Video of killer in Mississippi shooting, Police say 8 dead

Authorities in Mississippi said a suspect was in custody after eight people including two boys and a sheriff’s deputy were shot dead.

Mississippi Bureau of Investigation (MBI) spokesman Warren Strain said the shootings happened at three homes on Saturday night in rural Lincoln County. Two of the homes were in Brookhaven and one was in Bogue Chitto, about 68 miles south of Jackson, the state capital.

An MBI news release said three female victims and the deputy were killed at one location. More bodies were found at two other crime scenes: two boys at the second location and a man and a woman at the third.

The deputy was identified as 36-year-old William Durr, who served two years at the Lincoln County sheriff’s department and four years with the Brookhaven police. Names of the other victims were not immediately released.

In a statement, Mississippi governor Phil Bryant asked state residents to pray for the victims and noted the “sacrifice” made by law enforcement officers.

“Every day, the men and women who wear the badge make some measure of sacrifice to protect and serve their communities,” he said. “Too often, we lose one of our finest. I thank the law enforcement agencies involved for their hard work.”

The MBI said the suspect, 35-year-old Willie Corey Godbolt, was was being treated for a gunshot wound at a Jackson hospital. It did not say if he had been charged.

A local newspaper, the Clarion-Ledger, posted video of the suspect talking to a reporter while handcuffed and sitting on a road, surrounded by law enforcement officers.

“I ain’t fit to live, not after what I done,” said Godbolt, adding that he had been talking to his wife and members of her family when somebody called the authorities.

“I was having a conversation with her stepdaddy and her mama and her, my wife, about me taking my children home,” he said. “Somebody called the officer, people that didn’t even live at the house. That’s what they do. They intervene.

“They cost him his life,” the suspect said, apparently in reference to the slain deputy. “I’m sorry.”

He also said he did not intend for police to capture him alive.

“My intentions was to have God kill me. I ran out of bullets,” he said. “Suicide by cop was my intention.”

Vincent Mitchell, stepfather-in-law to Godbolt, said the suspect had been arguing with his estranged wife when he opened fire inside his in-laws’ home, after the deputy arrived. The killings “all stemmed from domestic violence”, Mitchell said.

Mitchell said three family members were killed at his home. “I’m devastated,” he said. “It don’t seem like it’s real.”

Godbolt came to his home to talk with his wife about taking their two children, Mitchell said, and appeared to be leaving after a sheriff’s deputy was called. But “then he reached into his back pocket. He started shooting”.

Mitchell said his wife, Barbara Mitchell, was killed with her daughter, Toccarra May, and the wife’s sister, Brenda May. Mitchell said he and the suspect’s wife escaped.