The Mississippi Court of Appeals has upheld a lower court’s decision to deny providing discovery records to a man convicted in 2001 of cutting a woman with a knife.
Appellant Tommy Lee Page was indicted for aggravated assault in early 2001 by an Oktibbeha County grand jury for cutting Karen Hendrix with a knife. He was found guilty at trial of aggravated assault and sentenced as a habitual offender to life imprisonment, according to an appeals court opinion.
Hendrix at the time testified that she was lured by Page into the back room of a coin-operated laundromat. Page said he could show her how to operate the dryers without depositing any money. But after pulling her inside the room, Page approached Hendrix with a knife.
In an attempt to defend herself during the struggle, Hendrix grabbed the knife and screamed. Page fled the building through a rear door. Hendrix later identified Page in a police lineup.
More than two decades after his conviction, Page filed a motion pro se (without an attorney) for discovery in the Oktibbeha County Circuit Court invoking the discovery process, which allows convicted individuals access to certain documents and evidence from their case.
It was not clear what specific documents Page was requesting, but he cited a statute that allows for discovery in post-conviction relief cases, or those in which the convicted person can challenge their sentence.
“In the petition, he detailed how he had not been able to contact his trial lawyer, who he believed left the state, and that the circuit clerk’s office told him that they did not have the information he wanted but that it may be in the possession of the district attorney,” the appeals court opinion said. “As such, it appears Page was not requesting a transcript of his trial or a copy of the clerk’s papers but, rather, discovery that was available during his prosecution.”
Soon after Page filed the petition, the circuit court determined it did not have the jurisdiction to grant the motion because the discovery request was made independently and not as part of a post-conviction relief petition as state law requires.
In its opinion, the court of appeals cited multiple supreme court precedents that consistently ruled a discovery request must be tied to a properly filed PCR petition. Because Page filed his motion as a standalone discovery request outside of a PCR petition, the appeals court upheld the circuit court’s decision.
“A petitioner may not file a standalone discovery request related to a criminal conviction,” the opinion said. “Instead, it must be included alongside a PCR and conform to statute.”
McRae is a general assignment and education reporter for The Dispatch.
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