By DON FLETCHER
News Staff Writer
An Escambia County man, one of two state inmates hit and killed by a car last week as they worked on an Alabama Department of Corrections (ADOC) work crew, was to have been laid to final rest on Tuesday, August 8.
Forty-year-old Colt Eugene Morris of Escambia County and Ronnie Steven Cornelius, 30, of Colbert County were both killed while working along Marion County Highway 278.
ADOC officials say Morris and Cornelius each wore a reflective vest, and all safety policies were being followed when the crash occurred.
Officials said both men were housed at Hamilton Community-Based Facility — a minimum-security penal institution about 70 miles north of Birmingham — and were part of an 11-man crew that was picking up trash.
Morris is survived by his father, Mack Morris of Cantonment, Fla.; his mother, Tammy Eady Burns of Perdido; two sons, Colton Morris of Bay Minette and Hamp Morris of Atmore; two daughters, Mia Morris of Uriah and Abranda Morris of Bay Minette; his stepmother, Pamela Morris of Cantonment; and several other family members and friends.
A funeral service was to be held at 11 a.m. on Tuesday at Petty Eastside Chapel Funeral Home in Atmore. Burial was to have followed at Pine Grove Freewill Baptist Cemetery in Perdido.
Alabama State Troopers had still not released by Tuesday’s press deadline the name of the driver who hit the men, nor any other details of the fatal incident, but a family member said authorities told the family the driver was “a minor.”