Flowers freed after six trials

Man served time in case of quadruple homicide

WINONA, Miss. – For the first time in more than 20 years, Curtis Flowers will be allowed to return home to his family.

Throughout a decades- long legal saga – as Flowers was tried six times for the same crime – he stayed behind bars, shuttling among the Mississippi State Penitentiary, also known as Parchman prison, and local jails.

On Monday, a judge granted him bond, allowing Flowers to leave jail to live with his family in Winona while his case makes its way through court. His bail was set at $ 250,000, and electronic monitoring of Flowers is required.

On Monday, the 49- year- old former death row inmate appeared before

Judge Joseph Loper for a bond hearing at the Montgomery County Courthouse, less than a mile from where four furniture store employees were shot in the head, execution- style, in summer 1996.

The quadruple homicide shocked Winona, a town of less than 6,000 people in central Mississippi, and has continued to make waves across the country as Flowers was tried six times for the murders – an unprecedented record in modern U. S. history, legal experts have said.

Two of Flowers’ trials ended in hung juries. He was found guilty of the crimes in four trials, but the convictions were each later overturned by higher courts.

This year, the U. S. Supreme Court overturned Flowers’ most recent conviction because justices found Fifth CircuitDistrict Attorney Doug Evans racially discriminated during jury selection.

At the hearing, Flowers’ attorney, Rob McDuff with the Mississippi Center for Justice, argued not only that Flowers deserves bond, but that the judge is legally required to grant it.

McDuff pointed to a state law that says anyone who’s been tried twice for a capital offense, and each trial has resulted in a failure of the jury to agree on the defendant’s guilt or innocence, shall be entitled to bail.

He also says information uncovered by investigative reporters with APM Reports’ podcast “In The Dark” – including statements by key witnesses admitting to lying and evidence pointing to alternate suspects – casts enough doubt on the case to require bail to be granted under the Mississippi Constitution.

McDuff argued that Flowers, who had no prior criminal record and was described as a model inmate by prison staff, does not pose a danger to the community and he won’t try to flee if bonded out.

Flowers could be tried for a seventh time for the quadruple homicide – it’s up to Evans, the district attorney, to decide. Flowers’ attorney has filed a mo-tion asking the judge to quash a potential seventh trial and to dismiss the charges against Flowers.

SARAH WARNOCK/ USA TODAY NETWORK Curtis Flowers, right, sits with his counsel, Henderson Hill, at a bond hearing at Montgomery County Courthouse on Monday.