WDAM - Channel 7 - Serving Hattiesburg, Laurel and the Pine BeltPawn shop owner shot to death
Member Center:
By Howard Ballou - bio | email
WESSON, MS (WLBT) - A longtime pawn-shop owner is dead, the apparent victim of an armed robber. It happened just after 2:00 Tuesday afternoon at the Wesson Pawn and Gun shop on U.S. Highway 51.
There were hugs and tears of disbelief that something like this could happen in the small Copiah County town. Interim police chief Chad Sills says someone gunned down Denmon Ward, 54, as Ward stood behind the counter of the store.
"Mr. Ward was a fine, upstanding guy," Sills said. "I knew him personally. He would do anything for anybody. If the guy would've come in and said I need whatever, I'm sure he'd done everything he could to get it for him."
Christina Twaddle discovered Denmon's body.
"He was just laid out there, with blood everywhere," Twaddle said. "So, I turned around and I come running bck out of the pawn shop, and I ran all the way down to the police department."
The Mississippi Bureau of Investigations crime scene unit was called in to process the scene, and Chief Sills says witnesses have helped them identify a potential suspect.
"They saw a white male enter a vehicle behind the pawn shop with a bag, and they saw a gun in the back of his pants," said Sills.
"This should not happen anywhere," lamented Wesson resident Paula Smith. "It bothers me that it happens in our little small town."
Lawmen are looking for Eric Wayne Holley, believed to be in his 20's. He was driving a grey, primer-colored 1990 Chevrolet pickup truck.
