A “troubled juvenile” charged with the brutal killing of an elderly Mississippi couple was well known by local cops as a suspect in other crimes and had been graciously hired by his alleged victims to do odd jobs around their house.
That according to a report by Fox News Digital, which obtained an incident report associated with the teenager.
Cordarius Hobbs, 17, is charged with killing Bill Blair, 74, and his 71-year-old wife Carol on June 3. The homicides came after the teen allegedly broke into their home in Mendenhall, a small town of only 2,200 residents located about 40 miles south of Jackson.
During a preliminary hearing in July, the teen’s family members said Hobbs did work for the Blairs such as house cleaning and other tasks.
Fox News Digital obtained an incident report from the Simpson County Sheriff’s Department, which alleged Hobbs is a “troubled juvenile” suspected of other crimes in the small community.
“When we first arrived [on the crime scene] I and other Deputies and Investigators believe the suspect could be a troubled juvenile known to us as Cordarius Hobbs who is also suspected of many other home burglaries as well as auto theft in this immediate area,” an officer’s incident report states.
Billy Newsome, Hobbs’ grandfather, told authorities he believed his grandson was called to work by the couple on the day of the alleged shooting and said he believes the teen is innocent.
“My grandson used to work for the man, why you gone rob a man that you work for,” Newsome said. “Why you gone stay there that long and you know the police out there, and then you gone wait until everybody gets there to run, it just ain’t adding up, something just ain’t right here.”
Newsome is referring to the police standoff that resulted that day after three contractors arrived at the Blairs’ home to install a generator.
They found a car parked there about 10 a.m. that morning with an open door and with several guns piled on the seats, according to a Mississippi Bureau of Investigation investigator.
Apparently when no one came out of the home as they worked, the crew called the Simpson County Sheriff’s Department at 11:30 a.m. for a welfare check on the couple.
As Breitbart News reported last month, when officers arrived at noon they were met with gunfire, starting a nearly two-hour-long standoff.
Hobbs eventually was apprehended after bolting from the home and trying to run away from officers. The teen was reportedly unarmed when he was caught.
Police found Carol Blair in the fetal position in a bedroom, shot three times in the back of the head, an investigator told the Court. Her husband was discovered on his back on the kitchen floor with three gunshot wounds to his face.
Jason Busby, who was friends with the couple, told a TV news outlet covering the homicides that the couple was extremely “selfless.”
“The man would’ve given you the shirt off his back, his wife is the same, and they’re just great people. It’s just a tragedy,” Busby said. “Everybody around here is still in shock. They were just good people.”
Prosecutors have charged Hobbs as an adult with two counts of capital murder, one count of burglary, four counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, four counts of aggravated assault on a law enforcement officer, and two counts of aggravated assault over 65 years old.
Zachary Vaughn, Hobbs’ defense attorney, told Fox News Digital that his young client has been respectful and courteous in their meetings. The attorney also argued that there is a lack of direct forensic evidence connecting the teenager to the couple’s homicide.
He told the cable news outlet:
There was nothing to say he’s a principal, he’s the one that pulled the trigger on these things. One of the things alone was, one of the victims was shot twice on one side of the head and once on the other. I think that’s pretty compelling that somebody else may have been in there. There’s a lot of things that are possible, just a tremendous amount of things.
During the standoff, a sheriff’s deputy was shot but was able to recover at home. While fleeing, Hobbs was also shot by a state trooper who had responded to the scene but was only briefly hospitalized with the non-life-threatening wound.
Hobbs remains jailed in Rankin County, a request for bond for his release denied.
Breitbart News contributor Lowell Cauffiel is the best-selling author of the Los Angeles crime novel Below the Line and nine other crime novels and nonfiction titles. See lowellcauffiel.com for more
