Man dies at Mississippi voting precinct, wife returns to vote

JACKSON, Miss. -- Election officials say a Mississippi man collapsed and died on the way to vote with his wife who went back later to cast her ballot. Precinct bailiff Keith Varnado tells The Enterprise-Journal that Emmitt Booth was coming in the door at the South McComb Baptist Church in southern Mississippi to vote Tuesday morning when he collapsed.

He was taken to the hospital where Pike County Coroner Jason Jones says he later died.

But precinct worker Ericka Johnson says his wife, Marie, returned to the precinct later in the day to vote.

Johnson says the wife said that was what her husband would have wanted her to do.

Pike County Election Commission Chair Trudy Berger says Marie Booth's decision to return to vote is a testament to her sense of civic responsibility.