WLBT 3 - Jackson, MS: Melton Indicted on Civil Rights Charges

Melton Indicted on Civil Rights Charges

By Howard Ballou
howard@wlbt.net

The mayor of Mississippi's capital city is in trouble again, this time with the U.S. Department of Justice for alleged civil rights violations. Mayor Frank Melton and his two police bodyguards are named in the indictment for their role in the destruction of a Jackson home.

The indictment comes a year after the trio was acquitted of state charges in the same case. The three-count indictment against Melton, Michael Recio and Marcus Wright says they conspired to destroy a duplex on Ridgeway Street in August 2006. Melton called it a drug house.

Witnesses said the mayor and a group of young men riding in the Jackson police department Mobile Command Unit used sledgehammers to destroy the home. It was owned by Jennifer Sutton and occupied at the time by Evans Welch.

The indictment alleges Melton and the others did not have any lawful authority to destroy the home and its contents and in fact conspired to deprive the owner and occupant of their right to be free from unreasonable search and seizure under color of law.

Melton, Recio and Wright were acquitted of the charges in Hinds County court. If convicted of the federal charges, the three could get a maximum 10 years in prison.

There is also a federal charge of using a firearm during the commission of a crime of violence, and that charge carries a minimum prison term of five years.

Pictures taken by a cell phone show the scene the night the house on Ridgeway Street was demolished. The federal indictment also says the group returned for a second visit to the home later that evening.

City council members we talked to had mixed reactions. Margeret Barrett Simon sad it was a sad day for Jackson, and Frank Bluntson suggested the federal government was wasting money going after Melton.

Reached by telephone at his home, Melton declined to speak with us on camera. He said he is focused on issues important to the city such as economic development and street paving and teaching kids to swim at the Farish Street YMCA -- and not on his legal troubles.

"While this is somewhat of a distraction, I can assure you I'm not going to lose focus on those things that are in the best interest of the city," the mayor said. 

Civil rights attorneys from the Justice Department's civil rights division are prosecuting the case for the government. The case is being investigated by FBI special agents assigned to the Jackson division.

Jackson attorney Dale Danks, who represented Melton in the state case, tells WLBT he is not representing Melton at this point, but that could change.

The indictment is merely an accusation and the defendants are presumed innocent unless proven guilty.

Melton, Recio and Wright make their first court appearances next Wednesday afternoon.