Former Jackson city councilman Aaron Banks will spend nearly four years in prison for his role in a federal bribery scandal.
U.S. District Judge Daniel Jordan sentenced Banks on Thursday to 45 months behind bars and $15,000 in fines, along with three years of supervised release once he’s out of prison. The former council president was sentenced after former Hinds County district attorney Jody Owens was ordered to spend 41 months in prison and pay a $100,000 fine.
Court records revealed that in 2023 and 2024, Banks, Owens, and former Jackson mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba, among others, were involved in a bid-rigging scheme for a downtown Jackson convention center hotel project in exchange for bribes. The three men are said to have taken bribes from undercover FBI informants posing as Nashville business developers for favorable treatment in the bidding process while serving as elected officials.
Instead of Jackson getting a new hotel, however, federal authorities exposed a broader string of public corruption through bribes, private planes, strip clubs, and yachts, court records assert.
Banks did not seek reelection for his Ward 6 seat after his federal indictment. Now-councilwoman Lashia Brown-Thomas was elected to the post in June 2025 and has held the office since.
As for Lumumba, the former mayor is set to be sentenced on Nov. 20.
