Live updates: Columbus jury now deliberating in suspended DA’s misconduct trial
It’s the fourth day of trial and third day of witness testimony in the misconduct case against suspended Columbus District Attorney Mark Jones.
Jones faces nine felony charges alleging he tried to influence witnesses, to persuade a detective to commit perjury, and to bribe staff prosecutors. Selected Monday, a jury of nine women and five men, two of them alternates, will decide Jones’ fate.
Testimony began Tuesday with four witnesses for the prosecution. Several more took the witness stand Wednesday, including Jones’ former attorney Chris Breault, whom Judge Katherine Lumsden held in contempt for disobeying her orders. Breault was arrested and taken to the Muscogee County Jail around 4:30 p.m.
Here are live updates from the courtroom:
Live updates
6:04 p.m. After getting a note from the jury, Lumsden announced that the jurors want to go home for the night and return in the morning, when they again want to see the July 16 police body-camera footage of Jones arguing with a homicide detective about a fatal shooting. Lumsden told them to return at 9:30 a.m. Friday.
4:45 p.m. Judge Lumsden just sent jurors to the jury room to begin their deliberations, after a restroom break.
4:11 p.m.: Fowler delved into testimony from Jeff Carter, an investigator in the DA’s office, who said Mark Jones wanted him to give false testimony to a grand jury to get a witness in a fatal shooting charged with murder, just to get the witness in custody to secure his testimony.
“You stand up and do what’s right, even if it’s hard.... That’s what being a prosecutor is all about,” Fowler told jurors, reiterating, “Justice is for everyone.”
Fowler concluded his closing argument at 4:16 p.m., and Judge Lumsden immediately began instructing jurors on the laws by which they will weigh the evidence in their deliberations.
3:52 p.m.: Fowler told jurors that Jones’ defense is that his conduct was legal. He cannot claim he was ignorant of the law, because he’s a district attorney, the prosecutor said.
Jones’ actions show his self-interest was paramount, Fowler said: “For Mark Jones, it’s not about justice. It’s all about him.”
“Prosecutors must be above-board,” Fowler said later. “Otherwise, bad things happen.”
3:40 p.m.: Deputy Attorney General John Fowler is starting his closing argument. “Justice is for everyone,” he said, and Mark Jones failed to ensure justice for everyone in his pursuit of convictions in court.
He noted that Jones did not call the nephew of a homicide victim about his uncle’s case until the nephew filed a motion complaining about how the case was being handled, and he never called the nephew again, once the motion was withdrawn. It’s clear from their recorded telephone conversation that Jones was pressuring the nephew to withdraw the motion, Fowler said.
3:10 p.m.: Wright said Jones was not trying to influence a witness when he called the nephew of a homicide victim to discuss a victims rights motion the nephew filed. Jones was just trying to deal with a personnel issue that led to the nephew’s complaint, and he never told the nephew to withdraw the motion.
Wright said that because the nephew was not in the victim’s immediate family, he was not among the relatives covered by Georgia’s Crime Victims Bill of Rights, and had no standing to file a motion based on that law.
Jones’ conduct may be unprofessional, but it is not criminal, she said, and it does not justify removing a duly elected district attorney from office, after the people voted him in.
“If the facts don’t fit, you must acquit Mr. Jones,” she said, repeating a theme from her opening statement on Tuesday.
3:05 p.m. Of Jones’ bribery charges stemming from his offering two staff prosecutors $1,000 bonuses for murder convictions, Wright said Jones was new to the job, having never worked as a prosecutor before he took office in January, and had a different understanding of how prosecutors may be compensated for their work. She implied that one witness Jones offered a bonus, acting District Attorney Sheneka Terry, had a motive to want Jones out of office, because she would be in charge.
2:50 p.m.: Wright compared Jones’ case to the Bible story of David and Goliath, saying the prosecution is the Goliath, and with its “great power,” it must prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt. Jones did not have to prove his innocence, so he did not have to call witnesses, she said.
Referring to Jones’ berating a homicide detective in regard to a fatal shooting police found to be accidental, Wright told jurors that what they heard on police body camera recordings was not an attempt to get the officer to lie under oath, but simply an argument between two people outside a bar. She noted the homicide case had been presented to a grand jury and indicted for involuntary manslaughter two days before the confrontation. “Mr. Jones didn’t do anything besides have a conversation,” Wright said, later adding, “All this was just a disagreement.”
She referred to Jones’ remarks that night as “drunk talk,” but said it did not rise to the level of trying to make an officer commit perjury. Jones as district attorney had the power to decide what charges were appropriate in a homicide case, but the officer he spoke to was only one of several witnesses in the case, she said.
