A man convicted of taking the life of a Leflore County sheriff’s deputy won’t be getting out of prison.
The Mississippi Department of Corrections denied a medical release on June 28 for Earnest Conrod, 79, who fatally shot Melvin “Buster” Brown in 1994.
Brown’s widow, Shirley Brown-Newell, thanked everyone who wrote letters and emails in opposition to Conrod’s proposed discharge in a letter to the Commonwealth.
“I especially want to thank Sheriff Ricky Banks and the law enforcement officers and personnel who expressed their outrage of his release. Because of the nationwide outpouring of opposition, Conrod’s release was denied, and he will remain in prison where he belongs,” Brown-Newell wrote. “Hopefully, this is the last time we will have to worry about this.”
The family had been unpleasantly surprised when it received notice last month that Conrod, who pleaded guilty and received a life sentence in exchange for the possibility of the death penalty being dropped, could be released.
But Mississippi Corrections Commissioner Chris Epps, who held the ultimate decision-making authority, later said that it was part of a routine process when an inmate becomes bed-bound and that he almost always sides with the wishes of the victim’s family.
Epps couldn’t be immediately reached for comment this morning.
Conrod ambushed and shot to death Brown, a 45-year-old lawman, in 1994 after Brown accompanied Conrod’s wife, Pearlean, to pick up clothes from her home in Colony Town on the western edge of Leflore County. Conrod, who had earlier accused his wife of cheating on him and threatened her, also shot her; she survived by pretending she was dead.
Conrod then drove to Indianola to confront the man with whom he claimed his wife was having an affair. Indianola police eventually exchanged gunfire with Conrod, who was seriously wounded and has been in a wheelchair ever since. He’s serving a life sentence for the capital murder of Brown and six counts of aggravated assault for the Sunflower County shootout.
• Contact Charlie Smith at 581-7235 or csmith@gwcommonwealth.com.
