Official: Woman took Pass shooting victim's clothing from hospital

GULFPORT -- A woman accused of hindering prosecution in a fatal gunfight after a Pass Christian parade removed a victim's bloody clothing from the hospital, a court document said.

Surveillance cameras at Memorial Hospital at Gulfport filmed Sharon Ann Johnson, 51, of Gulfport, as she took a wounded man's clothing out of the hospital after the Feb. 7 shooting, according to the affidavit of a Harrison County sheriff's investigator.

The exchange of gunfire, which erupted 15 minutes after the Mardi Gras parade had ended, killed two men and wounded a woman and three men. Police have estimated up to 1,500 people were in the vicinity and about 50,000 people had attended the parade.

Hospital personnel had bagged the clothes of the four people wounded but one bag disappeared before police came to retrieve the items.

Bag put into car trunk

Video footage shows Johnson take the clothes, walk the bag through the hospital and into the parking garage, where she put the bag in the trunk of a blue car, the affidavit said.

Johnson apparently is related to the man whose clothing she's accused of taking. The court document does not identify her relationship to him.

She is cafeteria supervisor for the hospital's Food and Nutrition Services Department and is still employed there, a hospital spokeswoman said Wednesday.

An investigator reported he had contacted Johnson to find out what she did with the clothing, but she said she had left the clothes in the waiting area of the emergency room and someone had taken the bag, the affidavit said.

The investigator met with the hospital security manager, who checked video surveillance footage.

Released from jail

Court papers show the investigator asked for an arrest warrant for Johnson on Saturday.

She was arrested Monday and released from jail the same day on a $20,000 bond set by Justice Court Judge Brandon Ladner.

Cases of defendants who post bail on a felony charge before a preliminary hearing typically are sent to a grand jury without further court hearings.

The arrest warrant was filed with the affidavit in Harrison County Justice Court in Gulfport.

Johnson knowingly suppressed or concealed evidence that may have assisted investigators, the warrant said.

Arrest IDs pending

Johnson is the eighth person arrested but the first one identified.

Pass Christian Police Chief Tim Hendricks has said a number of agencies have made arrests during investigations related to the shooting. He said he expects to identify others arrested after meeting with the district attorney and the assisting law enforcement officials' agencies.

Isaiah "Winky" Major III, 43, of Pass Christian, and Carlos "Los" Bates, 29, of Gulfport, died at the Ladnier Road and Davis Avenue shooting. It was just north of the parade route. The two men fell about 20 feet apart in the street.

Hendricks has said they have been ruled out as persons of interest.

Some of the wounded, he said, were bystanders hit by stray bullets.

In a police press release last week, Hendricks said search warrants had been obtained for five homes and two vehicles.

He identified other participating law enforcement agencies as the Gulfport and D'Iberville police departments, state Department of Corrections, Mississippi Bureau of Narcotics and the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

This story was originally published February 17, 2016 at 6:01 PM with the headline "Official: Woman took Pass shooting victim's clothing from hospital ."