McComb will get more time to defend its case in a wrongful death suit that was filed by the mother of a man who died in police custody in 2019 following a Mississippi Supreme Court ruling Thursday.
The court — with no written opinion — voted unanimously to afford the city an extension to respond to Stephanie Barnes’ lawsuit against the city.
Justices in a split vote also denied Barnes’ appeal of a previous order that had given the city a chance to respond to the lawsuit, which Barnes had won on a default judgement after the city failed to argue its side of the case in court documents.
Justices Michael Randolph, Josiah Coleman, James Maxwell, Dawn Beam and David Ishee voted in favor of denying Barnes’ petition while justices James Kitchens, Leslie King and Kenneth Griffis voted to approve it.
The legal battle centers around the death of Barnes’ son Demarcus Brown, who died in a shooting on North Locust Street on Aug. 8, 2019.
Barnes sued the city on Jan. 12, 2020, claiming responding police officers did not do enough to help her son, who died from blood loss.
The city claims body cam footage of the incident showed officers performing first aid on an unconscious Brown, and that should absolve the officers of the allegations.
Judge Mike Taylor originally ruled a default judgement against the city due to it failing to offer a defense in the case and awarded a $500,000 judgement to Barnes with an annual interest rate of 8%.
McComb successfully appealed the decision, arguing that the city had not been properly notified of court hearings and that the court did not make its decision based on the facts of the events.
“The plaintiffs failed to strictly comply with the notice requirement of the Mississippi Torts Claim Act,” former city board attorney Angela Cockerham wrote on behalf of the city in its request for Taylor to set aside his previous ruling. “As such, they are statutorily barred from maintaining this action against the city.”
Barnes previously said that she just wants justice for her son, after the man who was charged the day after the shooting was released from jail when a grand jury decided there wasn’t enough evidence to indict him.
