commentary by Patrick H. Moore
A new case out of Panola County in northern Mississippi is like something out of a nightmare so horrific that the dreamer would never want to go to sleep again.
On Saturday night, Jessica Chambers, a normal 19-year-old resident of the tiny town of Courtland was apparently assaulted in her car on Saturday night on a desolate country road and killed in almost unfathomably excruciating fashion. According to police, “the attacker likely bashed Chambers in the head before pouring fuel down her nose and throat and lighting her on fire.”
Her car also went up in flames. The Clarion-Ledger reports that someone called in the fire and when Panola County deputies responded to the call, they found poor Jessica on the brink of death wandering down the road still on fire.
Although the story varies slightly depending who is telling it, one school of thought believes that Ms. Chambers was able to tell the authorities her first name and the first name of her assailant – which would mean she knew him — before she died at a hospital in Memphis, Tenn., some 50 miles to the north.
Sasha Goldstein writes for the New York Daily News:
Family members said Chambers did not have a boyfriend or someone they could ever imagine would want to hurt the well-loved girl. Authorities say they believe the killer was inside Chambers’ car when he or she began the brutal attack.
WMC-TV reports that Ms. Chambers “told her mother she was off to clean her car and grab something to eat.” Her car was destroyed by the fire, though investigators discovered her cellphone in the wreckage and are going through its contents.
There is also a video from a Courtland gas station where Ms. Chamber is believed to have been seen a few hours before she was attacked. According to District Attorney John Champion, county authorities are reviewing the video carefully to see which locals entered and left the store during the period in question.
According to the AP, DA Champion also said that “investigators are looking into reports that Chambers had attended a party before her death.” They have also interviewed several witnesses but, notwithstanding whatever name Ms. Chambers uttered as she was dying, they have not identified a clear suspect. DA Champion told the Clarion-Ledger:
“We’ve talked to a lot of people and some of those people could end up being a suspect, but as of right now we have not questioned anybody who we believe to be a suspect.”
An autopsy is being performed and the “County Coroner Gracie Gulledge says the cause of death was thermal injuries.”
Chief Cole Haley told WMC that they “were expecting it to be a normal car fire. Put it out, extinguish it, be done with it.
“I realized who the victim was and it was just shocking.”
Lizzie Dearden of The Independent writes that Ms. Chambers father, Ben Chambers, told WDBD-TV that his daughter “had a big gash on top of her head” and that the “only part of her body that wasn’t burned was the bottom of her feet.”
Although the police have reportedly been careful not to confirm the claim, Mr. Chambers, a mechanic with the Panola County Sheriff’s Department, says the authorities told him that Jessica “used her last breaths to try and tell paramedics who attacked her.”
“She told them, she told them, told him who done it,” Mr. Chambers said.
According to Sasha Goldstein of the New York Daily News, Mr. Chambers said that he’s “so sorry Daddy wasn’t there for her” and that he’d “trade places with her in a minute if (he) could.”
David Lohr of the Huffington Post adds that Mr. Chambers said Jessica “had no known enemies”.
“She was just a typical 19-year-old girl getting ready to go to college. She went to church. She was the sweetest girl you could ask for. She didn’t smoke and she didn’t drink.”
Jessica was one of six siblings. One of her sisters, Amanda Prince, a resident of Fort Bliss, Texas has set up a Facebook page called “Justice For Jessica”. Friends and family as well as people from around the world have posted message and as of 9 a.m. Mississippi time the site has about 90,000 “likes” and is sure to have more as the days pass. Amanda hopes that by networking at the site, the participants will be able to turn up leads to help the investigators.
In a very human moment, Amanda told KTSM in El Paso, Texas that “her relationship with her little sister was a typical one.”
“We had our bad days, we had our good days; we were sisters. Nobody deserves what she went through.”
Once Amanda’s husband returns from overseas, they will travel to Mississippi to be with the family.
According to Amanda, Jessica graduated from South Panola High School and had recently begun working at a nearby department store.
“Jessica was a well known person, loved by a lot of people. She was full of life, she was bright, she was a comedian. She was always cracking jokes and making funny faces, and she kept you laughing.”
Jessica with her older brother
In what can only be viewed as nearly unbelievable tragedy, Jessica is the second of Ben Chambers’ children to die in the last 30 months. Her oldest brother, Allen Chambers, died in a car crash in May 2012.
Funeral services for Jessica will be held Saturday at 2 p.m. at the Wells Funeral Home in Batesville.
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Anyone who knows me or has read All Things Crime Blog may notice that in this post, there is not even a whisper of my usual dark humor. This is entirely too awful to even consider trying to diffuse 
matters with any kind of wit or humor.
I do, however, have one extremely important point to make. It is very important that the authorities not jump the gun and arrest the wrong person just for the sake of arresting someone. At the “Justice for Jessica” site, at least one individual is insisting that the authorities should release the name of the possible suspect that Jessica reportedly revealed while she was on the brink of death so that the citizens can go out and find him or her.
I personally don’t know what actual information the police have concerning possible suspects, and a first name, by itself, is far from being any kind of definitive identification. Fortunately, the police seem to be proceeding with real care which is exactly what they should be doing in this emotion-charged atmosphere. Furthermore, the investigation is complicated by the fact the murder took place on a desolate road.