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Death penalty now a possibility in alleged Mississippi hate killing
Jackson, Mississippi (CNN) – On a recent Sunday morning just before dawn, two carloads of white teenagers drove to Jackson, Mississippi, on what the county district attorney says was a mission of hate: to find and hurt a black person.
In a parking lot on the western side of town they found their victim.
James Craig Anderson, a 49-year-old auto plant worker, was standing in a parking lot, near his car. The teens allegedly beat Anderson repeatedly, yelled racial epithets, including “White Power!” according to witnesses.
Hinds County District Attorney Robert Shuler Smith says a group of the teens then climbed into their large Ford F250 green pickup truck, floored the gas, and drove the truck right over Anderson, killing him instantly.
Mississippi officials say it was a racially motivated murder. What the gang of teens did not know was that a surveillance camera was focused on the parking lot that night, and many of the events, including the actual murder of Anderson, were captured live on videotape.
CNN has exclusively obtained that surveillance tape. The group of teens that night was led by 18-year-old Deryl Dedmon, Jr., of Brandon, Mississippi, according to police and officials. Dedmon led and instigated the attack, according to officials; he took part in and led the beating of Anderson, and Dedmon was also the driver of the Ford 250 truck that served as the murder weapon, according to officials.
Before the murder, as the teens were partying and drinking miles away from Jackson that night, in largely white Rankin County, Dedmon told friends they should leave, saying, “Let’s go fuck with some niggers,” according to law enforcement officials.
Then the gang of teens climbed into Dedmon’s green truck and a white SUV Cherokee and drove 16 miles down Interstate 20 to the western edge of Jackson, a predominantly black area.
DA: Video shows white teens driving over, killing black man
UPGRADED TO CAPITAL MURDER AND POSSIBLE DEATH SENTENCE
(CNN) – The prosecutor investigating the hit-and-run killing of a black man in Jackson, Mississippi, announced he has upgraded the charge against suspect Deryl Dedmon from murder to capital murder. This makes the white 19-year-old suspect eligible for a possible death sentence if convicted.
Hinds County District Attorney Robert Smith released a statement that said the upgrade to capital murder was made after new evidence was discovered that supported the allegation that Dedmon committed the crime of robbery during the commission of the killing of James Craig Anderson.
Federal investigators are in Jackson at the request of Smith, who says he will be seeking indictments against some or all of the white teens in coming weeks.
“This was a racially motivated murder, committed because the victim was black. We want to prosecute and bring justice in this case to the fullest extent of the law,” said Smith, explaining that he called Justice Department officials and asked for more investigators to come to Mississippi to help interview witnesses and pursue leads in the crime.
Watch the video (contains graphic images; discretion advised)
The DA says Dedmon and another teen specifically targeted Anderson because he was black. Smith plans to try this case against Dedmon as a hate crime, and he tells us this is likely the first time the hate crime law has actually been used in Mississippi since it was established in 1994.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."
