By DON FLETCHER
News Staff Writer
Atmore police are working overtime, following up on leads and interviewing witnesses in a pair of December shootings that took place on Ashley Street, including one that left two local men dead, and in a November incident during which almost four-dozen shots were fired into several 4th Avenue homes.
Atmore Police Department Sgt. Darrell McMann said in response to a request for updates on the shootings that each one “is still under investigation.”
Alabama Department of Corrections (ADOC) officials reported the December 5 arrest of a local minister carries the same status.
The most serious of the three shooting probes currently under way is the December 8 slaying of Juwan McNeal, 25, and Joe Jones Jr., 27. The two were shot numerous times as they sat in a car, apparently by a person (or persons) who came from the rear of an Ashley Street house and began firing into the vehicle.
McNeal and Jones were both dead when police and emergency medical personnel arrived at the shooting site. Police have not released the type of weapon or weapons used, but official reports indicate that “around 20” shell casings were found in the vicinity of the death car.
Another Ashley Street shooting is also under investigation. The December 30 incident sent a local man to the hospital with a wound labeled as non-life threatening. Amazingly, the victim, who has not been identified by police, was hit only once — in the lower extremities. Police also found “around 20 shell casings” scattered around that vehicle.
When those shootings occurred, APD detectives were still investigating the Halloween (October 31) shooting of several houses along 4th Avenue. Although police found 49 shell casings from three different weapons — a 9mm handgun, a .45-caliber handgun and .223 casings that usually come from an automatic or semi-automatic rifle, nobody was hit by the flying lead.
Bishop arrest
“That investigation is ongoing. There is nothing further to report,” ADOC Public Information Manager Kelly Windham Betts said in a response to a request for an update on the arrest of the popular preacher.
Bishop, who pastors Destiny Worship Center here and also works as a counselor at Fountain Correctional Facility, was taken into custody on a charge of drug trafficking, along with numerous other drug-related and contraband-related charges, after a package containing nearly four ounces of flakka (street name, “bath salts”), as well as an unspecified quantity of marijuana, tobacco, cell phones and other prohibited items were found wedged under the rear bumper of his truck.
The imperiled pastor remains free on $500,000 bond while his attorney, Jerome C. Carter of Mobile, prepares his defense.
Bishop refused to resign from his position as an ADOC employee and was placed on mandatory leave until the matter is settled.