Cayson v. State

Jerry A. Cayson was convicted in the Montgomery Circuit Court of trafficking in cocaine and was sentenced as a habitual felony offender to life in prison without parole. Cayson filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in the Escambia Circuit Court, claiming: 1) that the trial court did not have jurisdiction over him because the statute under which he was sentenced was enacted pursuant to the Alabama Constitution of 1901, which according to Cayson, is unconstitutional because, he says, it was enacted to disenfranchise African Americans; 2) that the indictment charging him with the offense…