April 25, 1959

Days before his scheduled trial, Mack Charles Parker, a 23-year-old Black truck driver, was lynched after midnight by a hooded mob of white men in Poplarville, Mississippi. 

Parker had been accused of raping a pregnant white woman and was being held in a local jail. A deputy reportedly unlocked the jail, enabling a white mob to enter Parker's cell. The mob dragged Parker head first down the stairs, leaving a bloody trail. The mob then beat him, took him to a bridge, shot and killed him, then weighed his body down with chains and dumped him in the river. 

FBI agents identified the jailer, Jewel Alford, as giving the mob the keys. Another alleged participant was J.P. Walker, elected sheriff of Pearl River County four years later. Other suspects included “Crip” Reyer, L. C. Davis, “Preacher” James Floren Lee, his son James Floren “Jeff” Lee, Herman Schultz and Arthur Smith who supplied the names of Walker, Preacher Lee, L.C. Davis and the names of others who were in the two cars. Smith told agents that Lee, Reyer, Davis and Walker were in the lead car that carried Parker from the jail. 

Howard Smead's book, “Blood Justice,” tells the story. Parker is among 40 martyrs listed on the Civil Rights Memorial in Montgomery, Alabama, and is also listed at the National Memorial for Peace and Justice.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

The state Senate on Wednesday agreed to restore voting rights to four people who have completed their prison sentences and paid restitution for disenfranchising felony convictions. 

“I think we all have failed at some point in our lives,”  Democratic Sen. Juan Barnett of Heidelberg said on the Senate floor. “I think we all have asked for forgiveness. And these individuals now who are before us on these suffrage bills are asking us to forgive them of those things.”

The GOP-majority chamber overwhelmingly approved the bills, and they now head to the House for consideration. 

Sen. Mike Seymour, a Republican from Vancleave, was the only person in the 52-member Senate who voted against all of the suffrage restoration bills. Reporters attempted to ask Seymour why he opposed all of the suffrage measures, but he churlishly walked down three flights of stairs without substantively answering the questions. 

The only thing he said in response to the media's inquiries was a cryptic and confusing remark that he believes “everybody should have the same right to suffrage.” He declined to elaborate what that meant and darted into an office. 

The four people the Senate restored voting rights to were:

• A Newton County man who was released from prison in 1989 for escape, burglary and larceny convictions  
• An Oktibbeha County man who was released from prison in 1997 on an embezzlement conviction 
• An Oktibbeha County man who was released from prison in 1994 on a false pretenses-communications conviction 
• A Walthall County man who was convicted of grand larceny in 1977; Lawmakers said the conviction occurred so long ago that the Mississippi Department of Corrections did not even have all of the documentation in its possession to show how many years he served and when he was released from custody. 

Senators voted down a bill to restore voting rights to a Yazoo County man who was convicted of possessing stolen goods and attempted armed robbery in 1995. He was released to parole on September 16, 1997, and discharged on February 13, 2000. 

Sen. Walter Michel, a Republican from Ridgeland, and Sen. Chad McMahan, a Republican from Guntown, told reporters they voted against restoring suffrage to the Yazoo County man  because they believe attempted armed robbery is a violent crime, and they oppose restoring voting rights to people convicted of violent crimes. 

“If you put a gun to somebody's head or somebody murders somebody, then I'm going to vote against restoring suffrage,” Michel said. “But if they stole some money, and it was 35 or 40 years ago, I'm fine with that.”  

A senator held the defeated measure on a procedural measure, so the chamber could reconsider the issue at a later date. 

The Senate's decision to reject an effort to restore suffrage to the Yazoo County man comes a week after Kenneth Almons, a Jackson resident who was convicted of armed robbery and aggravated assault at 17 years old, testified before a legislative committee.  

At 51, Almons has run his own business, currently works for the city of Jackson, has raised three children and has not been convicted of any other crime for nearly three decades. 

Lawmakers who attended the hearing asked Almons, who served five years in state prison, what it would mean if the state restored his voting rights.  

“It would mean I'm no longer a nobody,” Almons responded. “And if you can't vote, you're nobody. And in the public's eye, I'm a nobody.” 

Michel said he would advise Almons that he can attempt to persuade a lawmaker to introduce a suffrage restoration bill on his behalf and let the bill work its way through the state's lawmaking process. 

Michel, who represents a part of Hinds County, said he would not be willing to introduce such a measure for Almons. 

Senators authored around nine suffrage restoration bills, and Senate Judiciary B Chairman Joey Fillingane, a Republican from Sumrall, decided to bring five of those bills up for debate. Members of the committee voted to advance all five suffrage bills with no opposition. 

The Senate bills will now head to the House for consideration where House Speaker Jason White will likely refer the measures to the House Judiciary B Committee for consideration, which is led by Rep. Kevin Horan, a Republican from Grenada. 

Horan previously told Mississippi Today that he will not restore suffrage to people convicted of violent offenses or those previously convicted of embezzling public money. Additionally, Horan said people must have completed the terms of their sentence and not have been convicted of another felony offense for at least five years to be considered. 

