By Billy Davis

Second-place District Two supervisor candidate William Pride failed to prove Panola County should hold a new election due to voting irregularities, a circuit judge ruled late Monday.

The ruling by Judge Charles Webster means Vernice Avant will remain the winner of the August 23 Democratic runoff.

Webster’s ruling came at 4:45 Monday evening at the county courthouse in Batesville, where an all-day trial proceeded in a crowded county boardroom.

The judge made his ruling with the five-member Panola County Election Commission seated as a tribunal per state election laws.

Pride had sued Avant and the Panola County Election Commission after it denied his request to hold a new election or name him the winner of the runoff.

Ruling at the end of the day, Webster agreed that the election commission had failed to give five day’s notice to Pride that it was meeting to review his petition.

“That was substantiated,” Webster said.

But the judge ruled that Pride’s attorney, Steven Pittman, had failed to show evidence that disputed absentee ballots would have overturned the outcome of the election.

The judge also ruled that Pride’s poll watchers in Crenshaw had a “suitable location” to observe voting — a complaint that gobbled up much of the courtroom testimony.

Webster ruled against Avant’s attorney, Willie Griffin, who had sought a motion to dismiss the case.

The judge also ruled against Pittman’s attempt to  question Avant over documents declaring her a “sovereign citizen” last spring.

State law allows only 10 days to challenge a candidate’s qualification, Webster pointed out.

“That ruling took the wind out of our sails,” Pittman conceded after the trial.

Rufus Manley represented the Democratic Executive Committee, which did not obtain an attorney for the trial.

Manley questioned witnesses during the trial.