Sworn officers of the Highway Patrol are known as "State Troopers" and have the power to arrest for any crime committed in their presence statewide.

The original uniform worn by the Mississippi troopers was a gray shirt with navy blue epaulettes trimmed with gold.

Red piping replaced gold for the shirt epaulettes as well as bordering the dark blue stripe on the pants leg for all Troopers below the rank of Major.

Leaders of major civil rights organizations, Martin Luther King Jr. of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, Floyd McKissick of the Congress of Racial Equality and Stokely Carmichael of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee attended the protest.

On May 15, 1970, during a period of student unrest over the Vietnam War and other issues, officers with the Mississippi Highway Safety Patrol and the Jackson Police Department opened fire with more than 150 rounds of "shotgun, carbine, rifle, and submachine gun fire", including armor-piercing bullets, on a women's dormitory at Jackson State College, killing Phillip Gibbs, a prelaw major, and James Green, a local high school student, and injuring 12 others.

[5] A federal commission found the response "unreasonable, unjustified" and "clearly unwarranted", and that the MHSP officers provided clearly misleading statements about the targets of their shooting.

[5] Highway patrol officers began to collect empty shell casings immediately after the shooting, discarded some, and did not publicly reveal the existence of others until required to surrender them under federal grand jury order.

Formerly led by Captain Philip Hemphill (Retired), the pistol team has won numerous competitions in the United States.

[6] In 2009 MHP Captain Hemphill set a record with his tenth win as overall champion in the National Police Shooter Competition.

Academy curriculum includes academics, law, EVOC, first aid, physical training, boxing, ground fighting and advanced officer survival.

The A-TEAM is equipped with Harley Davidson police package motorcycles, and deploys to various counties to strictly enforce the traffic laws in areas with a high accident or fatality rate.

MBI is considered State Police, however, by statute, they are supposed to only exercise those powers when it is deemed totally necessary, to benefit the public safety of the citizens of Mississippi.

[10] [11] The Mississippi Highway Patrol uses Ford Police Interceptors and Dodge Chargers in addition to its motorcycles, as well as Chevrolet Tahoes for K-9 units.

[12] The Mississippi Highway Safety Patrol has the highest percentage of African Americans employed as sworn officers of any U.S. state police force.