MANNING
By Jeff Amy
Associated Press
JACKSON – Lawyers for a Mississippi death row inmate say he deserves a new trial because evidence uncovered later shows that a key state witness lied.
Willie Jerome Manning is appealing an Oktibbeha County judge’s denial of his post-conviction challenges.
The Mississippi Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case Monday in Jackson, with lawyers saying that either the state concealed evidence or Manning’s original lawyers were too ineffective to find it.
The state says documents don’t conclusively show the witness lied and says there’s no proof prosecutors hid them.
In 1996, Manning was convicted and sentenced to death in the 1993 slayings of 90-year-old Emmoline Jimmerson and her daughter, 60-year-old Alberta Jordan, during a robbery attempt at their Starkville apartment. The women were beaten and their throats were slashed.