An update in the Tasia Fortune case claims that the police are investigating her death as a homicide pending autopsy results. The 29-year-old mother was found hanging from a tree in Jackson, Mississippi, on Monday, August 3.
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Police Chief Gives Update On Tasia Fortune’s Death Investigation
TSR reported that Tasia was found hanging from a tree behind a vacant property in Jackson. The property is located on the 500 block of Road of Remembrance, and Tasia’s body was found in the backyard. However, her mother, Christy Spivey, said at the time that she did not believe her daughter died by suicide.
During the Jackson City Council Meeting on Tuesday, September 8, Jackson Police Chief RaShall Brackney gave an update on the case after a letter was read by Spivey.
“I have no more answers from one day of this investigation,” Spivey said in her letter, which Councilman Kenneth Stokes read in the meeting, per WAPT. “The detectives are like they are on a prerecorded message just saying the same thing over and over. Now it’s gone to silence.”
An autopsy was reportedly completed on or around August 11-12. However, Brackney claims that the medical examiner’s office has not yet provided the JPD with the results. Brackney also claimed that the police were investigating Tasia’s death as a homicide pending the autopsy results, per WABT. Furthermore, she advised that the police had been doing so since “day one,” and would keep investigating until hearing “otherwise.”
She also pushed back against Spivey’s communication claims, saying that she’d been in constant contact with the grieving mother.
“Jackson police have been investigating this case since day one as a homicide,” Brackney said. “Until we hear otherwise from the medical examiner’s office. I have been in contact with the commissioner who oversees the medical examiners several times…. There is a lot of misinformation out there about this case and other ones. In addition, if you want to talk about the letter, we have been in constant contact with Miss Christy Spivey.”
Mississippi History Noted At Council Meeting
As said, Spivey’s letter was read at the meeting by Councilman Kenneth Stokes, and he noted the state’s history of lynching.
“Hanging is a ugly, ugly part of our past that we never, ever want to come back again,” Stokes said.
In addition, on Sunday, September 6, Stokes called for transparency in the case, per WLBT.
“We need to know whether it was suicide, homicide, gun shot, or whatever happened, to this young lady that was hung,” said Stokes. “Mississippi can not go backwards. We can not revisit our ugly past where hanging was a common thing.”
Not only that, but Stoked called out the Hinds County Coroner, the U.S. Attorney’s Office, and the Mississippi Medical Examiner’s Office for not responding to his inquiries about the investigation. He added that it appears as if they are trying to hide something.
“It sends a message that you’re trying to hide something, and we do not need to hide anything in the state of Mississippi,” said Stokes. “We want the world to know we’re open and above board.”
Unfortunately, it appears that there are no more answers after the council meetings.
Man Arrested And Questioned
According to WLBT, a man named Terence Anderson was arrested in August on a firearm charge, and he is reportedly a person of interest. NBC News noted that the 65-year-old is the father of Tasia’s five-year-old son, who reportedly resides with his father. Anderson denied being involved in her death. However, he allegedly admitted to having an argument with her. In addition, he lives on the same street where Tasia was found, per WLBT. However, he has not been charged with her death.
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