Late afternoon on December 26, 2023, a fatal workplace altercation in the parking lot of East Mississippi Correctional Facility in Meridian ended with 30-year-old Captain Justin James Whipps shot and killed. The dispute was between Whipps and a fellow on-duty corrections officer, 33-year-old Caboris McAfee, and officers who heard the gunshot subdued McAfee and summoned law enforcement and emergency services. Whipps was pronounced dead at the scene from the gunshot wound.

The Lauderdale County Sheriff’s Office arrested McAfee and charged him with murder, and the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation is leading the inquiry. Whipps, born June 23, 1993, was memorialized at services on January 20, 2024, at Morrison Heights Baptist Church in Clinton and buried at Lakewood Memorial Cemetery in Jackson; he is survived by his partner, his parents, and his biological father. Few specifics about what sparked the dispute have been released.

Did anyone in the Meridian area witness the parking lot confrontation or have information about what led to the argument?