Girls Say Accused Killer of Marco McMillian Claimed Rape Defense

Lawrence Reed, who is accused of killing

gay Clarksdale mayoral candidate  Marco 

McMillian last month.

Days after it was first revealed that the defense team for Lawrence Reed might be planning to use a "gay panic" defense in the killing of Clarksdale candidate Marco McMillian, two unidentified witnesses are now claiming that Reed told them he killed McMillian because he thought he was going to be raped:

However, the sisters say Reed told them everything. Just after midnight on February 26, their youngest sister received a panicked call from Reed. One sister says, "He called at 12:11am and he told her that the dude (McMillian) was trying to rape him. He was exposing himself to him, playing with himself, telling him to do things and then he'll take him home."  

He told the girl he was on a back road and couldn't get away. A few minutes later a bruised, bloody and broken Reed showed up at their back porch. "He just looked like he had been through war..." one sister describes, "He was standing in the back, back here, telling God to forgive him. He didn't mean to do it, and he was saying that he just wanted to die." 

She says when Reed couldn't get away from McMillian, he used the chain on his wallet to choke the 200 pound politician. "He was shaking real hard, he was crying real hard, he was circling, begging for somebody to talk to him."  

The sisters say Reed was inconsolable and, they believe, suicidal. "When he left out, he just drove out, sped up and hit a white truck head on."

New details also emerged regarding a more accurate description of the condition of McMillian's body than previously reported:

On Sunday, McMillian's family released a statement saying the politician was dragged, beaten and burned. A source close to the investigation told abc24.com the family's description of the death was inaccurate. His face was swollen. He had a black eye, he was dragged by hand a few feet and there were burn marks on small areas of his skin.  

Theoretically speaking on the basis of these reports, it's hard to imagine a scenario where a person who is faced with rape decides that, instead of attempting to escape, it would be easier to choke his "attacker" with a wallet chain, beat him, apparently burn him in some way, steal his truck, drag and dump his body, run cry to some friends, then leave again in his "attacker's" truck only to wreck it.

It seems that, if someone had the ability to do all of that, that person should've also had the ability to get away and call 911. Certainly, being in the same room as someone who might have been "playing with" himself isn't the same as being helplessly attacked by a rapist, and it wouldn't be any more of a justification for kill someone than, say, whistling at a white woman.

The story, as told by these two girls, simply doesn't add up. It'll be interesting to see if the story from the Lawrence defense team bears any resemblance.