Jackson Jambalaya

I think we would need to know the existing complement of a county court judge's staff before we could evaluate this request.

It is not exactly odd for judges to have assistants.

With Kenny looking to take a pay cut he obviously needs some supplemental income.

County court judges and their staffs are paid through the State of Mississippi, under a context overseen by the Administrative Office of Courts that is governed under the auspices of the Mississippi Supreme Court. The AOC administers judicial salaries through a budget provided to each court. The judges operate within the framework of that budget. In addition to state funding, county court systems are given the freedom to approach their county governments for additional funding for staffs. Most counties provide supplemental salary support by paying the difference after AOC funding is exhausted. I have to assume that Patton was putting the HCBOS on notice that AOC had approved the staff salary increases for FY15 for those staff identified in his letter and that, at some point, when his budget for FY15 is exhausted, the HCBOS will be paying the difference. I also assume that the HCBOS has been operating in this fashion vis-à-vis the Hinds County Court for some time.

I see that the next Sr. Judge (Skinner) did not sign on with Priester on this matter. Since these persons are employed at the "Will and Pleasure" of the Judges, will these persons find themselves unemployed when the term begins in January?

This is the definition of a non-story.

If ever there were a case of a county judge needing a legal assistant, I believe this is it!!!

Kenny can handle this job and the City Council seat too!

Oh P-L-E-A-S-E get that woman an assistant. P-L-E-A-S-E!

She needs help keeping up with those hats!

Is she going to try to wear those ridiculous hats in court?

Wheel has several of these. His predasesor had none.

I am going to go out on a limb and guess she needs a stand in given her attendance at city council meetings.

Judgement by proxy.

We are in troubled times.

You could add 25k to Paula's salary and she'd still be underpaid. To find a polite, COMPETENT, Hinds county employee is rare.

Another HUGE embarrassment for this part of Mississippi.

Being that Judge Skinner is presiding County Court Judge at the Youth Court and has his own Court Administrators why would he have to sign an order promoting and hiring court staff for other Judges? Did he have approval from the other judges to hire his staff? Judge Skinner will become Senior County Court Judge January 1, 2015. If he chooses to return to the County Court to preside over the civil or criminal docket he has the option to bring his own CA. And I am sure he will do that. If that happens then one of the other CA will go to youth court. And why does an article about Judge Stokes wanting to hire a judicial assistant have to become the talk of an order that Judge Patton and Judge Priester signed promoting and hiring staff? I can say that the ladies in county court really do a great job and assistant anybody that comes into that courthouse

What's disconcerting and bias about this article is that it fails to mention promotions and salary increases given to support staff by OTHER judges at VARIOUS times via COURT ORDER. I guess it's not important to the provide the reader with all the information to form an opinion - likely because the reader will not agree with blog.

As for Judge Stokes request, let the board decide what is or is not necessary. Why? Because obviously the facts received from "BLOWfish" are not reliable.

What's disconcerting is that she is a Judge.

We live in bizarro world.

She's an embarrassment. I'm not an attorney. However, I'm amazed that we allow non-attorneys to serve as judges in our state. What legal/justice system education does this woman have?!?!? I'm embarrassed for our state & for Hinds county. She's no more prepared to be any type of judge as I'm no more prepared to be a plumber. The difference is I'm smart enough to know I'm not a plumber. She, on the other hand, hasn't a clue. As was previously stated, we live in troubled times.

Cooper-Stokes has had a license since 1985. I've never heard of her having actually practiced law. Until you've practiced law a number of years, you really don't know anything about the practice of law.