Authorities have identified an alleged home intruder who was fatally stabbed in a Columbus home early Saturday morning.
Deondra Deshun Tillman, 21, of Columbus died at 2:15 a.m. at Baptist Memorial Hospital-Golden Triangle, Lowndes County Coroner Greg Merchant confirmed to The Dispatch. He reportedly broke into a home on Lake Norris Road earlier in the morning, where the homeowner confronted him and stabbed him twice in the upper body, Merchant said.
Police arrived to the scene of the stabbing at about 1 a.m., a CPD press release says.
The homeowner reported he and his family had been asleep when they heard a knock on the front door, according to the release. The intruder apparently went from the front to the side door and entered the home without permission.
The homeowner indicated he did not know the intruder or why entered the house, the release says.
Police had just received a similar call about an intruder entering another home in the area, but the intruder had left when confronted.
Though police are investigating the case and it will be presented to a grand jury, the homeowner who stabbed Tillman is not currently facing charges, police said.
In February 2016, Tillman was a back-seat passenger of a car that crashed into a light pole at the intersection of 21st Avenue North and Martin Luther King Jr. Drive that left about 900 Columbus Light and Water customers temporarily without power. The driver of the vehicle failed to pull over for law enforcement and a chase ensued.
Tillman was treated at Baptist Memorial before Columbus police arrested him for on charges of marijuana possession and felon in possession of a weapon in the incident. He was under Mississippi Department of Corrections-mandated house arrest at the time of the crash, police said.
Columbus police also arrested Tillman in April 2013, when he was 17, for allegedly stealing a car of which he later lost control while driving and crashed into a home on the corner of Eighth Avenue and College Street. He was indicted in March of that year on an aggravated assault with a deadly weapon charge.
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