'Gay Panic' Defense Trotted Out In Murder of Mississippi Mayoral Candidate

The family of the man charged with killing Marco McMillilan, a gay mayoral candidate in Clarksdale, Miss., told a local news station that McMillian tried to assault the suspect and that he killed McMillian in self-defense.

On March 1 the Coahoma County Sheriff's Department charged Lawrence Reed, 22, of Shelby, Miss., in the death of McMillian, 34, whose body was found beaten and burned February 27, just one day after Reed crashed McMillian's white SUV in a head-on collision.