MISSING BOY
Coast Guard calls off search for missing Petal teen
GULFPORT, Miss. (AP) – The U.S. Coast Guard has called off its search for a 16-year-old from Petal who disappeared Sunday afternoon from the western tip of West Ship Island.
The Sun Herald reports that the Coast Guard was using an 87-foot vessel with a high platform to search for Omar Gonzalez on Monday and Tuesday. Officials said the high platform offered a better view of the waters than from other vessels involved in the search.
The Mississippi Department of Marine Resources said it would continue searching for the teen.
Gonzalez had gone to the island with a 17-year-old friend and his friend’s mother. Both teens were reported missing, believed swept away by a rip current. MDMR officers found the older teen clinging to a buoy in the old Gulfport ship channel.
COCHRAN-STATE STAFF
Cochran hires new director for state offices
JACKSON, Miss. (AP) – A former Mississippi Republican Party chairman is becoming the new director of Sen. Thad Cochran’s state offices, where he’ll be in charge of constituent services.
Brad White begins the new job June 1. He succeeds Brad Davis, who is going to work for a private law firm.
White has been deputy state auditor and chief of staff for the state Department of Audit since September 2013.
He previously worked for the Public Service Commission, the Mississippi Department of Transportation and the Simpson County Development Foundation.
White became executive director of the state Republican Party in January 2008 and took on the dual role as party chairman in September of that year. He stepped down from both positions in early 2011, when he ran unsuccessfully for Simpson County chancery clerk.
SENATOR COCHRAN-MARRIAGE
Lawyer says Sen. Cochran’s marriage helps blogger’s defense
JACKSON, Miss. (AP) – A lawyer defending a man accused of crimes in taking photos of Sen. Thad Cochran’s late wife says the legislator’s Saturday marriage to his executive assistant will help his defense.
Kevin Camp says Cochran’s marriage to Kay Webber lends credence to statements that his client, blogger Clayton Kelly of Pearl, was trying to make when he entered a nursing home and took pictures of Rose Cochran while bedridden in April 2014.
Kelly is scheduled for a June 8 trial in Madison County Circuit Court on charges of conspiracy, burglary and attempted burglary. Camp questions whether any laws were broken.
Officials said when they arrested Kelly that he wanted to advance allegations that the senator was having an inappropriate relationship with Webber. Cochran’s aides said then that there was nothing improper.
CONGRESS-MISSISSIPPI
Zinn and Kelly seeking support in Miss. congressional race
JACKSON, Miss. (AP) – Two candidates are trying to win support in the final days before a runoff in a north Mississippi congressional election.
Democrat Walter Zinn and Republican Trent Kelly are keeping busy campaign schedules ahead of the June 2 runoff.
They are in a race to succeed Republican U.S. Rep. Alan Nunnelee, who died of brain cancer in February. The winner will serve most of the two-year term that ends in January 2017.
Zinn’s schedule includes events Tuesday in Oxford and Thursday in Tupelo.
Kelly has events Tuesday in Tupelo and Wednesday in Oxford and DeSoto County.
They emerged as the top two candidates from an original field of 13.
Mississippi’s 1st Congressional District encompasses all of 21 counties and part of Oktibbeha County.
CORRECTIONAL OFFICER KILLED
Miss. correctional officer killed in crash while working
HATTIESBURG, Miss. (AP) – The Mississippi Department of Corrections says one of its officers was killed in a traffic accident while helping escort an inmate from one hospital to another.
The department says in a news release Tuesday that 53-year-old Sgt. Iris Smith died Monday when the prison van she was driving hit the back of an 18-wheeler on U.S. 49 in Hattiesburg.
Smith was alone in the van. Another correctional officer was riding in an ambulance with an inmate who was being taken from Greene County Hospital to Forrest General Hospital.
Smith worked at South Mississippi Correctional Institution in Greene County. She previously worked at George County Community Work Center.
The department says Smith was its first correctional officer killed on the job since 1999.
The accident remains under investigation.
EMCC IMPROVEMENTS
East Mississippi Community College officials seeks upgrades
SCOOBA, Miss. (AP) – Retiring East Mississippi Community College President Dr. Rick Young will spend his final six weeks at the school by campaigning for a new men’s dorm and a new athletic operations center to be built for the main campus in Scooba.
The Meridian Star reports Young and other college officials met last week with the Lauderdale County Board of Supervisors to present a plan to replace two men’s dorms and to build a new, centralized athletic center for the Lions’ sports teams.
Vice President Dr. Paul Miller says the new dorm would have 160 beds and would replace the two buildings and its combined 140 beds.
Alumni Affairs Director Nick Clark says the new dorm will cost $7 million and $5 million to build the athletic operations center.