Donald Bell v. State of Mississippi, 202 So. 3d 1239

On Nov. 14, 2012, Donald Bell entered Southern Bancorp with a hood and a .22 revolver in his pocket; teller fled and police arrested him at the teller window. Bell later gave a written confession.
Bell conceded the conduct but asserted a lack-of-intent defense: side effects from post–liver-transplant antirejection medication caused intermittent altered mental states; he testified he did not remember the incident.
At trial Bell was the sole defense witness and the jury initially reported a 9–3 split.
The trial judge sent the jury back to deliberate and added a comment urging them not to be “stubborn,” to take their “seriousness of purpose,” and that they came to “do a job.”
Defense counsel moved for a mistrial after the comment; the motion was denied. The jury subsequently returned a unanimous guilty verdict for attempted armed robbery and Bell was sentenced to five years.
On appeal Bell raised (1) that the judge’s comments to a deadlocked jury were coercive and (2) ineffective assistance for failing to subpoena a treating physician; the Court reversed and remanded based on the jury-comment issue and deemed the ineffectiveness claim moot.

Issue	Bell's Argument	State's Argument	Held
Whether the trial judge s comments to a deadlocked jury were impermissibly coercive	The judge s admonition (e.g., don t be "stubborn," you came to "do a job") improperly pressured holdout jurors and coerced a verdict	The judge merely returned the jury to deliberate and the comments did not force a verdict	Reversed and remanded: comments deviated from permitted Sharplin/Edlin language and could be interpreted as coercive
Whether trial counsel rendered ineffective assistance by not calling Bell s treating physician	Counsel failed to investigate/subpoena the physician who could corroborate Bell s medical non‑intent defense	Ineffective assistance claims are generally for post‑conviction where record is incomplete; no affirmative record of counsel s deficiency	Moot as case reversed on other grounds; claim not decided on merits

Sharplin v. State, 330 So. 2d 591 (Miss. 1976) (sets permissible language for sending a deadlocked jury back and warns against coercive judicial comments)
Edlin v. State, 523 So. 2d 42 (Miss. 1988) (identifies two proper supplemental instructions for deadlocked juries and condemns other language)
Brantley v. State, 610 So. 2d 1139 (Miss. 1992) (reinforces Edlin/Sharplin procedure and treats departures as clear error)
Lafayette v. State, 90 So. 3d 1215 (Miss. 2012) (emphasizes trial judge s persuasive influence on jurors and need for caution)
Folk v. State, 576 So. 2d 1243 (Miss. 1991) (notes judge s position gives peculiar power to influence jurors)
Puckett v. State, 879 So. 2d 920 (Miss. 2004) (states Strickland standard for ineffective assistance claims)
Read v. State, 430 So. 2d 832 (Miss. 1983) (explains when ineffective-assistance claims may be decided on direct appeal)
Dartez v. State, 177 So. 3d 420 (Miss. 2015) (notes general appropriateness of post-conviction proceedings for ineffective-assistance claims)
Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (U.S. 1984) (two-prong constitutional standard for ineffective assistance of counsel)