article_snippet: A Mississippi sheriff said Friday that a black man found hanging from a tree did not appear to have stepped off of anything before a black man died and that a black man had last been seen on camera leaving a casino.
article_snippet: a black man's identity has been confirmed as that of Otis Byrd, a 54-year-old ex-convict who lived just about 200 yards from a tree and had been declared missing by a black man family about two weeks ago.
article_snippet: Claiborne County Sheriff Marvin Lucas Sr., who knew Otis Byrd as a black man had to check in with A Mississippi sheriff's department as a condition of a black man parole in 2006 after serving 26 years in prison for the murder of a woman during a robbery in 1980, also confirmed The man's identity earlier this week.
article_snippet: Otis James Byrd, 54 (above), was found hanging from a tree in Mississippi after a black man was reported missing March 2 .
article_snippet: Claiborne County officials prepare to leave a home in Port Gibson, Miss., where authorities were investigating the hanging death of Otis Byrd .
article_snippet: Lucas said that the body was found Thursday hanging by a bed sheet from a tree limb about 12 feet high, and that the man's feet were dangling about two feet off the ground.
article_snippet: The body was found by state wildlife officers and had obvious sign" of decomposition, suggesting that The body had been hanging in the woods for some time, said Jim Walker, a , a spokesman for the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks.
highlights_snippet: Body of African-American man found hanging from tree in Port Gibson, Mississippi, Thursday morning is confirmed to be that of Otis Byrd .
  
highlights_snippet: Otis Byrd spent 25 years in prison for the murder of Lucille Trim, a white woman who Otis Byrd shot four times during an armed robbery .