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MSU forensic anthropologist offers hope in identifying long missing persons

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On June 1, 1960, Lyrian Barry-Stallings, a 5-foot-tall Black woman, boarded a Greyhound bus in Columbus to get to St. Louis, Missouri. She vanished, never to be seen at her destination or have further contact with her family.

Her missing persons case is among the profiles of hundreds of people in a searchable online database created by a Mississippi State University forensic anthropologist who hopes to help law enforcement find them and give their loved ones closure.

“(This is) to allow the public access to missing persons data so the state of Mississippi and anyone in Mississippi could find anyone who was missing in this state and information for families to advocate for them,” said Jesse Goliath, an assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology and Middle Eastern Cultures.

The Mississippi Repository for Missing and Unidentified Persons, launched in November, includes pictures, demographic information, where they were last seen and circumstances of their disappearance.

Since its launch, the database has profiles for 475 missing people and 51 profiles for unidentified remains.

Black and Indigenous people and people of two or more races are among the majority of missing people in Mississippi, which Goliath said mirrors national trends.

The database shows the average missing age was around 34.

Among the unidentified, the majority are white men and the average estimated age is around 28.

Cases in the database stretch back decades and the oldest unidentified case is of a Black woman between the ages of 30 and 40 whose skeletal remains were found in Natchez in May 1967.

People went missing or remains were uncovered mostly from population centers such as Jackson, the Coast, outside of Memphis and Hattiesburg, but there are cases from all over the state.

Jesse Goliath, an assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology and Middle Eastern Cultures at Mississippi State University, has helped create the Mississippi Repository for Missing and Unidentified Persons at MSU. Credit: Grace Cockrell/MSU

Before the database, Goliath said it wasn’t clear how many missing and unidentified people there are in Mississippi.

There are national databases, like the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System, but because law enforcement isn’t required to submit information to it, there is likely underreporting, he said. The National Crime Information Center collects information from law enforcement and compiles annual statistics about missing and unidentified people, but it has had challenges with receiving quality data that is often incomplete, too.

Goliath has spoken with members of law enforcement about how a database could be helpful to solve missing persons cases. He has found that there’s not always enough staff dedicated to locating missing people, or there is a lack of communication between law enforcement agencies.

When someone goes missing, the local law enforcement agency will submit information to the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation to put out a missing persons alert on its emergency system that has the ability to be broadcast statewide, a spokesperson from the agency said.

This can also include posting the missing person’s picture and information on social media, which would originate from the law enforcement agency where the person was filed missing.

The main way Goliath has found out about missing people is through Facebook when law enforcement post an alert and information about someone or posts from nonprofit advocacy groups such as MissingSippi and Mississippi Missing and Unidentified Persons.

“The more eyes, the more awareness these cases get,” he said about supporting the groups’ work.

Undergraduate student workers scan social media to find information about missing and unidentified people to add to the database, Goliath said. Family members have also reached out to ask the team to include their loved one or to update their profile already included in the database, he said.

Goliath said the goal is to update the database every few weeks.

The database is modeled after one in Louisiana, which is based at Louisiana State University and is also run by forensic anthropologists.

Goliath said one of the goals of a Mississippi database is to build something lawmakers can support and create policy around, such as mandatory reporting to the database by law enforcement.

He and Assistant Professor Jordan Lynton Cox plan to use the database for research. He is interested in why people from certain demographics go missing compared to others.

With Cox, a cultural anthropologist, they want to map food deserts, hospitals and areas of poverty to find where people are missing from the most in Mississippi.

They also want to look at law enforcement budgets to see if the offices have the overall funding and resources and support to work in missing persons cases. Goliath wants to know if there are more people missing from areas with departments that are under budgeted.

He used his forensic skills for the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, the goal of which is to identify all remains of soldiers missing since World War II and return them home to their families. Goliath said the agency is the biggest employer and trainer of forensic anthropologists.

At MSU, he is able to teach and research and occasionally the anthropology department is called to assist in missing persons cases, such as the exhumation in Pontotoc County of Felecia Cox – who had been missing since 2007 and was located after her killer, David Cox, told attorneys where to find her before his 2021 execution for killing his estranged wife Kim Kirk Cox, and sexually assaulting her young daughter as her mother lay dying. Felicia Cox was the wife of David Cox’s brother.

Goliath said the The Bureau of Indian Affairs has contacted the department to go into a creek with cadaver dogs to look for a missing woman from the Neshoba area.

He also is called when bones are recovered and people want to know whether they belong to a human or an animal.

“We’re all in this together in finding these people,” Goliath said about his forensic anthropology work. 

For more information about the Mississippi Repository for Missing and Unidentified Persons, visit https://www.missinginms.msstate.edu/ or reach out by email at missinginms@msstate.edu.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Mississippi Today

On this day in 1997

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mississippitoday.org – Jerry Mitchell – 2024-12-22 07:00:00

Dec. 22, 1997

Myrlie Evers and Reena Evers-Everette cheer the jury verdict of Feb. 5, 1994, when Byron De La Beckwith was found guilty of the 1963 murder of Mississippi NAACP leader Medgar Evers. Credit: AP/Rogelio Solis

The Mississippi Supreme Court upheld the conviction of white supremacist Byron De La Beckwith for the 1963 murder of Medgar Evers. 

In the court’s 4–2 decision, Justice Mike Mills praised efforts “to squeeze justice out of the harm caused by a furtive explosion which erupted from dark bushes on a June night in Jackson, Mississippi.” 

