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The Shelby County Sheriff’s Office called a Friday night press conference to announce the deaths of two inmates, bringing the weekly death toll at the Shelby County Jail to four. Darian Nolen, 33, died at Regional One Health after being transported from the jail just hours earlier because of an apparent “mental status change,” according to Sheriff Floyd Bonner. Darin Crawford, 57, was found unresponsive in his cell and was transported to Methodist University Hospital, where he was pronounced dead. Bonner said the deaths highlight the jail’s low-staffing problems, and Chief Jailer Kirk Fields said they highlight the need for a new jail. In outlining the next steps in planned renovations of FedExForum last week, Memphis Mayor Paul Young said the project could last through 2032. He told The Daily Memphian’s Samuel Hardiman that renovating the arena in phases will save taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars. Young also said the city hopes to move forward with a long-term lease with the Grizzlies this year. Fired Memphis-Shelby County Schools Superintendent Marie Feagins filed a lawsuit in Shelby County Circuit Court last week alleging the district’s board members violated the state open meetings law in their move to oust her. Feagins is seeking that the board’s vote to fire her be ruled null and void because board members violated the Tennessee Open Meetings Act to discuss it. Defendants in the suit are the nine elected school board members. Sherwood Brown spent decades at Parchman prison in Mississippi awaiting the execution team to take him to his death. His conviction in the murders of three women in DeSoto County was based on a shoe print similar to athletic shoes he wore and other questionable evidence. After years of appeals and requests for further advanced DNA testing, Brown was finally released from prison, a free man with lost time due to the testimony of a discredited forensic bite expert and the claims of an acquaintance that Brown confessed to the slayings — claims the accuser later recounted. Now, as The Daily Memphian’s Rob Moore reports, Sherwood Brown is trying to get his life back in order and waiting to see the result of his lawsuit against the State of Mississippi for the time he spent falsely imprisoned. — Metro editor Jane Donahoe and suburbs editor Clay Bailey
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The private school opened the third campus in an effort to diversify its student body. The Memphis campus could become a public school by the fall.
By Laura Testino
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