A special judge has been appointed to hear a civil suit filed last week over the results of the April 6 Democratic primary for Ward 4 Columbus City Council.
According to court filings, Patricia Ann Douglas filed the civil suit on May 6 in Lowndes County Circuit Court against her opponent, former councilman Marty Turner, in a bid to overturn Turner’s narrow victory.
Monday, Mississippi Supreme Court Chief Justice Michael Randolph appointed former Mississippi Court of Appeals Judge Larry E. Roberts of Meridian to hear the case.
As of Thursday, no date for the hearing before Roberts had been set.
“I haven’t been served, so that’s all I know at this point,” Turner said Thursday.
Turner was pronounced winner of the primary by a four-vote margin when the election was certified on April 16, but Douglas immediately announced her intentions to contest the outcome.
Douglas first contested the election with the Democratic Municipal Executive Committee through a letter written by her attorney, Spencer Ritchie of Jackson. In the letter, the Douglas campaign challenged the residency of eight voters and alleged that four others had cast improper absentee ballots. The letter asked that those voters be subpoenaed to determine who they voted for, have those votes deleted from that candidate’s total, then recalculate the results to determine the winner. As an alternative to that, the letter asked that the election be overturned and a new election held.
The committee discussed the letter at its April 19 meeting, but declined to act, saying in a letter to Douglas that it lacked the authority to provide the remedies she sought.
Douglas said she would file a civil suit to challenge the election results after the committee declined to act.
“I’m going to go to the fullest extent because I know where these people live, and they didn’t live at the address they listed,” Douglas said after being notified of the committee’s decision. “I don’t plan to stop because what happened isn’t right and everybody knows it.”
In the civil suit filed last week, the Douglas campaign raised the same arguments and asked for the same remedies as were listed in its complaint to the Democratic Municipal Executive Committee.
Turner said he wasn’t surprised by the suit.
“(Douglas) has every right to do that if she wants to,” he said. “But it’s like I’ve said all along: To me, this is nothing but a distraction. I’m not worried at all because I know the truth. So I’m not going to lose focus. What I’m concentrating on is the people of Ward 4 and what they need.”
The primary winner faces incumbent Pierre Beard, who is running as an independent, in the June 8 general election.
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
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