The committee Horan leads advanced 27 House suffrage bills out of the committee, but he has not presented them for consideration in the full House chamber. Lawmakers can debate suffrage bills until the final days of the 2024 session. 

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

The Mississippi Senate on Wednesday unanimously confirmed Bill Cork as Gov. Tate Reeves' pick for a permanent chief economic development officer, despite a background report provided to senators that he “created a toxic workplace” and had faced complaints including sexual harassment and creating a hostile work environment.

In a hearing before his Senate confirmation, Cork said he did nothing wrong, has a winning economic development record, has overhauled MDA.

“… If that takes a little hostility to get that done, that's what's going to happen,” Cork said in the hearing on Tuesday.

Cork is now the first permanent director of the state's economic development agency since 2021, when former agency director John Rounsaville resigned after sexual misconduct allegations.

Cork is credited with recently helping the state land record-setting large economic developments, including Amazon Web Services' commitment to spend $10 billion to construct two “hyperscale data centers” in Madison County.

A background report provided to the Senate Finance Committee before members voted to confirm him said that Cork, who has worked at MDA since September of 2020, was investigated by the Mississippi Personnel Board in 2021. The investigation followed a claim against Cork of sexual harassment, age discrimination and creating a hostile work environment while he was serving as chief economic development officer at MDA.

The personnel board said it conducted the investigation at Gov. Reeves' request. It submitted a report to Reeves after the investigation that said Cork had been uncooperative with the investigation, and that while no legal violations were found, “Cork's management style has created a toxic workplace.” Personnel recommended Cork receive a written reprimand and that he complete at least 12 hours of training on workforce harassment, which he completed.

Cork was traveling Thursday, his office said, and could not be reached for comment. In a Senate Finance confirmation hearing on Wednesday, Cork addressed the report after Sen. Bradford Blackmon asked about it.

Cork said he helped lead “reorganizing and reforming” MDA, resulting in two-thirds of the project management and international teams leaving the agency, and “we had a small cadre of employees that didn't like what was happening.”

“At the end of the day, the state Personnel Board found I hadn't done anything illegal, but that I was a tough boss,” Cork said. “Some people find that level of tough and directedness to be a little hostile. None of it was directed at anyone, but when you're trying to put together a winning team, you just don't settle for second-place.

“… I don't apologize for anything I've done because I didn't do anything wrong,” Cork said. “I didn't cooperate with the investigation because I didn't do anything wrong, and that's exactly what that investigation found.”

State Personnel Director Kelly Hardwick said: “Regretfully, (Cork) didn't cooperate with the investigation, which might have changed our determination. Because he didn't, we were left with only the testimony of the accusations.”

Hardwick declined to provide details of the allegations against Cork, and his office would not release its report to Mississippi Today, citing public records exemptions for personnel records.

Hardwick said Cork did successfully complete the state workplace harassment training and implemented some of the practices recommended in the training.

“He's been shown to be successful and there have been no other complaints on him since,” Hardwick said. “From our standpoint he successfully did what we recommended to the governor.”

Both the Senate Finance Committee and full Senate voted unanimously for Cork's confirmation.

Senate Finance Chairman Josh Harkins noted the report said personnel board found no legal violations, and that Cork openly addressed the allegations in committee. He said he received recommendation letters for Cork from across the state and country and, “It's hard to argue with the product MDA has put out in the last few months.”

A spokesman for Reeves praised Cork, said the “old” personnel complaint is not credible and criticized Mississippi Today.

“Bill Cork has gotten better results for the people of Mississippi than almost any other employee of state government in decades,” Reeves Deputy Chief of Staff Cory Custer said in a statement. “… (Cork) opted to make the results of the investigation known, addressed it in detail in his confirmation hearing yesterday, and was then unanimously confirmed. It would not be a surprise to see a biased article that hypes up discredited nonsense, but it would be a disservice to a great, hard-working man.”

Cork has previously served as deputy director and chief economic development officer at MDA. He formerly led the Hancock County Port and Harbor Commission and before that was the CEO of an industrial complex in New Boston, Texas. He is a Marine Corps veteran and received a master of Urban and Regional Planning from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Reeves on Aug. 13, 2021, announced Cork's predecessor, Rounsaville, would be “stepping down” at the end of that month as MDA director to spend more time with his family and less time traveling. Reeves thanked him for his service and wished him well.

But Mississippi Today reported that sexual misconduct allegations had led to Rounsaville's resignation, and that Reeves had in July received a personnel investigation report and recommendation Rounsaville be fired. After that report, Reeves said Rounsaville had been put on administrative leave and removed from day-to-day operations at MDA and that his resignation had been tendered Aug. 13 after an investigation into his conduct.

An allegedly intoxicated Rounsaville allegedly made sexual advances toward three subordinate female MDA employees at a bar in Biloxi while attending a business conference.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.