A man charged with the 2022 fatal shooting of Julius L. Wilson, 55, was found not guilty Feb. 12 in Lowndes County Circuit Court.
Bobby Childs Jr., 24, was indicted for first-degree murder in November 2023. His first trial, held in August, ended in a 6-6 hung jury and mistrial. The acquittal in his second trial came after less than two hours of deliberation, according to lead defense attorney Sumeka Thomas of Okolona.
The case dates back to Dec. 13, 2022, at a residence on Jess Lyons Road where Childs lived with his girlfriend and her four children. That evening, Childs and one of the 15-year-old girls in the home began arguing. The teen then called Wilson, her great-uncle, asking him to pick her up.
Wilson and his wife arrived a short time later. Thomas said Wilson came to the house with a loaded gun, including one round in the chamber. According to Thomas, Wilson and his wife entered the home without knocking, at which point an argument ensued between Wilson and Childs, lasting between five and 10 minutes before gunfire erupted.
“Mr. Childs felt like he was being threatened,” Thomas told The Dispatch. “There was lots of loud talking and profanities being hurled back and forth. Mr. Wilson reached for his weapon (and) Mr. Childs reached for his. Mr Childs … shot him in the chest.”
Wilson suffered two gunshot wounds to the chest and one to the shoulder, Thomas said.
Childs’ girlfriend and one of the teenage daughters testified they witnessed the shooting but said they did not see Wilson’s weapon. Thomas said neither witness could “offer a coherent perspective of what actually happened.”
After the shooting, Childs fled but turned himself in to the Lowndes County Sheriff’s Office two days later.
Prosecutors argued Childs had a history of aggression in the household, particularly with the teenage girls, Thomas said.
“From their perspective, this was somewhat of a premeditated act that could have been prevented, in their estimation,” she said. “… They attempted to paint Bobby as some violent aggressive person … who killed Julius because he felt disrespected because Julius was in his home telling him what he should and should not be doing.”
Thomas said the prosecution portrayed Wilson as “a peace-loving man who just simply came to pick up his nieces,” which she countered with the assertion that Wilson arrived armed.
The two teenage daughters testified that they had previous arguments with Childs in the past over “petty things,” though there was never any physical abuse.
In addition to family members, jurors heard testimony from an LCSO investigator, a deputy who responded to the scene, as well as a former medical examiner.
Thomas, along with defense attorneys Joseph Van Every and Clarissa Harris, argued Childs acted in self-defense under Mississippi’s Castle Doctrine. The law allows a person to use force, including deadly force, to protect themselves if they reasonably believe they are in imminent danger inside their own home, Thomas said.
“Mr. Childs was in his own home, he did not invite Mr. Julius over,” Thomas said. “… Unfortunately Mr. Wilson ended up losing his life, and of course Mr. Childs felt, and still feels, horrible about that, but it was most definitely a situation of ‘I have to protect myself.’”
Thomas said she was grateful to see “justice serviced.”
“We are just absolutely thrilled and grateful that we were able to present the case, present the facts of the case, and that the jury took their time to listen to testimony and understood that Bobby was simply trying to protect himself,” she said.
Prosecutors and a communications director for the Mississippi Attorney General’s Office did not respond to multiple requests for comment from The Dispatch by press time.
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