Trouble getting witness subpoenaed postpones trial

January 29, 2011

By BRIAN HAWKINS
sdneditor@bellsouth.net

The trial of an Oktibbeha County woman on a murder charge in the November 2008 shooting death of a Mathiston man has been postponed until May.
Leslie Sharp, 21, was to be tried in Oktibbeha County Circuit Court beginning Monday in the Nov. 10, 2008, shooting death of Christopher Cole, 20, but attempts by both prosecutors and defense attorneys to serve a key material witness with a subpoena to testify at the trial have been unsuccessful.
This fact — coupled with the receipt of some 131 pages of text and cell phone messages on Thursday as evidence in the case — gave Judge Lee Howard grounds to postpone the trial until May 16, which is a special setting outside the normal spring Circuit Court term.
Sharp is accused of shooting Cole at 7:30 p.m. Nov. 10, 2008, on Kelly Road off Rockhill Road in northeast Oktibbeha County.
Cole died at the scene of the shooting from multiple gunshot wounds, though attempts were made by Oktibbeha County Hospital paramedics and East Oktibbeha volunteer firefighters to revive him, said Coroner Michael Hunt the day after the shooting incident.
At that time, Hunt would not comment specifically on where Cole’s wounds occurred, but did confirm that rumors he had been shot in the head were untrue.
Few details about the circumstances of the shooting have been made public, though volunteer fire officials that responded to the scene said the incident was reported via telephone to E-911 operators.
Court documents state that Sharp fired multiple shots at Cole after he threatened her and her friends and fired at least one shot at her. Her attorneys claim Sharp acted in self-defense, court documents state.