Kay B. Cobb

This case involves a dispute over the amount of child support awarded to Susan Southerland for her minor daughter following her divorce from Craig Southerland. The Panola County Chancery Court ordered Craig to pay $1,000 per month in child support, exceeding the statutory guideline of 14% of his adjusted gross income, and the Mississippi Supreme Court affirmed this decision. On remand from a prior appeal, the chancery court made specific findings that the guideline amount would be unjust and inappropriate, citing factors such as the daughter's private school expenses, the parties' income disparity, and Craig's actions leading to the divorce. The court further held that it was not required to recalculate support based on post-remand income, as the remand did not call for a new trial on the issue.

family law

This case involved Shasco Wholesale Supply suing Nash Plumbing, Inc., Milton Nash, A.C.T. Services, Inc., and related parties to recover payment for plumbing supplies sold on credit but never paid for. Following a bench trial, the circuit court entered judgment against Nash, Nash Plumbing, and affiliated entities, but the Mississippi Supreme Court reversed in part, holding that Milton Nash individually and Nash Services Group could not be held liable. The court affirmed liability against Nash Plumbing and additionally held A.C.T. Services jointly and severally liable with Nash Plumbing based on equitable estoppel, given the evidence of management agreements, asset transfers, and control of operations among the corporate entities without a formal acquisition or proper defense by A.C.T.

business & regulatory

The case involved Reginald Johnson, convicted of deliberate design murder and sentenced to life in prison, who appealed on grounds that the State had used its peremptory strikes to remove black jurors in violation of Batson v. Kentucky. After an earlier remand, the trial court conducted a Batson hearing and found the State's race-neutral reasons for each strike to be non-pretextual with no purposeful discrimination. On review, the Mississippi Supreme Court affirmed the conviction, holding that the trial court's findings were supported by the record and that Johnson had not met his burden to show discriminatory purpose in the jury selection process. The Court applied deference to the trial court's credibility-based determinations under Batson and Hatten v. State.

criminal lawcivil rights

The case concerned Howard Monteville Neal, who was convicted and sentenced to death in 1982 for the kidnapping and murder of his half-niece and another girl, and who later filed a successive petition for post-conviction relief asserting that his execution would violate the Eighth Amendment due to mental retardation. Relying on the intervening U.S. Supreme Court decision in Atkins v. Virginia, Neal sought to vacate his death sentence and argued that any hearing on mental retardation should be before a jury under Ring v. Arizona. The Mississippi Supreme Court granted Neal leave to present his mental retardation claim to the trial court for determination by a preponderance of the evidence under the procedures set forth in Atkins and Chase v. State, allowing both sides to introduce evidence, but denied the jury-trial request and all other claims.

criminal lawprocedurecivil rights

In Carr v. State, Anthony Carr, who was convicted in 1990 of four counts of capital murder and sentenced to death for the killings of the Parker family, filed an application for post-conviction relief asserting claims of prosecutorial misconduct, ineffective assistance of counsel, and entitlement to resentencing under Atkins v. Virginia due to mental retardation. The Mississippi Supreme Court reviewed the application and found the claims of prosecutorial misconduct and ineffective assistance of counsel to lack merit based on prior rulings and the absence of reversible error. However, the court granted Carr leave to seek relief in the trial court on the Atkins claim, allowing an evidentiary hearing on his mental status in accordance with Atkins and Chase v. State. The decision was limited to permitting further proceedings only on the mental retardation issue while denying all other requested relief.

criminal law

The case involved Frederick E. Schuck's conviction for the deliberate design murder of Byron Beasley, for which he received a life sentence after a jury trial in George County. Schuck appealed on multiple grounds, including challenges to the sufficiency of the evidence, jury instructions, the prosecution's comments on expert testimony during closing arguments, and a pro se claim of ineffective assistance of trial counsel. The Mississippi Supreme Court affirmed the conviction and sentence, concluding that the evidence supported the verdict, no individual or cumulative errors occurred that denied a fair trial, and Schuck did not demonstrate deficient performance or prejudice by counsel under the Strickland standard.

criminal lawprocedure