Jackson politics, property, and power.
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The Capitol, campaigns, and everyone angling for your tax dollars.
Mayor John Horhn told WLBT on Monday that talks about a data center at the Lake Hico site are "very premature," walking back records showing his administration quietly planned the hub for months. Separately, a federal judge has raised concerns about what the project could mean for JXN Water.
Brad McCullouch, appointed to replace Jody Owens after his federal guilty plea, invited Shad White to audit the Hinds County District Attorney's Office. Owens separately moved to surrender his law license.
Internal documents obtained by WLBT reveal the city eyed a $5 billion to $15 billion hyperscale data center at the former Rex Brown plant site, projecting $9 million to $20 million a year in new revenue. The council passed a moratorium on data centers two days before the records came out.
The former councilman turned down a government offer that required cooperation with prosecutors. His two co-defendants also pleaded guilty without cooperating.
The special election that was supposed to happen July 14 was canceled by Governor Reeves the day before. Now Archie's attorney is asking the Mississippi Supreme Court to fast-track the case, arguing every month of delay extends the harm of a voided election.
The City Council will vote Tuesday on applying for a competitive federal grant that would award Jackson up to $300 million for public safety, technology, and crime reduction. Only two to four cities nationwide are expected to win.
The former mayor's signed plea agreement, filed in federal court July 6, surrenders his rights to appeal, to FOIA records, and to control his assets. A probation officer has now been assigned to build the pre-sentence report that will shape all three sentencings on October 15.
The Planning and Economic Development Committee reviewed a draft regulatory framework Monday afternoon. The full council took up a six-month moratorium that night. No vote was taken, but the path forward is clearer than it was.
The Jackson bribery case now moves to the only courtroom fight left: punishment. A person-by-person guide to the exposure, the guidelines math, the cooperation credit, and the order in which the bills come due.
The Mississippi Bar asked the state Supreme Court on July 6 to suspend Jody Owens from practicing law, the near-automatic consequence of his felony plea. The harder problem arrives later: six years of Hinds County convictions won by an office whose leader was committing federal crimes while running it.
Hours after Lumumba folded, the last defendant did too. The biggest corruption case in the city's modern history is over: one mayor, one district attorney, one council president, one councilwoman, one associate, all guilty by their own word. What remains is the sentencing calendar, and the questions no jury will ever answer.
The former mayor, twice elected and the heir to a movement, has changed his plea in the federal bribery case. Seven days before opening statements, only Aaron Banks still says he is innocent.
Chief Administrative Officer Pieter Teeuwissen is stepping down after less than a year on the job, citing personal obligations. His departure comes as the city faces a budget shortfall, a data center fight, and the fallout from Jody Owens's guilty plea.
The council will consider a temporary ban on new data center development at a 6 p.m. public hearing Monday, following a committee discussion at 4 p.m. Both meetings are at City Hall.
Lumumba has called his indictment a political prosecution timed to destroy him. In a city that watched the state take its airport, its courts, and its water, that theory did not come from nowhere. An examination of the case his defenders make, and where it collides with the record.
The former mayor loses the cover of a co-defendant's entrapment fight and gains a star witness against him. Banks loses the same cover and may be better off without it. A strategic map of the trial that opens July 13.
After a standing-room-only public hearing where 25 of 26 speakers opposed data centers, the Jackson City Council is drafting regulations that will determine whether Saxum's 230-acre rezoning moves forward. The next vote is July 14.
After seven days of testimony and nearly four hours of closing arguments, the decade-old fight over Jackson-Medgar Wiley Evers International Airport now rests with one man. A ruling could take months.
Between July 11 and July 14, the capital city faces a new district attorney, a federal corruption trial, a court-ordered election do-over, and a possible transit strike. None of these deadlines was planned. All of them are about the same thing.
First Assistant DA Brad McCullouch is holding the office while Governor Tate Reeves decides who gets it. Under state law, Reeves has 10 days to make an emergency appointment and must call a special election. The politics here are not simple.
Document 205, filed June 29, reveals an asset freeze, a full waiver of all appeal rights, and a sealed supplement that almost certainly contains the cooperation terms. The fine print tells a story the courtroom summary did not.
