Guest post by Alex Fascilla
Right now, Curtis Flowers sits in solitary confinement waiting for the state of Mississippi to carry out his capital punishment for quadruple homicide. And right now, we still do not know beyond a reasonable doubt—as determined by a jury of his peers—if Curtis Flowers is guilty. Curtis Flowers is black. He has been incarcerated for the last 22 years. And Curtis Flowers has an unfortunate reputation: he’s been tried six times for the same crime by white prosecutor Doug Evans.
22 years ago four people that worked in a furniture store in Winona, MS were shot to death. Local law enforcement was coming up empty handed at nearly every turn given there were no prints, no gun, and no other physical evidence to attach to a suspect. The prosecution was buckling under mounting desperation.
As they often do in Mississippi, the crosshairs of racist conviction eventually swung and landed squarely on Curtis Flowers, a man who worked at the furniture store. Curtis Flowers was also a man who no witnesses could identify as having been at the store that day. Add to that Curtis Flowers had no prior criminal record.
Let’s unpack those six convictions, emphasizing their determination by a jury of his peers. The first two times he was convicted, the Mississippi Supreme Court threw them out, pointing to misconduct on the part of Doug Evans. The third time, they threw it out because the jury contained not a single person of color. Winona is 53% black. The fourth and fifth times: mistrials. Both were hung juries, and both were the first to feature multiple black jurors. The sixth and final trial: a single black person. The justices of the MS Supreme Court called these series of gaffes the worst cases of racial discrimination they had ever seen.
And they did nothing else but provide that label.
But how was this possible? From a tactical standpoint, because of something called a “peremptory challenge” of which a prosecutor is granted 41. These challenges give them the authority to eliminate any juror they choose without reason. Jurors are selected from a semifinal pool of 42. Evans fired every bullet in his chamber to remove all but a single black person from his final jury.
From a strategic standpoint, however, we see what we continue to see every day by law enforcement, the judicial system, the legislative process, and the executive branch: systematic racism that fuels our infinitely profitable prison industrial complex. And people of color are the crude oil, commodities, propelling the whole machine forward with a growing momentum of oppression and greed. Consider the recent changes in the abortion laws in Curtis Flowers’ neighboring Alabama. What better pipeline for growth in prison populations than a generation of:
Likely poor
Likely black
men and women—the richest vein available. Burgeoning prison populations means more prisons, but to fill those prisons, the system must grow. That means more officers, more prosecutors, more judges, and more laws intended to oppress people of color. Excuse the plunge into the depths of conjecture, but it’s extremely difficult to believe these southern legislators don’t know exactly why it’s good business to exacerbate the problems that abortion solves. And if you don’t think our current regime wouldn’t like an excuse to put more officers in the streets, you’re just not paying attention.
Curtis Flowers is a singular casualty in this system of oppression: for every one Curtis Flowers, there are 20 cases like this that escape the national news spotlight. This is happening and Supreme Courts, like the Mississippi Supreme Court, are going so far as to recognize it and yet: Curtis Flowers remains in shackles. Dravon Ames and Iesha Harper of Phoenix get guns shoved into their faces in a video so visceral some of the comments read, irony-free: “seeing this makes me want to die.”
This is all happening now. And it feels like it’s accelerating. Systematic racism fortified with untold greed is driving us right into an (ostensibly) legal form of enslavement and Curtis Flowers and Doug Evans and Dravon Ames and Iesha Harper and those Phoenix cops are single rivets in the miles-long bridge to get there.
How can one person be tried six times for the same crime? Racism. Still alive and well. Make changes in your thinking. Make your voice heard. Disrupt the construction of that bridge with your action.
Written by me, Alex Fascilla, who became sick with empathy and genuinely angry when I learned the details of Curtis Flowers’ plight. I also wanted to comment on Iesha Harper’s video but the comment I wanted to leave was already there. Thank you, Emily for encouraging me to write this.