The gravel road separating Academy Crossing Apartments and the property along Louisville Street owned by Dr. Charles Scarborough is 12 feet wide and, at one time, is believed to have gone all the way to Louisville.
These days, it”s in the middle of a five-year-old property dispute between Scarborough and Academy Crossing owner Mildred Rollins.
The Mississippi Court of Appeals convened Thursday at Mississippi State University and heard oral arguments in the civil case between Scarborough and Rollins, although the judges didn”t make a ruling. The group will go back to Jackson and study all transcripts, records, briefs and evidence in the case before making a decision.
Scarborough is appealing an Aug. 28, 2008, ruling from Oktibbeha County Chancery Court in favor of Rollins, which ordered Scarborough to pay $7,500 in punitive damages, $7,500 in Rollins” attorneys” fees and $2,150 for culverts. Rollins had culverts installed along the road, but Scarborough believed the road was on his property and removed the culverts. He never returned the culverts to Rollins.
The properties have been surveyed several times and each time resulted in different boundary lines, said Starkville attorney Dolton McAlpin, who represented Scarborough.
“The culverts were located on land (Scarborough) thought he owned,” McAlpin said.
Scarborough was arrested for tearing up the culverts and later indicted by a grand jury for grand larceny. The case is still pending, McAlpin said.
Attorney Charles Bruce Brown, also of Starkville, represented Rollins and said Scarborough didn”t even have his land surveyed until after he was arrested for the culvert incident.
“You can”t rely on ”The surveyor told me that was my land” because the surveyor hadn”t even been out there yet,” Brown said.
Scarborough even tried to extort money from Rollins, Brown said, by telling her she had to pay $200 a year to use the road or he would tear up the culverts. When she failed to pay by Nov. 5, 2005, Scarborough followed through with his promise and police were called.
Chancery Court ultimately ruled the property line was located in the center of the road, with Rollins owning the six feet on the north side of the road and Scarborough owning the six feet on the south side. Scarborough believed he owned the road and a narrow stretch just north of the road.
It was unclear how long the Court of Appeals will take to reach a decision.
Manslaughter appeal
The second case heard Thursday at Mississippi State involved a Hazelhurst man appealing a 20-year prison sentence for manslaughter.
Brian Keith Martin, a paraplegic confined to a wheelchair since birth, was convicted of manslaughter in Copiah County Circuit Court in July 2008 for the death of John Welch. According to testimony, Welch was dating Martin”s mother in March 2008 when Martin stabbed him to death in the home the three shared.
Martin”s defense team claimed their client acted in self defense, saying Welch came back to the house after a night of drinking and attacked Martin. Testimony in Martin”s initial trial showed contradicting evidence, however, as Welch had wounds consistent with defensive posturing on his hands. The testimony of Martin”s mother also complicated the case as she gave three different accounts of what happened that night.
At the Court of Appeals hearing Thursday, third-year University of Mississippi law school students Douglas Mains, of Michigan, and Kiger Sigh, of Vicksburg, represented Martin as part of an annual Department of Justice initiative at Ole Miss which allows third-year law students to appeal cases.
Mains and Sigh argued Martin had inadequate legal counsel during his trial in Copiah County Circuit Court, and that the case shouldn”t even have gone in front of a jury because there wasn”t enough sufficient evidence. The pair argued Welch attacked Martin in a 36-inch-wide hallway and Martin wasn”t able to turn around and flee, so he was forced to defend himself.
The Court of Appeals judges will take Martin”s case back to Jackson, as well, to consider transcripts, records, briefs and other evidence before making a decision.
Each year the Court of Appeals convenes three or four times at universities around the state to give the public a glimpse into the inner workings of the court system.
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