Contact: Sammy McDavid
STAR`KVILLE, Miss.--The head of the Mississippi Court of Appeals system is receiving the 30th annual Distinguished Jurist Award given at Mississippi State.
Chief Judge Leslie D. King will be honored March 27 by the university's Pre-Law Society. He will accept the award and speak on a topic of his choosing during an 11 a.m. public program in the John Grisham Room of Mitchell Memorial Library.
As part of the student organization's tradition to honor the careers of outstanding judicial practitioners, King will join a group of society members for a legal roundtable during the afternoon. The approximately one-hour discussion--also open to the public--will get under way at 2 p.m. in 160 Bowen Hall.
King, a Greenville native, has served on the appeals court since 1995. He was a presiding judge from 1999-2004, when he was appointed to fill the vacancy of chief judge. Earlier this year, he was appointed to a full four-year term in the position by state Supreme Court Chief Justice James W. Smith Jr.
Before coming to the bench, King represented Washington County from 1980-94 in the Mississippi House of Representatives. While a legislator, he served as vice chairman of the Ways and Means and Conservation and Water committees.
King is a graduate of the Greenville public school system who went on to complete a bachelor's degree in political science from the University of Mississippi. He was among the first class of African-Americans to begin and complete all of its undergraduate degree requirements at Ole Miss. After graduating in 1970, he enrolled in the Texas Southern University School of Law in Houston.
In 1973, King completed his law degree and was admitted to the Texas and Mississippi bar associations. He was in private practice in Greenville until 1994.
He was honored by Ole Miss in 1995 with its Award of Distinction.
In being selected for the MSU Pre-Law Society recognition, King joins the ranks of, among others, former U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Tom Clark, sitting Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, former U.S. attorneys general Griffin Bell, Edward Levi and William Webster, and numerous other federal and state judges.
The Distinguished Jurist Award is supported by the College of Arts and Sciences and Office of the President.
NEWS EDITORS/DIRECTORS: For additional information on the program, contact Pre-Law Society adviser Diane Wall at 662-325-7864 or dew1@ps.msstate.edu.
For more information about Mississippi State University, see http://www.msstate.edu/.