The Mississippi Supreme Court handed down no opinions today. The hand-down list had three orders, one was an interesting cert grant in a criminal case.
Powers v. State, 2017-DR-00696-SCT (denying the State’s Motion to Dismiss Petitioner’s Motion to Rehear the Court’s June 21, 2022 Order Denying Petitioner’s Motion to Hold PCR Proceedings in Abeyance)
Manuel v. State, 2020-CT-00711-SCT (granting cert)
Here is the COA opinion in Manuel v. State. The dissent's contention was limited to the sentencing as a habitual offender. Specifically, the dissent concluded that the habitual-offender portions of the sentence were not supported by sufficient evidence and should be reversed under plain error review. Manuel v. State, 2020-KA-00711-COA (Criminal – Felony/Excited Utterance) Affirming convictions and sentences for second-degree murder and aggravated assault, holding that the circuit court did not abuse its discretion by (1) admitting testimony under the excited-utterance hearsay exception, (2) excusing a juror mid-trial for failure to disclose information during voir dire, (3) collecting the parties’ jury panel information sheets following jury selection and placing them under seal, or (4) sentencing the defendant as a habitual offender. (Judge Westbrooks concurred in part and dissented in part, joined by Judge McDonald and Judge McCarty; Judge McDonald and Judge McCarty concurred in part and dissented in part without separate written opinion; and Judge Emfinger concurred in part and in the result without separate written opinion) The cert petition led with the sentencing issue, but also raised issues related to the trial court's finding that certain defense witnesses' testimony was hearsay and not excited utterances and the trial court's admission of State witness testimony under that hearsay exception.
Edwards v. State, 2021-CT-00259-SCT (denying cert)
Mississippi Appeals Blog 