Johnny L. Jones was the former Miami-Dade Schools

Miami-Dade County Public Schools

Miami-Dade County Public Schools is a public school district serving Miami-Dade County, Florida. Founded in 1885, it is the largest school district in Florida and the Southeastern United States, and the fourth largest in the United States, with a student enrollment of 380,006 as of July 5, 2010...

 superintendent

Superintendent (education)

In education in the United States, a superintendent is an individual who has executive oversight and administration rights, usually within an educational entity or organization....

 between 1977 and 1979, who was the first black person to hold the post in Miami-Dade.

He was convicted on grand theft

Grand theft

Grand theft or grand larceny is a category used to rank the severity of crime associated with theft.Generally, in the United States it is defined as intentional taking property of others in an amount exceeding the state statutory amount....

 charges linked to gold-plated plumbing on March 1980. His conviction was overturned because his jury had been all white, and on July 3, 1986 the state attorney, Janet Reno

Janet Reno

Janet Wood Reno is a former Attorney General of the United States . She was nominated by President Bill Clinton on February 11, 1993, and confirmed on March 11...

, announced that Jones would not be retried. But in a separate case, he was convicted on misdemeanor charges of soliciting perjury

Perjury

Perjury, also known as forswearing, is the willful act of swearing a false oath or affirmation to tell the truth, whether spoken or in writing, concerning matters material to a judicial proceeding. That is, the witness falsely promises to tell the truth about matters which affect the outcome of the...

 and witness tampering

Witness tampering

Witness tampering is harming or otherwise threatening a witness, hoping to influence his or her testimony.-Witness tampering in the USA:In the United States, the crime of witness tampering in federal cases is defined by statute at , "Tampering with a witness, victim, or an informant"...

 and received a two year jail sentence. Many believed Jones was targeted because he was an African American

African American

African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...

 man in power.

In Miami, Florida

Miami, Florida

Miami is a city located on the Atlantic coast in southeastern Florida and the county seat of Miami-Dade County, the most populous county in Florida and the eighth-most populous county in the United States with a population of 2,500,625...

, on September 2, 1984, Jones, was again in the news as he accidentally crashed his car into a house killing a six year old boy. Jones was acquitted of careless driving charges.