Benton County, Mississippi

• White (non-Hispanic) 4,584 60.4%
• Hispanic or Latino (any race) 183 2.4%
• Black or African American (non-Hispanic) 2,615 34.5%
• Asian (non-Hispanic) 25 0.3%
• Two or more races (non-Hispanic) 169 2.2%
• American Indian / Alaska Native (non-Hispanic) 7 0.1%
• Native Hawaiian / Pacific Islander (non-Hispanic) 0 0.0%
• Some other race (non-Hispanic) 6 0.1%

• Under 18 1,598 21.1%
• 18–24 533 7.0%
• 25–44 1,690 22.3%
• 45–64 2,175 28.7%
• 65 and over 1,593 21.0%

Median household income

$49,106

90% interval $43,754–$54,458

−$10,195 vs MS · 53rd of 82

Below poverty line

19.9%

90% interval 15.1%–24.7%

+2.1 pp vs MS · 40th of 82

Unemployment (12-mo)

4.0%

+0.32 pp vs. state

County GDP

$399.6M

0.25% of state

Avg. annual pay

$48,207

Establishments

94

• Education & health services 415 39.0%
• Manufacturing 193 18.1%
• Trade, transportation & utilities 167 15.7%
• Public administration 152 14.3%
• Professional & business services 51 4.8%
• Other services 28 2.6%
• Information 4 0.4%

The sectors listed cover 94.8% of covered employment; BLS withholds the rest to avoid disclosing individual employers.

Home ownership

86.0%

+16.0 pp vs MS · 2nd of 82

Median gross rent

$731

−$223 vs MS · 54th of 82

Owner-occupied

2,643

Renter-occupied

431

• Concentrated

  Top three sectors employ 73% of the county workforce. Most panelists likely share employer relationships within these sectors, surface those connections early in voir dire before any institutional-defendant or sector-specific framing.

• Wide wage spread

  Highest-paid sector (Professional & business services, $87,478/yr) pays 4.7× the lowest (Information, $18,749/yr). Stark intra-economy class divisions on the panel; calibrate damages and lost-wages framing to that range.

• Mixed business scale

  Average establishment employs 11 workers, a mix of institutional employers and small businesses. Both employed-by-large-institution and small-business-owner perspectives are likely on the panel.

• Republican 2,535 65.3%
• Democratic 1,318 34.0%
• Other / third-party 27 0.7%

• Spanish 153 2.1%
• German or other West Germanic 11 0.2%
• Tagalog 4 0.1%
• French, Haitian, or Cajun 3 0.0%

Households

3,074

Family households

2,019

65.7% of households

Married couples w/ children

411

20.4% of families

Single-mother families

188

9.3% of families

Veterans

289

4.8% of civilians 18+

• Evangelical Protestant 4,875 63.8%
• Black Protestant 552 7.2%
• Mainline Protestant 261 3.4%

Health insured

90.9%

±2.3 pp

Uninsured

9.1%

±2.3 pp

71st of 82

With a disability

26.3%

±3.5 pp

7th of 82

Bachelor's or higher

12.8%

±2.7 pp

−12.3 pp vs MS · 72nd of 82

Uninsured, under 65 (2024)

12.1%

90% interval 10.6%–13.6% · Census SAHIE

The under-65 uninsured rate is not comparable to the ACS insurance figures, which cover all ages.

Trial court

3rd Circuit Court District

Judges

3 (Circuit Court judges per district (general civil + felony criminal jurisdiction); Chancery Court judges (equity matters, separate 20 Chancery Court Districts) and limited-jurisdiction County Court judges are not counted here. Vintage 2026 courts.ms.gov; statutory judgeship allocations are set district-by-district in Miss. Code § 9-7-3 et seq. Counts for the smallest rural districts (22nd, 23rd) are approximate and may reflect single-judgeship statutory allocations.)

Court seats

Ashland, Holly Springs, Houston, Okolona, New Albany, Oxford, Pittsboro, Ripley

This judicial district spans multiple counties.

Traffic fatalities

6

100.15 per 100k adults (18+)

Fatal crashes

6