Police in Mississippi are searching for a man who escaped from jail over the weekend and is considered the main suspect in the death of a pastor who was killed during a carjacking, police shared.
According to the Jackson Police Department, 61-year-old pastor Anthony Watts was shot and killed Monday night after he pulled over to help a man who had wrecked a motorcycle, CBS News reported.
However, instead of taking Watts’ help, he took his life, shooting him several times before stealing his Red Dodge Ram. Watts was pronounced dead at the scene.
During a news conference on Tuesday, Jackson Police Chief James Davis said that a man who recently escaped a detention center in the state is the leading suspect.
“Based on information gathered from investigators, the suspect ... fit the description of 22-year-old Dylan Arrington,” Davis said.
The Hinds County Sheriff’s Office is also searching for Arrington, one of four prisoners who escaped the Raymond Detention Center on Saturday night, the others being Casey Grayson, Corey Harrison, and Jerry Raynes.
The sheriff’s office noted that the four prisoners escaped through breaches in a cell and the roof of the detention center. Hinds County Sheriff Tyree Jones said the men might have camped out on the roof before fleeing the facility in different directions.
All four of the inmates had been in custody on felony charges. Arrington had been charged with auto theft and illegal possession of a firearm, the sheriff’s office noted.
The statement from the sheriff’s office says, “one of the escapees could be possibly responsible for this incident,” when referring to Watts’ death. However, the authorities are still investigating to confirm.
Church members at St. Mary Missionary Baptist Church, where Watts was a pastor, spoke with WJTV about his death, saying they are deeply saddened.
“We are all in some sort of grief moment, but we know that God has the upper hand. We cast all of our cares upon him because he cares for everything that we have to go through, we have to deal with, even in this,” Reverend Carl Burton, an associate pastor at St. Mary Missionary Baptist Church, said.
One church member, Vivan Ross, said that Watts stopping to help the stranded man was exactly something he would do.
“Reverend Watts was a person that loved everyone,” Ross said. “He didn’t meet no stranger. He would help you, do anything he could for you. He just loved everyone, and we loved him.”
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