JACKSON, Miss. (AP) – A judge ordered the execution of a judicial agreement between Mississippi’s capital and the family of a man who died after police officers pulled him from a car while searching for a murder suspect.
George Robinson, 62, died in January 2019, days after the encounter with three Jackson police officers. His relatives sued the city in October 2019, saying Robinson was not the subject of any warrant and alleging that the officers “brutally, cruelly and mercilessly beat Mr. Robinson, hitting and kicking him.”
The Jackson City Council unanimously approved April 23 to pay $17,786 to settle the lawsuit with Robinson’s relatives, including his sister Bettersten Wade. City documents say the settlement was not an admission of liability by the city or the three officers named in the lawsuit. Robinson was black, as were the three officers.
But Wade’s attorney, Dennis Sweet III, released a letter April 24 saying the city violated a confidentiality agreement that was part of the settlement. Sweet said that because of the public disclosure and because the city “appears to be claiming or inferring some kind of perceived victory,” Wade would continue to sue the city.
In a ruling Friday, Judge Faye Peterson wrote that she found “no merit” in the arguments presented by Sweet. Peterson wrote that the plaintiffs and the city had entered into a legally binding agreement.
“Further, the City of Jackson cannot legally choose to maintain the confidentiality of the agreements, and this fact does not amount to some abstract form of fraudulent misrepresentation,” Peterson wrote.
Robinson had been hospitalized for a stroke days before the police encounter and was taking medication, Wade said. He had a seizure hours after being beaten and died two days later from bleeding on the brain.
Second-degree murder charges against two of the officers were dropped in the case. In August 2022, a Hinds County jury convicted former detective Anthony Fox of negligent homicide. In January of this year, the Mississippi Court of Appeals overturned Fox’s conviction. The appeals court majority wrote that prosecutors failed to prove that Fox “acted grossly negligent” or that Robinson’s death “was reasonably foreseeable under the circumstances.”
Wade is the mother of Dexter Wadewho was run over by an off-duty Jackson Police Department officer in March 2023.
Dexter Wade was buried in the Hinds County Pauper’s Cemetery. But it was in October that his mother was informed about the burial. From him body was exhumed November 13, and an independent autopsy was performed. A wallet found in the pocket of his jeans contained his state identity card with his home address, credit card and health insurance card, said civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who represents Wade’s family.
On November 20, Dexter Wade’s family held a funeral for him, and he was buried in another cemetery.