2:37 p.m.: The jury has just returned to the courtroom after a lunch break, during which attorneys worked out the instructions on the law that Judge Lumsden will give jurors when closing arguments end. Defense attorney Katonga Wright will make her closing argument first. Prosecutor John Fowler will save his closing for last.
12:19 p.m.: Jones’ former attorney Chris Breault, whom Lumsden held in contempt of court Wednesday, was just released on bond from the Muscogee County Jail, according to jail records.
11 a.m.: Fowler countered that Wright has misrepresented the law and the evidence, which Lumsden must consider “in a light most favorable” to the prosecution. He asked that Wright’s motion be denied, and Lumsden agreed, saying the case will go to the jury.
10:50 a.m.: Judge Lumsden brought the jurors in so they could hear Fowler announce he has no more witnesses. On Jones’ behalf, Katonga Wright said the defense will call no witnesses, and Jones will not testify. “Mr. Jones does not have to prove he’s innocent, so we’ll let the evidence speak for itself,” Wright said.
Lumsden told the jurors that they are free until 1:30 p.m., and then they’ll hear closing arguments. She will have to instruct them on the law before they begin deliberating, but she said that could begin this afternoon.
Wright asked the judge for a directed verdict of not guilty, arguing the evidence is insufficient to sustain the charges against Jones. A “directed verdict” means the judge decides the case without the jury.
Wright said the case is a “concerted effort” to get Jones kicked out of office.
10:30 a.m.: With the jury out of the room, Jones told Lumsden he will not testify in his own defense.
10:25 a.m.: Because Powers was a sequestered witness, she did not hear Chris Bailey testify about his phone call with Mark Jones, but she did hear the entire recording. Wright said Bailey’s testimony provided relevant evidence beyond what was on the recording. Wright also has questioned Powers’ motive in testifying for Fowler, with whom she used to work.
Powers’ testimony is over. Judge Lumsden ordered a brief break so jurors can use the restroom.
Fowler said Powers was his last witness. Wright said the defense will not call witnesses, and Jones will decide whether he will testify.
9:50 a.m.: Powers said that in her expert opinion, Jones’ offering a bonus for murder convictions violates his oath of office, and he also is not allowed to tell a police officer to lie in a homicide case, or to pressure a victim’s family to withdraw a motion.
Jones’ attorney Katonga Wright is cross-examining Powers, eliciting testimony that Powers and prosecutor John Fowler once worked together in the Clayton County district attorney’s office. Powers said she was Fowler’s supervisor at the time.
Wright noted that Chris Bailey testified Jones never told him directly to withdraw his motion complaining about how the DA’s staff was handling his uncle’s homicide case.
9:30 a.m.: Powers told Fowler that Jones had no authority to tell the nephew of a homicide victim to withdraw a victims rights motion that complained the victim’s family was not notified when a suspect’s bond was reduced and he was released from jail. She said she reviewed a 30-minute recording of a phone call between Jones and the nephew, Chris Bailey, and believes that Jones threatened Bailey on the call.
Powers testified also that it was illegal for Jones to offer staff attorneys a $1,000 bonus for convictions in murder cases. Jones is charged with bribery for promising such incentives to Sheneka Terry, currently the acting district attorney, and to Kimberly Schwartz, an assistant district attorney.
9:20 a.m.: Fowler has called to the stand Katie Powers, a professor of law at Mercer University and one of 20 Georgia “special masters” appointed to handle bar complaints against lawyers. She is an expert in “prosecutorial ethics,” Fowler said.
Powers said she reviewed the evidence against Jones, including a police body camera video of Jones’ haranguing a homicide detective over his finding a fatal shooting to be accidental. She told Fowler prosecutors are not allowed to tell an officer to lie under oath.
9:10 a.m.: Lumsden said she will give Breault a $5,000 bond to allow his release from jail, and he will not be allowed back in the courtroom. “I’ll make sure he won’t be back in this courtroom until this trial is over,” Adams told her.
Lumsden said Breault will be allowed in the Columbus Government Center only if he has other work to do here that is unrelated to Jones’ case.
8:59 a.m.: Bentley Adams, an attorney who long served with the public defender’s office here, has appeared on Breault’s behalf. Judge Lumsden is speaking with him now. Adams said Breault remained jailed Thursday.
Adams wants to file court motions for Breault, but the Muscogee Superior Court clerk’s office is closed for the Veterans Day holiday, so no one is there to accept Adams’ filings.
Adams handed copies of his documents to the prosecutor, Deputy Attorney General John Fowler, but Fowler said he is not a party to Breault’s contempt of court case and has no role in it.
This story was originally published November 11, 2021 at 9:01 AM.