He wrote that Beckwith’s constitutional right to a speedy trial had not been denied. His “complicity with the Sovereignty Commission’s involvement in the prior trials contributed to the delay.” 

The decision did more than ensure that Beckwith would stay behind bars. The conviction helped clear the way for other prosecutions of unpunished killings from the Civil Rights Era.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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Mississippi Today

Medicaid expansion tracker approaches $1 billion loss for Mississippi

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mississippitoday.org – Bobby Harrison – 2024-12-22 06:00:00

About the time people ring in the new year next week, the digital tracker on Mississippi Today’s homepage tabulating the amount of money the state is losing by not expanding Medicaid will hit $1 billion.

The state has lost $1 billion not since the start of the quickly departing 2024 but since the beginning of the state’s fiscal year on July 1.

Some who oppose Medicaid expansion say the digital tracker is flawed.

During an October news conference, when state Auditor Shad White unveiled details of his $2 million study seeking ways to cut state government spending, he said he did not look at Medicaid expansion as a method to save money or grow state revenue.

“I think that (Mississippi Today) calculator is wrong,” White said. “… I don’t think that takes into account how many people are going to be moved off the federal health care exchange where their health care is paid for fully by the federal government and moved onto Medicaid.”

White is not the only Mississippi politician who has expressed concern that if Medicaid expansion were enacted, thousands of people would lose their insurance on the exchange and be forced to enroll in Medicaid for health care coverage.

Mississippi Today’s projections used for the tracker are based on studies conducted by the Institutions of Higher Learning University Research Center. Granted, there are a lot of variables in the study that are inexact. It is impossible to say, for example, how many people will get sick and need health care, thus increasing the cost of Medicaid expansion. But is reasonable that the projections of the University Research Center are in the ballpark of being accurate and close to other studies conducted by health care experts.

White and others are correct that Mississippi Today’s calculator does not take into account money flowing into the state for people covered on the health care exchange. But that money does not go to the state; it goes to insurance companies that, granted, use that money to reimburse Mississippians for providing health care. But at least a portion of the money goes to out-of-state insurance companies as profits.

Both Medicaid expansion and the health care exchange are part of the Affordable Care Act. Under Medicaid expansion people earning up to $20,120 annually can sign up for Medicaid and the federal government will pay the bulk of the cost. Mississippi is one of 10 states that have not opted into Medicaid expansion.

People making more than $14,580 annually can garner private insurance through the health insurance exchanges, and people below certain income levels can receive help from the federal government in paying for that coverage.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, legislation championed and signed into law by President Joe Biden significantly increased the federal subsidies provided to people receiving insurance on the exchange. Those increased subsidies led to many Mississippians — desperate for health care — turning to the exchange for help.

White, state Insurance Commissioner Mike Chaney, Gov. Tate Reeves and others have expressed concern that those people would lose their private health insurance and be forced to sign up for Medicaid if lawmakers vote to expand Medicaid.

They are correct.

But they do not mention that the enhanced benefits authored by the Biden administration are scheduled to expire in December 2025 unless they are reenacted by Congress. The incoming Donald Trump administration has given no indication it will continue the enhanced subsidies.

As a matter of fact, the Trump administration, led by billionaire Elon Musk, is looking for ways to cut federal spending.

Some have speculated that Medicaid expansion also could be on Musk’s chopping block.

That is possible. But remember congressional action is required to continue the enhanced subsidies. On the flip side, congressional action would most likely be required to end or cut Medicaid expansion.

Would the multiple U.S. senators and House members in the red states that have expanded Medicaid vote to end a program that is providing health care to thousands of their constituents?

If Congress does not continue Biden’s enhanced subsidies, the rates for Mississippians on the exchange will increase on average about $500 per year, according to a study by KFF, a national health advocacy nonprofit. If that occurs, it is likely that many of the 280,000 Mississippians on the exchange will drop their coverage.

The result will be that Mississippi’s rate of uninsured — already one of the highest in the nation – will rise further, putting additional pressure on hospitals and other providers who will be treating patients who have no ability to pay.

In the meantime, the Mississippi Today counter that tracks the amount of money Mississippi is losing by not expanding Medicaid keeps ticking up.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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Mississippi Today

On this day in 1911

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mississippitoday.org – Jerry Mitchell – 2024-12-21 07:00:00

Dec. 21, 1911

A colorized photograph of Josh Gibson, who was playing with the Homestead Grays Credit: Wikipedia

Josh Gibson, the Negro League’s “Home Run King,” was born in Buena Vista, Georgia. 

When the family’s farm suffered, they moved to Pittsburgh, and Gibson tried baseball at age 16. He eventually played for a semi-pro team in Pittsburgh and became known for his towering home runs. 

He was watching the Homestead Grays play on July 25, 1930, when the catcher injured his hand. Team members called for Gibson, sitting in the stands, to join them. He was such a talented catcher that base runners were more reluctant to steal. He hit the baseball so hard and so far (580 feet once at Yankee Stadium) that he became the second-highest paid player in the Negro Leagues behind Satchel Paige, with both of them entering the National Baseball Hame of Fame. 

The Hall estimated that Gibson hit nearly 800 homers in his 17-year career and had a lifetime batting average of .359. Gibson was portrayed in the 1996 TV movie, “Soul of the Game,” by Mykelti Williamson. Blair Underwood played Jackie Robinson, Delroy Lindo portrayed Satchel Paige, and Harvey Williams played “Cat” Mays, the father of the legendary Willie Mays. 

Gibson has now been honored with a statue outside the Washington Nationals’ ballpark.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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