Black Man and Homeless Man Found Dead Hanging From Trees on Same Day

Two communities are reeling after two men, one Black, one white, were found dead hanging from trees in Mississippi just hours apart from one another. Demartravion “Trey” Reed, a 21-year-old Black student, was found Monday morning on his campus of Delta State University. Hours later, Corey Zukatis, 36, was found in Vicksburg. Zukatis was homeless.

Local police are reporting Reed’s death as a suicide, while they are still investigating Zukatis’s.

“At this current time, we are conducting a thorough death investigation,” read a statement from the coroner’s office on Reed’s death. “Based on the preliminary examination, we can confirm that the deceased did not suffer any lacerations, contusions, compound fractures, broken bones, or injuries consistent with an assault. At this time, there is no evidence to suggest the individual was physically attacked before his death.”

Still, the timing and imagery of the hangings has caused rampant speculation, with many recalling the racist lynchings of mostly Black people—something Mississippi, and the greater American South, has dealt with for centuries.

The Delta State community has been especially disturbed, as Reed’s body was found on campus during the week of the school’s centennial celebration.

“Our community is deeply saddened by their loss. We extend our heartfelt condolences to the family and friends impacted,” the university said in a statement earlier in the day.

FBI Director Kash Patel played defense Tuesday for Jeffrey Epstein’s alleged sex-trafficking ring by claiming that not only did the disgraced financier have no client list—he had no clients at all.

Speaking during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Republican Senator John Kennedy asked: “Who, if anyone, did Epstein traffic these young women to, besides himself?”

“Himself,” Patel quickly answered. “There is no credible information, none. If there were, I would bring the case yesterday that he trafficked to other individuals. And the information that we have—again—is limited.”

“So, the answer is no one?” asked Kennedy, somewhat incredulously.

“For the information that we have,” Patel replied, clarifying that he meant the Epstein files.

The FBI director also admitted that he hadn’t actually done the reading. “I have not reviewed the entirety of [the Epstein files] myself, but a good amount,” he said.

Patel’s claim that Epstein, who was indicted by federal prosecutors on charges related to sex trafficking minors in 2019, had procured dozens of women just for himself directly contradicts a trove of testimony from the survivors of Epstein’s abuse.

Virgina Giuffre previously alleged that she had been sexually exploited by Prince Andrew and Epstein’s other “adult male peers, including royalty, politicians, academicians, businessmen, and/or other professional and personal acquaintances.” The Duke of York denied the accusation, and the suit was settled in 2022.

In January 2024, hundreds of documents were made public as part of Giuffre’s defamation suit against Epstein, including 150 names of individuals associated with the alleged sex trafficker. And though not all of the names were directly implicated in his crimes, some were.

One survivor, Sarah Ransome, testified under oath in 2017 that she had been “lent out by him to his friends and associates” in New York City and that guests at his home in the Virgin Islands had used girls for “instant sexual entertainment.” Another unnamed survivor claimed that she was forced to have sex with two high-profile politicians, both of whom had their names redacted from the documents.

Earlier this month, a group of survivors declared their intention to compile their own list of abusers and accomplices who participated in Epstein’s alleged sex trafficking.

As Donald Trump embarks Tuesday on his second state visit to the U.K., demonstrators have spread an enormous banner depicting the president with notorious sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein across a lawn outside Windsor Castle—where King Charles III is set to host him.

The banner is one of many antics planned for the trip by Everyone Hates Elon, a British guerilla group formed earlier this year to troll billionaire Elon Musk with viral stunts.

For Trump’s visit, Everyone Hates Elon is endeavoring to put the 1997 photo of the president and his former friend Epstein “everywhere he goes,” thus making it “the defining image” of the trip, according to a fundraising page. (As of this writing, almost 1,800 donors have contributed 31,760 pounds—or more than $43,000—to the cause.)

For every 15 pounds raised, the group vowed to add another square meter to the banner, which was unveiled Tuesday as “the WORLD’S BIGGEST PHOTO of Donald with convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.”

