Mississippi Tea Party Leader’s Death Possible Suicide, Accused Of Cochran Photo Conspiracy

Mississippi Tea Party Leader Mark Mayfield was found dead from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound Friday morning in the garage of his home in a gated community outside Jackson, Mississippi. Mayfield has been under fire recently when he allegedly conspired with three others, including conservative blogger Clayton Thomas Kelly, to take photographs of Senator Thad Cochran’s wife, Rose, who suffers from dementia and lives in a nursing home. The plan was to use the footage in a smear campaign.

According to CNN, Ridgeland, Mississippi, Police Chief Jimmy Houston told them:

“He left a suicide note and we are verifying its validity. We found him at his home with a gunshot wound in his head. We found him deceased there. We are working this currently as a suicide because all of the indications, it appears to be suicide, but we still got some things to look into.”

Cochran was in the middle of a bitter campaign fight against Tea Party-backed candidate Chris McDaniel and himself. The initial primaries left neither candidate with the needed 50 percent vote to move on, so a second race was held. During that race, the veteran senator edged out his challenger for the Republican party’s nomination in a primary runoff on Tuesday. Cochran’s death comes less than a week after that victory according to the NY Daily News.

After the results were deemed in favor of Cochran by an incredibly narrow margin, McDaniel repeated his vow to use every legal maneuver available to fight the run-off results. The turmoil over the run-off was ongoing.

Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant released a statement in response to the news of Mayfield’s death:

“Deborah and I are saddened to hear of the loss of Mark Mayfield. He was a longtime friend, and he will be missed. Our prayers go out to his family in this tragic moment.”

Mayfield’s attorney, Merrida Coxwell, also left her condolences for the family in a message to CNN, stating:

“[He was a client] but more importantly, he was a friend for almost 34 years. My heart is completely broken. This is beyond tragic and the people of this community and state have lost a good man and citizen.”

There are no details at this time about the contents of the suicide note or the possible motive for Mark Mayfield’s suicide. What is apparent is that many in the community are mourning the death of a friend and political leader. Whether the stress of the primary turmoil or alleged involvement with the Cochran smear campaign was too much is yet to be known.