Alabama
Police: 89 shots fired into crowded Sweet 16 party
DADEVILLE, Ala. (AP) — An Alabama investigator on Tuesday described a bloody, chaotic crime scene littered with 89 bullet casings and other evidence after a shooting killed four young people and wounded dozens at a Sweet Sixteen birthday party. Authorities have charged six people with reckless murder.
The lead investigator in the case testified at a court hearing that could determine if the three adults accused in last week’s shooting will be held without bond. The three juvenile defendants will have separate hearings. The judge did not immediately issue a ruling.
“Multiple shell casings. Blood everywhere,” Special Agent Jess Thornton said. The crime scene was like nothing he’d encountered in 18 years with the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency, he said.
Shell casings from four types of handguns were recovered at the dance studio just off the town square in Dadeville, about an hour’s drive northeast of Montgomery, Thornton said.
Evidence indicates at least one of the handguns had been altered for rapid fire, he said. “Witnesses said it sounded like a machine gun.”
Investigators have not discussed a motive or what they believe led to the shooting. Thornton said the six defendants are relatives or friends. They were not invited to the party but had travelled from Auburn and Tuskegee to attend it.
Thornton said five of the six defendants admitting being at the party and firing guns. The sixth suspect did not admit being there, but the co-defendants said he was there and fired a gun, Thornton said. The investigator said at least five of the six met after the party at a parking lot in a nearby city.
The three adult defendants are Wilson LaMar Hill Jr., 20, of Auburn; Johnny Letron Brown, 20, of Tuskegee; and Willie George Brown Jr., 19, also of Auburn.
However, a defense lawyer suggested that one of the slain partygoers had fired first.
George Bulls, a lawyer for Willie Brown, asked the state investigator if there were at least some statements about one of the deceased individuals, Corbin Holston, being the one who started the shooting.
Thornton replied that was true.
Thornton testified that Holston, 23, of Dadeville, was found with a 40-caliber gun sitting on his chest. Thornton said the position of the gun, which had been fired, struck him as odd. “Almost like it was placed there,” Thornton said.
Thornton said there were about 50 to 60 people crammed inside the party venue, which measured about 38 feet (12 meters) by 26 feet (8 meters), when the gunfire erupted.
Earlier in the evening there was a loud noise when a speaker fell over and at least one person lifted their shirt to indicate they had a gun, Thornton said. That led to an announcement telling people with guns to leave. The shooting happened shortly after, he said. He did not say if the person who lifted their shirt was one of the defendants.
Two Dadeville High School seniors, Phil Dowdell, 18, and Shaunkivia Nicole “KeKe” Smith, 17, were killed. Also killed were Marsiah Emmanuel “Siah” Collins, 19, and Holston, 23.
Mississippi
Residents told to lock doors amid search for jail escapees
JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Authorities hunted Wednesday for four inmates, including one suspected of killing a man and stealing his pickup truck, who escaped over the weekend from a Mississippi jail that has been under federal scrutiny.
Multiple law enforcement agencies were searching parts of the state, with at least one county sheriff’s department telling residents to “please keep your doors locked and have no keys or weapons in your vehicles” following unconfirmed reports that the man was spotted in the area.
The U.S. Marshals service and the Mississippi Bureau of Investigations are among the agencies assisting in the search.
Police said Anthony Watts, 61, was shot and killed Monday night around 7 p.m. on Interstate 55 in Jackson after he pulled over to help a man who had wrecked a motorcycle. Police say that man shot Watts several times and then stole his Red Dodge Ram. Watts died at the scene.
“Based on information gathered from investigators, the suspect ... fit the description of 22-year-old Dylan Arrington,” Jackson Police Chief James E. Davis said.
Arrington is one of four prisoners — along with Casey Grayson, Corey Harrison and Jerry Raynes — who escaped Saturday night from the Raymond Detention Center, a facility near Jackson, through breaches in a cell and the roof. Hinds County Sheriff Tyree Jones said the men might have camped out on the roof before fleeing the facility and going their separate ways.
The four were in custody for various felony charges, most involving theft. Arrington had charges of auto theft and illegal possession of a firearm, WAPT-TV reported.
Watts’ stolen Red Dodge Ram, which has tan trim and Cowboys stickers on the front and the back, was last seen heading south on I-55 in Terry, Mississippi, police said.
Jones said one of the prisoners stole a Hinds County Public Works vehicle that was later recovered in a suburb of Houston. Investigators also believe a stolen Chevy Silverado is connected to the escape. None of the men had been captured as of Tuesday afternoon.
“Be extra cautious, be vigilant of anything that appears to be suspicious,” Jones said Tuesday. “Make sure you get on the phone” and notify local police.
“No information at this point is too small to provide to law enforcement,” he said.
In July, a federal judge ordered a rare takeover of the jail after he said deficiencies in supervision and staffing led to “a stunning array of assaults, as well as deaths.”
Seven people died last year while detained at the jail, U.S. District Judge Carlton Reeves said. Reeves wrote in his ruling that cell doors did not lock and a lack of lighting in cells makes life “miserable for the detainees who live there and prevents guards from adequately surveilling detainees.”
He also said guards sometimes slept instead of monitoring the cameras in the control room.
Federal and state judges had only ordered receiverships or similar transfers of control for prisons and jails about eight times before Reeves’ order, according to Hernandez Stroud, an attorney at the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law.
But just days before the appointed receiver was scheduled to assume control over the jail on Jan. 1, the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals stayed the lower court’s order until it ruled on the county’s motion for reconsideration.
The court was to examine whether the lower court’s injunction complies with the Prison Litigation Reform Act, a 1996 federal law that places restrictions on lawsuits brought by prisoners.
Hinds County Sheriff Tyree Jones said in December that county officials were committed to fixing the issues at the jail, many of which stem from staffing shortages.
Hinds County officials applauded the stay. Attorneys for the county said the receiver would be “utterly unaccountable” to voters and taxpayers.
