4 days ago
He was 20 when he was sentenced to death. Now he hopes US Supreme Court will hear his case
A man on Mississippi's death row is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to take a look at his case while he continues seeking other federal relief.
Terry Pitchford, 39, was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death in 2006 for the death of a man in a Grenada County grocery store during an armed robbery in 2004.
In 2023, Terry Pitchford's conviction and death sentence were set aside and a new trial was ordered by a federal district court judge.
The state appealed and the conviction and sentence were reinstated after a ruling in favor of the state by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals.
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Now Pitchford is hoping the nation's highest court will review his case while he also continues to work on other aspects of the case in the Mississippi Northern District of U.S. District Court.
The state has until July 3 to file a brief opposing Pitchford's petition.
The Supreme Court may consider Pitchford's petition at the opening conference of the October term.
Pitchford is asking the Supreme Court to review his Batson claim, which refers to jury selection in which race, ethnicity or gender played a role in excluding potential jurors.
During jury selection at Pitchford's trial, then-District Attorney Doug Evans "used four of his allotted 12 peremptory strikes to remove four of the five Black venirepersons provisionally seated in the jury's empaneling," court records show.
Evans was accused of doing the same during the prosecution of Curtis Flowers, who stood trial six times for the murders of four people at a furniture store in Winona.
The U.S. Supreme Court in 2019 overturned Flowers' conviction for the last time, with Justice Brett Kavanaugh "citing a 'relentless, determined effort to rid the jury of Black individuals,'" according to an earlier story.
In Pitchford's case, during his appeal, the Mississippi Supreme Court said Pitchford should have raised objections at his initial trial if he wanted to contest the jury selection.
The court's decision in favor of the state was not unanimous. Two justices disagreed with the ruling, saying "the record showed that D.A. Evans used peremptory strikes in an intentionally racially discriminatory manner," according to court documents.
The federal court agreed with the dissenters and set aside Pitchford's conviction and ordered a new trial.
The federal appellate court looked at the case and determined the Mississippi Supreme Court did not err when it considered the Batson claim and reinstated Pitchford's conviction and sentence.
Now it will be up to the U.S. Supreme Court to weigh in, if it decides to review the case.
Lici Beveridge is a reporter for the Hattiesburg American and Clarion Ledger. Contact her at lbeveridge@ Follow her on X @licibev or Facebook at
This article originally appeared on Mississippi Clarion Ledger: Mississippi death row inmate asks SCOTUS for help
