best college punter I have ever seen. He doesn't have the best leg, but he's shown me that it's not all about the leg. This stat is from a New York Times article on the Australian Wing and Bama's Australian player Jesse Williams:

He is a 6-foot-3, 185-pound redshirt freshman whose long, controlled, end-over-end kicks — known as drop punts in Australian football — have helped limit opponents to seven total return yards this season.

I've been telling people all year how good Wing is, but even I didn't know he was that good. 7 return yards in 8 games? Unreal. What I've noticed is how well he puts the ball inside the 15. By the way, most people's eyes start glassing over when you start telling them about your punter--so wake up. 

My point? In a battle of field position game the best punter is king. 

The closest anyone came to LSU this year was State. How did State hang in there for most of the game? Wing was hurt and didn't make the trip to Starkville. Seriously. LSU would have won that game by 30 if Wing had played.

But I don't think Saturday's game will be that low scoring. Both teams have too much big play capabilities and defenses that can score points. I look for the winning team to score around 30 points and win by 10. I think that will be the Tigers. But I don't feel strongly about it and wouldn't be surprised if Bama won by 10. 

In fact, anyone who thinks they have a good read on what's going to happen in this game is a fool. Both teams are too good for us to know what will happen when they play each other. It's a shame one will have to lose. This is the best LSU team...ever. Yea, I said it. Ever. I don't know why. I don't know where most of these guys came from. But I know they are.

But LSU may lose Saturday and would probably be eliminated from the National Championship race. It's a shame either team has to lose. They are both so much better than anyone else this year that I wish they could play once for all the marbles in the BCS Championship Game in New Orleans. I would like LSU's chances a lot better in that venue.   

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Patsy Brumfield at the Northeast Miss. Daily Journal reported last week on the arrest and strip search of 3 Tate County Youths for walking across a neighbor's yard.

According to a press release issued by an attorney (Cliff Johnson) for the three kids, they were arrested in July in Senatobia after a neighbor complained that the three walked across her yard. Tate County Youth Court Referee Leigh Ann Darby was a the police station on another matter and demanded that the kids be given a drug test. When one of the kid's parents asked why, Darby explained that she was the authority over all children in Tate County. When the parent asked to talk to a lawyer, Darby ordered the kids taken into custody.

The 3 kids were then transported to the Alcorn County Youth Detention Center where they were stripped and forced to “squat and cough” while closely observed by perverts guards. The kids were incarcerated in Alcorn County for 3 days.

On October 20 the 3 kids were found not guilty of trespassing.   

My Take:

It never ceases to amaze me what can happen when you give a little power to idiots. It started here with the Senatobia police, who over-reacted by arresting kids on a trespassing charge. You arrested them for walking across a neighbor's yard? Seriously? Hey Barney, did it ever occur to you that the neighbor might be a nut for asking you to arrest kids for walking in her yard?

Things got worse when Youth Court Referee Leigh Ann Darby exhibited a God-complex at the police station. The problem was compounded when whoever it was made the decision to ship the 3 off to Alcorn County—for trespassing. Alcorn County then upped the ante with the Abu Ghraib-like treatment.

A lot of people should be fired for this, starting with Darby and the Alcorn County guards. Someone in the Senatobia Police Department who went along with Darby should also be fired. I doubt that she was acting alone on this.