NY Daily News
May 11, 2015
Two Mississippi police officers were gunned down in cold blood by two armed men while the partners were on patrol in Hattiesburg on Saturday night, officials said.
The shooting happened around 8:30 p.m. near the center of the small southern Mississippi town of 50,000 during a routine traffic stop, authorities said. Forrest County Coroner Butch Benedict said both officers died after being rushed to a hospital.
Authorities questioned one “person of interest” after a pair of suspects reportedly sped off in an officer’s cruiser, only to abandon it on rail road tracks behind a train depot.
Hattiesburg police later captured the suspects and identified the two cops as K-9 officer Benjamin Deen, 34, and recent police academy graduate Liquori Tate, 25, The Jackson Clarion-Ledger reported. Deen was a former “officer of the year” for the department.
Cops arrested Marvin Banks at a local hotel at around 1:15 a.m. local time Sunday, and they collared Curtis Banks at an apartment complex roughly two hours later, according to WDAM-TV. Both suspects live close to the site of the shooting and both have prior criminal records, the TV station reported.
Marvin Banks, 29, and Joanie Calloway, 22, were charged with capital murder, police said Sunday morning. Marvin Banks was charged with one count of being a felon in possession of a firearm and with grand theft for fleeing in the police car.