Bloody 4th in Memphis as 5 murdered; several shootings

Five homicides this July 4th made for a particulary bloody Memphis holiday with the bloodshed continuing into the morning as another shooting took place in front of a Beale Street nightclub, The Plush Club.

This may not be anything abnormal considering this bit from the article about the mayhem describing it as "the deadliest in Memphis since six people were killed in homicides two weekends ago."

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Booneville man latest nabbed by Sheriff's Dept. cybersex sting

The old line "If it sounds too good to be true, it probably isn't." -- ahh, if only some would apply this line of critical thinking when talking to 15 year old girls online. Even after heavy media exposure, both locally and nationally, people are still falling victim to the Lee County Sheriff Department's successful cybersex sting operations.

Questions are posed though. Sheriff Johnson states "actually committed once they make contact with an under age child and they entice them for some type of sexual purpose" -- the "child" in these cases is a deputy posing as one, not an actual child. The biggest question of all though is why, after massive exposure on these types of operations, do people continue to fall for it?

Justin Windham, 30, of Booneville faces a felony charge of enticement of a child to meet for sexual purposes. From WCBI :

Authorities say 30 year old Justin Windham made the drive from Booneville to Lee County, on Tuesday (June 30), with the understanding that he would have sexual relations with a 15 year old girl.

When Windham arrived at the meeting place the girl wasn't there, but Lee County Sheriff's Deputies were.

The 15 year old that Windham had allegedly been chatting with on-line was actually an undercover officer.

"The crime is actually committed once they make contact with an under age child and they entice them for some type of sexual purpose," Lee County Sheriff Jim Johnson explained Thursday (July 2), as Windham was awaiting his initial appearance before Justice Court Judge Pat Carr. "The meeting is just for us to positively identify the individual that's talking to us."

Because the Internet was used, the Federal Bureau of Investigation is involved with the felony case.

Justin Windham's bond has been set at $50 thousand.

The Lee County Sheriff's Department started its on-line investigations in May of 2006. Windham is the seventeenth suspect to be arrested in the ongoing operation.

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Thousands of MS public officials fail to meet ethics filing deadline.

Governor Haley Barbour and Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann are among around 1,000 officials who failed to meet a May 1st deadline to file ethics reports relating to sources of income.

From WBCI News:

According to records at the Mississippi Ethics Commission, Barbour and Hosemann are the only two of the eight statewide elected officials to miss the deadline.

Under Mississippi law, public officials are report to file all sources of income of more than $2,500, all stock holdings of more than $5,000 and all official positions in businesses.

Those rules apply for adults living full-time in the household of the public official.

The Ethics Commission will notify by letter the public officials who did not file starting next week.

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Opinion piece from the Hattiesburg American.

Contraband cigarettes set to be auctioned.

More that 855,000 cartons of 'contraband' cigarettes found in a Tupelo warehouse this April are set to be auctioned by the state of Mississippi in an effort to recover nearly 5 million dollars in state tax revenue. The value of the cigarettes are around 20 million dollars. The initial raid by Federal agents uncovered a warehouse full of the cigarettes located at 120 Franklin St. in downtown Tupelo owned by Randy Benham of Cordova, TN under the name Globe Distributing. Federal officials are seeking to forfeit property assets as well. The case is connected to untaxed cigarettes in South Carolina, Mississippi and other southeastern states. No criminal charges have been filed in connection.