In his Point of View, Local 24 News political commentator and analyst Otis Sanford discusses the recent passing of two important public figures in Memphis.
Updated: 12:44 PM CDT April 16, 2021
MEMPHIS, Tenn. Former Tennessee lawmaker Roscoe Dixon has died. He was 71-years-old.
Javier Bailey and Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland both announced Dixon s passing Friday on social media.
Sorry to hear that former state Senator Roscoe Dixon has passed. He was always gracious and encouraging to me, including two years ago when I knocked on his door campaigning. He invited us in for 30 minutes of reminiscing a great memory today. pic.twitter.com/eoJKHglvQt Mayor Jim Strickland (@MayorMemphis) April 16, 2021
Dixon served in the Tennessee Senate from 1994 to 2005. In 2010 he was elected to the Tennessee House of Representatives, where he served until 2017.
Roscoe Dixon, a Memphis Democrat who was prominent in state politics for more than a decade before his 2006 conviction in an FBI corruption sting, and who later advocated for restoration of voting rights, died at a local hospital Thursday. He was 71.
Dixon s sister confirmed his death, which was attributed to a lengthy, undisclosed illness.
Former mayor of Shelby County and then Memphis, A C Wharton, who had been friends with Dixon since 1973 and who had hired him at the county after Dixon resigned his state senate seat in 2005, said he personified public service. And it was Dixon who borrowed a pickup truck to help the Whartons move to Memphis in 1973, Wharton said.