Suspects deceive police concerning bridge wreck
Published 12:41am Thursday, August 13, 2009VIDALIA — One of the men arrested in connection with the accident on the eastbound Mississippi River bridge has been released after he was able to prove he had nothing to do with the wreck.
The accident occurred when a vehicle carrying Arthur Richardson, William Carter and an unidentified third person apparently tried to pass two cars by using the shoulder on the bridge, Vidalia Police Investigator Randy Stockman said.
While Richardson and Carter were arrested on the scene, the third person sprinted the length of the bridge and escaped into a wooded area in Natchez.
Eventually, the two men who were arrested named Melvin Trivell Green as the driver of the car.
The problem was, he wasn’t, Stockman said.
“The guys in the car knew him, they had gone to school with him, and they just threw his name up as the driver,” Stockman said.
After Green learned he had a warrant for his arrest, he went to the Vidalia police and was booked.
“He said, ‘There is no way this was me, I was on my way from Hattiesburg to visit my family,’” Stockman said.
When the investigator asked him if there was anything to back his claims up, Green was able to produce a receipt from the Dollar General in Prentiss for ice cream sandwiches he had bought his children approximately 20 minutes before the accident happened.
Stockman called the Dollar General and was able to confirm Green had been there through the store’s surveillance video, he said.
Green was released and the charges against him were dropped on an order signed by Judge Leo Boothe Aug. 10.
Stockman said another arrest is pending.
