breaking news in our national lead any moment we could learn more at what happened in hattiesburg, mississippi leading to the shocking murders of two young police officers. four suspects charged in connection with that heinous crime. they re making their first court appearance right now and once arraigned investigators could release more details about the events leading up to the killings of 34-year-old benjamin deen and 24-year-old liquori tate. hours ago a huge crowd gathered in hattiesburg, to pay respects many struggling to understand how something like this could have happened. nick valencia is live outside the courthouse. you just talked to investigators. what did you learn? reporter: jake i spoke one-on-one with a spokesman for the mississippi bureau of investigation who says according to a preliminary autopsy one of the officers was shot in the face. the other shot in the back. they also tell me they believed they know who the shooter was.
used that singular saying one shooter. flags here behind me flags at half-staff to honor the two fallen officers. in front of cameras and police curtus banks, asserts his innocence. curtus did you do it? no, sir, i done do it. reporter: the 26-year-old now one of four suspects in custody after the shooting deaths of these hat itsberg police officers. two of the suspects face capital murder charges. never want this to happen. the men and women who go out every day, to protect us. reporter: addressing the city after the shooting, the face of hattiesburg mayor said it all i. want to tell you all that this community is one that has not had this kind of incident to happen to us in 30 years. we re very good. the men and ladies behind me are very good of solving these kinds of crimes and very good about doing it because our community works together. you can t solve these kinds of crimes without our community working today, and they do that. reporter: the motive to what
happened around 8:00 p.m. saturday night is a mistress. during a traffic stop veteran officer deen calls for backup moments after rookie officer liqueurie tate arrived to home both shot and killed. suspect curtus banks and his brother marvin flee the scene. according to police steal a police cruiser for a getaway car. on monday a memorial for the fallen officers. for the small town of has is hattiesburg makes sense. filled with grief, officer tate s family says their son became a cop to make a difference in the world. he always wanted to be a police officer, since he was young. playing with police cars, and xbox games and just having that protective spirit that a has always been one of his dreams. reporter: while there may be no justification for what happened the mother of one of
making this statement i find to be incredibly humble. i find it to be a positive sign of changing with the times. gretchen: it s interesting because a lot of times people don t go out on top, so to speak, and this is a pure example of humility in that sense. father jonathan we ve got to wrap it up. thank you for your time. steve: 22 minutes before the top of the hour on this busy monday morning. extreme weather striking the south overnight. look at this. homes wrecked, dozens injured as a giant tornado tore through a mississippi city. that s hattiesburg down there. this morning residents in that town are waking up to a day of removing trees, patching roofs and giving thanks for surviving. maria molina has been tracking these storms all night long. maria, this is a big one. yes, and a littlerly in the season and a little early in the season. typically we see storms peak during april, may and june. today we re going to be
majorly damaged and baseball fields across that area and also reports of homes damaged. not just across the hattiesburg, but lamar county, marion county at least five injuries across the region and we have currently ongoing tornado warnings across the area and we want to show this to you, across parts of southern alabama and mississippi where we still have ongoing warnings and please seek shelter immediately when they re issued. now, more huckabee. the president s drone program which authorizes the targeting killing of americans. it s come under a lot of fire. the president s pick for cia director john brennan tried to defend the strategy during the confirmation hearing. i think the hearing is one of the things that can be done because i think the discourse between the branches are important. i think there need to be continued speeches that are going to be given by the executive branch to explain our counterterrorism programs and we only take such actions