Looks like a real life "Mississippi Burning" story going on re the slain census worker...

[Junkdrawer]

Many, many oddities:

1.) The body was discovered Sept. 12 in a remote, wooded area

2.) The Mother was advised to cremate her son:

...

She said investigators have given her few details about her son's death. They did tell her his body was decomposed and haven't yet released it for burial.

"I was told it would be better for him to be cremated," she said.

...

Sparkman's mother is simply waiting for answers.

"I have my own ideas, but I can't say them out loud. Not at this point," she said. "Right now, what I'm doing, I'm just waiting on the FBI to come to some conclusion."

...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32991672/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/page/2/

3.) The death made it to the media (AP) via a leak, apparently from the FBI.

4.) FBI was advised "apparent homicide"

5.) Now, local authorities are walking back the story:

1) Kentucky state police have not ruled out the possibility that the death was a suicide or even that it was accidental, according to police spokesman Don Trosper.

2) His death has been ruled “asphyxia,” Trosper said in an interview. “There was a rope around his neck. It was attached to a tree,” Trosper continued, adding this intriguing detail: “He was in contact with the ground.”

That raises the possibility that the cause of death was not hanging. Asked if this were possible, Trosper said: “Nothing is being ruled out.”

3) Trosper said the initial AP story on the death contains “flaws and errors.” That means it’s possible that the AP’s claim, based on an anonymous source, that he had the word “fed” scrawled on his chest could be false. Asked if that were the case, Trosper declined to comment.

...

http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/uncategorized/suicide-not-ruled-out-for-dead-census-worker-he-was-in-contact-with-the-ground

[Taverner]

1. If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, smells like a duck, then it must be suicide

:sarcasm:

[question everything]

2. Yes, many unanswered questions. However, to claim that it was because

he was a census worker, and to "tie" this with Michelle Bachman could backfire if it is found out that the census had nothing to do with it, or that they murderers and their accomplices have never heard of her. She will come out with flying colors and will be re-elected.

[redqueen]

8. "She will come out with flying colors and will be re-elected."

Um... what?

First of all, she barely gets elected at all, even in her heavily republican district.

Second of all... how does not being guilty of inciting violence make one come out 'with flying colors'? If anything all this does is bring more attention to her batshit insane blathering. Not being able to tie her inciteful comments to this incident doesn't really help her at all.

[Warpy]

3. I can sympathize with the local cops

who don't want to admit to themselves that a monster of some sort is living right there and they missed him.

I'm just glad the Feds are involved with this one. They don't have that kind of attachment.

[lolly]

18. Unless they're involved?

Wasn't that the point of the Mississippi Burning allusion?

Or at least covering up for the person responsible because they sympathize with him?

[PDJane]

4. When someone tells you to cremate your son,

It's a fine way to hide evidence, and I would be seriously concerned about that....among other things.

I have a major problem with the whole deal, and am sure that there are reasons.......and good ones........for conspiracy theories. There are such things.

[Junkdrawer]

5. Working theory:

Local authorities wanted to cover it up.

Someone (Mother?) calls in FBI

Someone (FBI ?) leaks to the press

MSM side with local authorities - Nothing to see here, move along.

[TxRider]

9. A body out in the woods exposed just days is going to quite nasty

Not something your going to want to look at in casket...

Or that an embalmer could do anything with...

Cremation is likely appropriate.

Bodies begin to move on their own within 24hrs of exposure, or, well, the millions of wriggling things inside move anyway.. they can consume 60% of a body in less than a week. Then there are the wild animals.

We know he was missing for 2 days before he was reported missing, plus whatever time it took to find him.

Figure 3 days or maybe more.

He was found the same day as the teabagger rally in D.C. evidently.

[Junkdrawer]

10. TPM: "Sparkman reportedly had died on the morning of the day before."

http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/09/census_worker_found_dead_in_kentucky_--_what_do_we.php

[TxRider]

16. I saw reports he didn't show up for work for 2 days so they reported it.

I think on Huffpo...

So he may have been missing for a whole day, in whoever killed him's hands, before he was killed?

[Tippy]

19. We have had a lot of rain in the last three weeks

and high humidity....

[gatorboy]

6. This happened on a teabagger holiday 9/12, huh?

[Junkdrawer]

7. Body was discovered on 9/12. Reports are that the death occurred earlier. n/t

[starroute]

11. On the morning of 9/11, then?

That's even more bizarre.

[Barack_America]

13. Not quite. He failed to show up for work on the 10th. nt

[librechik]

12. Mississippi Burning was real life too

I know a lot of folks don't want to believe it. But part of America never came out of the Civil War.

[TxRider]

17. Part of America like this might predate even the civil war.

[starroute]

14. I found this, which may support the pot-growers theory

This is from the Congressional Record, from 1994 -- but I doubt much has changed. Sparkman's body was found in Clay County, mentioned below as one of the hot spots where even law enforcement wouldn't go without backup.

http://www.c-spanarchives.org/congress/?q=node/77531&id=7941123

Local pranksters thwacked the nail on the head a few years ago when they amended one of the entrance signs to read, Daniel Boone National Pot Forest: Nearly half of the marijuana plants confiscated on national forest land last year were grown here. Authorities reaped and burned 248,487 plants from 4,591 plots around the forest and ferreted out 38 booby traps, including steel bear traps, punji sticks, dynamite, and fishhooks strung across trails at eye level. The good news: That's way down from the 145 traps found in 1989.

Daniel Boone's status as dope capital of our public lands is no surprise, in historical context. During World War II, under a federal incentive program, farmers in this part of southeastern Kentucky were paid to grow marijuana plants for the hemp fiber used to make rope, and it's still widely acknowledged as a vital part of the local economy. `We were interviewing an elderly gentleman whom we'd just arrested for cultivating marijuana,' says the forest's special agent in charge of eradication, `and there in his patch I said to him, `Now what in the world are you doing here? You're three counties away from your residence!' And he looked at me and said, `Sonny, all the good places over there were taken.' . . .

Hot Spots

Leslie Clay, and Owsley Counties, in the extreme southeastern part of the forest. This is the location of most of the 180,000 acres designated as `constrained,' meaning the law enforcement always goes in with backup. Each year a dozen or so visitors to these areas report that they've been told at gunpoint they'd best pitch their tents elsewhere. Growers are less polite with the feds: During the 1992 growing season, they shot at a Kentucky National Guard truck used to refuel drug-surveillance choppers.

Form the Files

In Kentucky, the religion that is high school football holds services on Friday night, and for ten years Archie Powers was its high priest--which is to say, he was the head coach at Corbin City High School, a long-time powerhouse that brought home the state title twice under his guidance. When Powers resigned in 1982, he rode his popularity into the office of judge executive of Whitley County. From this new pulpit, he and a partner extended a hoe to a bit of his jurisdiction in southern Daniel Boone National Forest and raised about a thousand marijuana plants. Upon his indictment in 1990, the cry swept across the land: `My God, my boys played football for him!'

[gatorboy]

15. "report that they've been told at gunpoint"

There's alot of gunplay in that article. Nothing about taking the time to hang someone.

All this article proves is these folks are very protective of their area and will defend it. Being hanged is a bit more malicious, I think.