Jody Owens brought Gary Kohlman, one of Washington's most decorated trial lawyers, to lead the defense. Legal observers expected the other two defendants to ride in his wake. Owens is gone. The question is what his departure leaves behind.
Jody Owens admitted Monday he funneled more than $80,000 in FBI cash to the mayor and a city councilman. He resigned as Hinds County DA effective Wednesday. Lumumba and Banks go to trial July 13.
The former Hinds County DA faces conspiracy, money laundering, and honest services fraud. Federal guidelines point to 2 to 3.5 years. One question will determine whether he gets less.
The former Jackson City Council president just dropped a legal bombshell on prosecutors, arguing they illegally crammed multiple separate crimes into a single count. His lawyers want the judge to make the government show its hand before trial.
Judge Jordan held the final pretrial conference June 16, then a separate in-chambers session the same day. By the end of it, the defendants had a bigger strike sheet, a tighter deadline stack, and an order to start drafting anonymous-jury instructions.
When the federal corruption trial of Jody Owens, Chokwe Antar Lumumba, and Aaron Banks opens July 13, the courtroom is open to the public. No ticket, no press pass. A reader's guide to getting in.
A city that begged the federal government for drinking water in 2022 is being courted to host the thirstiest machines in America.
A plain-language guide to the federal bribery trial of DA Jody Owens, former Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba, and former Councilman Aaron Banks. The arguments, the witnesses, and what to listen for in opening statements.
The corruption case has been quieter on the docket than in the headlines. The last two weeks changed that. Twenty-eight days from trial, the pretrial motions are picking up.
A rezoning brawl over 230 acres in northwest Jackson has the protests and the deadline. But a separate developer's off-grid gas plant — the project state regulators just declined to touch — may set the precedent that lasts.
After months arguing that pretrial publicity had poisoned the local jury pool, federal prosecutors told the court last week they are satisfied a fair jury can be seated in Jackson — quietly ending the last skirmish before the corruption trial of Jody Owens, Chokwe Antar Lumumba and Aaron Banks.
The city convened a panel at Jackson State to ask whether it wants a 230-acre data center in northwest Jackson — a question it has not answered, with a rezoning vote now days away.
A month before the July 13 trial, prosecutors withdrew their bid to move the case to Gulfport or widen the jury pool — telling the court they are satisfied a fair jury can be seated in Jackson.
Special Judge Barry Ford couldn't find the will of the voters in the boxes, so he ordered a new election between David Archie and Anthony Smith. The ballots reopen the same week the federal bribery trial begins downtown.
Warren Gary Kohlman has argued before the U.S. Supreme Court, served as general counsel to the National Basketball Players Association, and once defended a congressman caught in the FBI's ABSCAM sting. Now he is in Jackson, defending the district attorney.
A federal judge let the new Metro Jackson Water Authority seat a board and do almost nothing else, keeping the city's water and sewer systems under his own control for now.
The federal corruption case against Hinds County District Attorney Jody Owens, former Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba, and former Councilman Aaron Banks moved another inch toward the jury this week. The inches are starting to add up.
Three Jackson officials, three different indictments. The numbers aren't an accident.
An analysis: of the three men headed to trial in Jackson's biggest corruption case, Aaron Banks has always been the quiet one — and the quiet may be calculated.
An essay: for twenty years Jackson couldn't give away a downtown lot — and when investors finally arrived with a private jet and a yacht, they turned out to be the FBI.
For readers who want to understand Chokwe Antar Lumumba's case: of the three men charged, his alleged crime is the thinnest — and his defense the most purely legal.
Why the defense sees an opening: the judge denied the motion to dismiss, but kept Owens's entrapment defense alive and left the central legal question for the jury.
A New Jersey firm wants to rezone 190 acres for what looks like a data center, just as the City Council weighs a moratorium — part of a boom that's made Mississippi one of the country's hottest markets.
As the Jackson corruption case heads toward trial, here's what the headlines won't tell you about how it will actually unfold.
An updated chronology of United States v. Owens — from the FBI's 2022 tip through the July 13 trial date, with the jury and venue fight in focus.
How Mississippi already mastered the gerrymander everyone's suddenly talking about.