Leesa Gray was a 16-year-old girl who found joy in her church youth group, sang in the school chorus and quietly stood up for teenagers who were bullied by their peers. On Wednesday, the man who pleaded guilty to raping and killing her will die.
During the summer ahead of what should have been Leesa's senior year of high school, she worked as a waitress at her uncle's restaurant in north Mississippi's Itawamba County — a place that serves eggs, grits and biscuits in the morning, and hamburgers, steak and catfish later in the day. On June 22, 2000, she left work after dark and became stranded with a flat tire on a rural road.
In September 2021, Loden pleaded guilty to capital murder, rape and four counts of sexual battery. According to court records, Loden told Leesa's friends and family during his sentencing: “I hope you may have some sense of justice when you leave here today.”“I don’t particularly want to see somebody die,” Farris said. “But I do believe in the death penalty. ... I do believe in justice.”
“Same name, different spelling," said Darracott, 39. “Our mothers introduced us to distract us from that fact that we didn’t want to be there.”When they were small, they would play at working in an office or keeping house, she said, and “give ourselves married names of whatever boy we had a crush on.” When they were older, they enjoyed dancing to Shania Twain’s “Any Man of Mine.
Farris said she forgave her daughter's killer years ago. A feeling came over her, and she believes it was the Lord speaking to her heart.
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