LEXINGTON, Miss. (AP) - A Mississippi man accused of killing his pregnant girlfriend has been released from custody while the case is under investigation.
Terence Sample was released Tuesday after posting bond, Holmes County Sheriff Willie March told the Clarion Ledger. Sample had been denied bond three times but was released after the Mississippi Supreme Court asked a lower court to reconsider.
Sample is charged with two counts of kidnapping and capital murder. McKayla Winston, 21, disappeared days before her body was found July 1 next to a rural road. Winston was expected to give birth July 4.
Mississippi Department of Human Services documents show Sample, 33, was scheduled to have a paternity hearing July 3 in Attala County Chancery Court, but the hearing never took place.
The state crime lab has not released a cause of death for Winston or the unborn baby, March said. Winston was nine months pregnant at the time of her death.
District Attorney Akillie Malone Oliver said this week that Winston’s family is “outraged” about Sample being released from custody.
Prosecutors say Sample and Winston met the night she was last seen in late June. Oliver has said Sample became mad after learning Winston wasn’t going to put the baby up for adoption.
Sample’s attorney, Richard Carter, said during a court hearing Aug. 1 that prosecutors had presented “no proof there has been a murder.”
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