"FED" Hanging was Murder

I really need to follow the development of one of these stories online one of these days, as this one has been circling for a while now and absolutely nothing new has developed since it was first reported, yet it keeps being re-reported as though it just happened and things just developed:

A census worker was found naked and gagged, his hands bound behind him, hanging from a tree in a Kentucky cemetery by a visitor from Ohio. Originally, it was reported that the man was going door-to-door in Clay County, KY. The big detail was that the word, "FED," had been scrawled across his chest in pen. The details as to his being bound and gagged, as well as his having been found naked, were not released, but the original report said clearly that it had been determined a homicide - in fact, the article I read said something along the lines of, "Police are not releasing many details, but say it was a homicide."

I don't know when it was amended to say they aren't sure as to this last detail, but it has been. Now, how - exactly - do you bind your own hands behind your back before you write something across your chest and hang yourself? Well, it's Kentucky - them boys'll git to figurin' on it... Now they are refusing to say if he was going door-to-door, yet the article I read quoted a friend of his who said he'd warned him to be careful in that area. Furthermore, door-to-door census calls in the area have been canceled.

Obviously, them Clay County boys done gone and compromised the investigation. And they ought to be charged for it.

The latest AP article quotes "two anonymous sources" and also mentions drug activity in the area - particularly meth labs.

© C Harris Lynn, 2009