The Everyone Hates Elon Instagram page also boasts of sneaking Trump-Epstein merchandise into the gift shop at Windsor Castle, installing posters of the photo in a bus stop advertisement near the U.S. Embassy in London, and placing a plaque memorializing Epstein on a bench at Trump’s golf course in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, which reads: “In loving memory of Jeffrey Epstein—a terrific guy. See you very, very soon. From Donald.”

The group has additionally floated displaying the photo on a mobile billboard van, as well as placards and projections.

“Picture Trump spitting out his tea and scones as he sees the image of him with notorious sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein at every iconic UK location,” the fundraising page states.

The New York Times is fighting back after President Trump filed a massive $15 billion defamation lawsuit against the paper.

“This lawsuit has no merit. It lacks any legitimate legal claims and instead is an attempt to stifle and discourage independent reporting. The New York Times will not be deterred by intimidation tactics,” a spokesperson for the Times said in a statement. “We will continue to pursue the facts without fear or favor and stand up for journalists’ First Amendment right to ask questions on behalf of the American people.”

Trump is essentially filing this lawsuit on the grounds that the Times’ coverage isn’t kind enough to him. The 85-page lawsuit specifically calls out Times writers Peter Baker, Michael S. Schmidt, Susanne Craig, and Russ Buettner. The latter two wrote the book Lucky Loser: How Donald Trump Squandered His Father’s Fortune and Created the Illusion of Success, published last year.

“Today, I have the Great Honor of bringing a $15 Billion Dollar [sic] Defamation and Libel Lawsuit against The New York Times, one of the worst and most degenerate newspapers in the History of our Country, becoming a virtual “mouthpiece” for the Radical Left Democrat Party,” Trump wrote Monday evening on Truth Social. “I view it as the single largest illegal Campaign contribution, EVER. Their Endorsement of Kamala Harris was actually put dead center on the front page of The New York Times, something heretofore UNHEARD OF! The ‘Times’ has engaged in a decades long method of lying about your Favorite President (ME!), my family, business, the America First Movement, MAGA, and our Nation as a whole.”

This is a tried and true method for Trump, as he sued Disney’s ABC and Paramount Global’s CBS News for defamation, settling each case for millions of dollars. The Times likely isn’t planning on folding in the same way, as publisher A.G. Sulzberger told media members in a Monday gala speech before Trump’s announcement to “stand up for your journalism. Stand up for your journalists. Stand up for your rights.”

FBI Director Kash Patel published his own enemies list in 2022, but he doesn’t want to be held accountable now that he’s actually taken retribution against them.

Speaking before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, Patel plainly rejected that he had ever drafted the kind of list that he included in his book Government Gangsters, which made reference to dozens of individuals who he claimed were “a cabal of unelected tyrants.” But the proof was in the pudding.

“It appears to me that there have been adverse actions of various kinds taken against about 20 of the 60 people on your enemies list,” said Senator Sheldon Whitehouse. “You’ve been in office for seven months. At that rate, you’ve got 14 months until you’ve hit all 60.

“Can you explain that?” asked Whitehouse.

“Again, that is an entirely inaccurate presupposition,” Patel said. “I do not have an enemies list.

“You can continue to characterize it as you wish, the only actions we take—generally speaking—for personnel at the FBI are what’s based on merit qualifications and your ability to uphold your constitutional duty. You fall short, you won’t work there anymore,” he added.

“Well, there was a list,” Whitehouse said. “You don’t like it to be called an enemies list, but it had about 60 names, and about 20 have had adverse actions. So I think those are pretty clear facts.”

Some of those names included former President Joe Biden, Donald Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton, former FBI Director James Comey, former Attorney General Merrick Garland, and former USAID administrator Samantha Power.

When Patel’s name was floated in December as an option to run the FBI, Paul Rosenzweig, the former deputy assistant secretary for policy in the Department of Homeland Security under President George W. Bush, warned that Patel would be the “poster child of vindictiveness.”

“His infamous public declarations of retribution may lead to the dismissal of any politically motivated prosecutions he initiates against his enemies list of ‘Deep State’ opponents,” Rosenzweig wrote in The Bulwark at the time.

But a fire appears to be growing against Patel in the inner echelons of the Trump administration. Patel’s clumsy handling of the manhunt for Charlie Kirk’s killer left the White House thoroughly unimpressed, with insiders reportedly on the lookout for Patel’s replacement.