Drugs Motive In Mobile County Murder

Mobile County Sheriff Sam Cochran says Jermaine Pettway, 22, was murdered while trying to sell drugs to his killers.

During a press conference Thursday morning, Cochran said Pettway went to Shenk Road in North Mobile County to sell crack cocaine to Rickey Shenk, his cousin Corey Shenk, William Porter and Taylor Leaird.

That's when the four men shot and killed him, then dumped his body on a dirt road off Highway 158, according to investigators.

"The bottom line is this case is not unlike the majority of cases we have in Mobile County," says Cochran. "This is another situation where lifestyles have lead to the demise of one individual and the ruination of at least four others."

Of the twelve murders investigated by the Mobile County Sheriff's Office in 2008, ten were drug related. Pettway is the second person murdered in the county this year, and so far both cases have involved drugs.

Pettway's body was discovered Monday night by a man walking in the area.

Three of the suspects allegedly involved in Pettway's murder are behind bars. Investigators are still looking for Leaird, 18. Anyone with information about his whereabouts are asked to call the sheriff's office.