Jackson Free Press

On Feb. 14, Joyce Jackson finished with enough votes in the Ward 3 special election to get her name on the ballot with frontrunner LaRita Cooper-Stokes for a Feb. 28 runoff election.

Cooper-Stokes, wife of former Ward 3 Councilman and Hinds County Supervisor Kenneth Stokes, defeated Joyce Jackson by 156 votes at the runoff to become the new Ward 3 councilwoman. Now, it appears Jackson will get a third chance to beat Cooper-Stokes at the polls.

Friday, a jury unanimously found in favor of Jackson Friday at the end of a five-day hearing in Hinds County Court. Jackson claimed that illegal voting irregularities were rampant during the runoff election. Pending an appeal by Cooper-Stokes, the election results will be thrown out, and there will be another runoff election between the two contenders, likely later this month.

Jackson said Friday that the hearing wasn't really about her getting elected, it was about ending voting problems that she alleges have gone on for years.

"The people who were here, they've seen the same kind of irregularities throughout these years," Jackson said. "It has happened within the last 20 years. No one would have had a fair chance to ever be elected if we had let this go on. So it has to stop, and I am the person to stop it. It has to be exposed. (The people) had to know the truth."

Witnesses, including three of Jackson's sisters and several of her supporters, claimed they saw people campaigning inside the 150-feet vicinity of the polling place, heard a radio playing Cooper-Stokes' campaign ads inside one precinct, saw a Cooper-Stokes campaign worker pass money to a potential voter and even heard a poll manager, Linda Anderson, call Jackson a "half-white n*gger."

"I never thought, in all my days, that I would have anyone call me (that) or say names like that about me," Jackson said on the witness stand.

Reeves said that under the law, Jackson City Clerk Brenda Pree will put a resolution for a new election on the city council agenda for Tuesday, June 12. At that time, the Council will select a date between 20 and 30 days in the future for the new election.

After a special election, a run-off election and a five-day hearing, voters can tout the election as Jackson vs. Cooper-Stokes, Round Four.

Jackson is a retired school teacher and works part-time at Collins Funeral Home on Northside Drive. While teaching, Jackson earned honors including JPS teacher of the year and Outstanding Teacher in America in 1972.