In the early morning hours of a Sunday in Victoria, Mississippi, a disturbance in the parking lot of Watkins Grocery shattered the night's quiet. It was there that 27-year-old Atha Eldridge Falkner, a male resident of the Highway 309 South area, was shot on December 9, 2018. When Marshall County deputies arrived at the scene around 1 a.m., they found Falkner and immediately began performing CPR, continuing for about an hour in a desperate attempt to save him. Local firefighters and first responders joined the effort, doing everything they could to keep him alive, but their efforts were in vain. The coroner, James Richard Anderson, ultimately pronounced Atha Falkner dead at the scene.
The investigation into the homicide began immediately, with law enforcement trying to piece together the events that led to the fatal shooting. The incident took place across the road from Elmore's Club, a detail noted by the sheriff. According to initial information gathered at the scene, it is believed that an altercation between a female and Falkner preceded the shooting. An unidentified suspect is reported to have then arrived in the parking lot and shot him.
As investigators attempted to speak with potential witnesses, they were met with a large and angry crowd, which complicated their efforts to identify the shooter. In order to secure the crime scene and allow the investigation to proceed, officers from the Byhalia and Holly Springs Police Departments, as well as the DeSoto County Sheriff's Department, were called in for assistance. In the days following the shooting, the sheriff's department made a public appeal for any information that could help identify the suspect. At the time, they also highlighted that rewards of up to $15,000 were available for information leading to convictions in several of the county's unsolved homicides. There have been no subsequent reports found online detailing any arrests or the identification of any suspects in connection with the death of Atha Falkner.
