Curtis Flowers, who spent almost 23 years in prison for four murders he said he did not commit, was found dead Wednesday at the age of 56.
Flowers died at his home in Mississippi, Flowers’ attorney, Rob McDuff, told The Associated Press on Thursday. No cause of death was given.
Flowers’ ordeal began in July 1996 when he was arrested following the shooting deaths of four people in a furniture store in Winona, Mississippi. Prosecutors alleged Flowers was responsible, even though the weapon prosecutors alleged Flowers used was never recovered. Flowers’ defense team also cited his clean record.
What followed was years of legal battles that eventually progressed to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Former Montgomery County District Attorney Doug Evans, who is white, tried Flowers, who was Black, six times for the shooting deaths. U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brent Kavanaugh summarized Evans’ efforts in 2019 and said “the State’s pattern of striking black prospective jurors persisted from Flowers’ first trial through Flowers’ sixth trial.”
The Mississippi Supreme Court overturned Flowers’ first three convictions, citing prosecutorial misconduct, including racial discrimination in jury selection. The next two trials ended in mistrials.
His sixth trial in 2010—featuring only one Black juror out of 12, in a county where the Black population makes up more than four out of 10 people—came to the same conclusion as the first three which had been overturned. Flowers was convicted and sentenced to death. Evans struck five Black prospective jurors before the trial began.
The U.S. Supreme Court overturned his conviction in 2019 due to claims of bias in the makeup of the jury. The court found Mississippi had tried to exclude 36 Black prospective jurors in the first four trials. Forty-one of 42 Black prospective jurors were removed across the six trials.
“The state’s relentless, determined effort to rid the jury of black individuals strongly suggests that the state wanted to try Flowers before a jury with as few black jurors as possible, and ideally before an all-white jury. We cannot ignore that history,” Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote for the court’s 7-to-2 majority in that case.
Flowers returned home on bail in December of 2019, but Evans said he was considering trying Flowers a seventh time. Flowers’ attorneys filed a motion seeking Evans’ recusal, and Evans withdrew from the case on Jan. 6, 2020.
“Today, I am finally free from the injustice that left me locked in a box for nearly 23 years,” Flowers said in a statement following his release six years ago.
Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch dropped all charges against Flowers the following fall, after taking office and reviewing Flowers’ case.
There was “no clear prosecution witness that incriminated Mr. Flowers who is alive and available and has not had multiple, conflicting statements in the record,” Fitch wrote in her motion to dismiss. Other evidence that Evans had not presented at trial, she noted, offered “exculpatory evidence” in Flowers’ favor and pointed to other potential suspects.
A Montgomery County Court ordered the State of Mississippi to pay Flowers $500,000 for his wrongful imprisonment in a March 2, 2021, judgement.
Flowers filed a lawsuit against Evans on Sept. 3, 2021. John Johnson, the lead investigator in the murders case, and two Mississippi Highway Patrol officers who helped with the investigation, Wayne Miller and Jack Matthews, were also named in the lawsuit.
Evans resigned as Montgomery County District Attorney as the case was ongoing in June of 2023, six months before his term was set to end.
U.S. District Judge Debra Brown for the Northern District of Mississippi dismissed Flowers’ lawsuit on the grounds that federal judges are to refrain from interfering in state criminal cases under certain circumstances. The U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals later affirmed Brown’s decision.
Flowers is preceded in death by his father, Archie Lee Flowers, and his mother, Lola Flowers. In 2018, then Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood supported Evans’ effort to block Flowers from attending his mother’s funeral while his case was being appealed.
Flowers leaves behind his wife, Marlena Wright, daughter Crystal, granddaughter Ariel, four sisters, one brother and an extended family.
Montgomery County Coroner Allan Pratt and Montgomery County Sheriff Jeff Tompkins were not available for comment.
Follow the Mississippi Free Press’ coverage of Curtis Flowers and read past stories here.
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