Detective: Tasia Fortune's Hanging Was Staged After Killing

A Jackson detective testified Friday that Tasia Fortune was killed in a drug dispute before her body was hanged in a staged scene behind an abandoned Mississippi home.

Jackson police Detective Samuel Dukes testified Friday that Tasia Fortune was apparently killed in a disagreement about drugs before her body was hung in a tree behind an abandoned home in the Mississippi capital this summer, in what he called a "staged" lynching. Citing the medical examiner's opinion, Dukes said Fortune was already dead before her body was placed there, and that interviews with others revealed she fought hard before she was killed. Her hanging body was discovered on August 3, and authorities ruled the death a homicide.

Fortune was Black, and the August 3 discovery of her hanging body stoked fear and drew widespread attention because the scene recalled actual lynchings in Mississippi, a Southern state with a long and troubled history of racial violence. Authorities have not said whether race played a role, and they have not disclosed the exact cause of Fortune's death or explained why they believe her body was hanged afterward. The surprise in Friday's hearing is that investigators now describe the lynching imagery as staged after a killing with a different apparent motive.

Dukes cited the state medical examiner's conclusion that Fortune was already dead before her body was hanged, and he testified the motive for the killing appears to have been a drug dispute. He said witness interviews indicated Fortune fought for her life before she was killed. Authorities arrested two men, both of them Black, on murder charges and issued a warrant for a third person. According to CNN, a 45-year-old man turned himself in Friday after a warrant was issued, was charged with murder, and will appear in court Monday.

The hearing was meant to determine whether there is sufficient evidence to send the case against the first man arrested, Jarques Ratliff, 51, to a grand jury for a possible indictment; it will resume September 30. Ratliff was arrested in mid-September, has pleaded not guilty, and remains jailed without bond. Police arrested a second defendant, 25-year-old Earnest Lloyd Jr., this week. During Friday's hearing, Ratliff blurted out that he and Fortune were friends. Outside court, his stepdaughter, Lashuna Jones, said, "He didn't do it, and I'm behind him."

Outside court, Fortune's mother, Christy Spivey, told reporters she had been aware that her daughter died before her body was hanged, but that step "brought all the attention to it." "What bothered me was they said Tasia fought for her life. I know she did. I know my daughter," Spivey said. She said her daughter, who had four children, struggled with homelessness in recent years and talked about starting a cleaning business while trying to get her life in order. Spivey said of Ratliff's claim of friendship: "It sounded sincere. Tasia had a lot of friends."

The preliminary hearing resumes September 30, when a judge will decide whether prosecutors have enough evidence to present the case against Ratliff to a grand jury. Investigators still have not said why they believe the defendants hanged Fortune's body after she was already dead, a question that could shape both the prosecution and the public understanding of a case that evoked Mississippi's history of racial violence.