Updated: U.S. Census worker found hanging in tree in Kentucky – SUSPECT WAS NOT HUNG AS REPORTED!

This is just absolutely sad:

Via the AP:

When Bill Sparkman told retired trooper Gilbert Acciardo that he was going door-to-door collecting census data in rural Kentucky, the former cop drew on years of experience for a warning: “Be careful.”

The 51-year-old Sparkman was found this month hanged from a tree near a Kentucky cemetery with the word “fed” scrawled on his chest, a law enforcement official said Wednesday, and the FBI is investigating whether he was a victim of anti-government sentiment.

“Even though he was with the Census Bureau, sometimes people can view someone with any government agency as ‘the government.’ I just was afraid that he might meet the wrong character along the way up there,” said Acciardo, who directs an after-school program at an elementary school where Sparkman was a frequent substitute teacher.

The Census Bureau has suspended door-to-door interviews in rural Clay County, where the body was found, until the investigation is complete, an official said.

The law enforcement official, who was not authorized to discuss the case and requested anonymity, did not say what type of instrument was used to write the word on the chest of Sparkman, who was supplementing his income doing Census field work. He was found Sept. 12 in a remote patch of Daniel Boone National Forest and an autopsy report is pending.

Manchester, the main hub of the southeastern Kentucky county, is an exit off the highway, with a Walmart, a few hotels, chain restaurants and a couple gas stations. The drive away from town and toward the area where Sparkman’s body was found goes through sparsely populated forest with no streetlights, on winding roads that run up and down steep hills.

Manchester Police Chief Jeff Culver, whose agency is not part of the investigation because the death was outside city limits, said the area where Sparkman was found has a history of problems with prescription drug and methamphetamine trading.

“That part of the county, it has its ups and downs. We’ll get a lot of complaints of drug activity. They’ll whittle away, then flourish back up,” Culver said. He said officers last month rounded up 40 drug suspects, mostly dealers, and made several more arrests in subsequent days.

FBI spokesman David Beyer said the bureau is assisting state police and declined to discuss any details of the crime scene. Agents are trying to determine if foul play was involved and whether it had anything to do with Sparkman’s job as Census worker, Beyer said. Attacking a federal worker during or because of his federal job is a federal crime.

Lucindia Scurry-Johnson, assistant director of the Census Bureau’s southern office in Charlotte, N.C., said law enforcement officers have told the agency the matter is “an apparent homicide” but nothing else.

Census employees were told Sparkman’s truck was found nearby, and a computer he was using for work was inside, she said.

Sparkman’s mother, Henrie Sparkman of Inverness, Fla., told The Associated Press her son was an Eagle scout who moved to Kentucky to direct the local Boy Scouts of America. He later became a substitute teacher in Laurel County, adjacent to the county where his body was found.

She said investigators have given her few details about her son’s death. They did tell her his body was decomposed and haven’t yet released it for burial.

“I was told it would be better for him to be cremated,” she said.

I believe the real sad thing is this; and that is the behavior of some of the political blogs out there. There are some Liberal Blogs, that are already acting like the victim of this crime was black and perpetrators were white. This is absolutely disgusting to me.  I must give credit to someone; I would like to thank John over at AmericaBlog; for being honest and reporting that the victim was actually white. For all we know, the perpetrators could have also been white or even, God forbid, black. I mean, that would run against the theme or talking point of the “Victim Card” Liberal Blogs and Media; but at least it would be telling the truth.

But more importantly is this; none of this absolutely asinine political jousting and positioning is going to bring this poor soul back. The man is dead and no amount of jousting is going to change that. The simple and sad fact is, that this man stumbled over something and whomever or whatever it was; the people involved did not want this man to live to tell about it.

I think that this should be a lesson to political blogging world; that sometimes, a crime is just simply a crime and should be treated as such. It speaks to one thing; that there are just rotten, awful people in this sin-depraved World of ours; and that should give everyone, Conservative, Liberal or whatever pause; and make them want to make this World a better place.

Here is hoping that these awful people are caught and sentenced to a nice long time in the clink.

Others: Hugh Hewitt’s TownHall Blog, Washington Monthly, Cogitamus, Salon, Federal Eye, Riehl World View, Facing South, Hullabaloo, Sadly, No!, Confederate Yankee, skippy the bush kangaroo, MyDD, The Impolitic, Little Green Footballs, Outside The Beltway, Pam’s House Blend, The Washington Independent, AMERICAblog News and The Other McCain

Update: The Website Talking Points Memo Reports the following:

Bill Sparkman, the Census worker found dead in Kentucky recently was not found hanging from a tree, according to an FBI spokesman. Rather, David Beyer told TPMmuckraker, Sparkman’s feet were planted on the ground. A rope around Sparkman’s neck was attached to a tree.

An anonymously sourced AP report said that Sparkman was hanging from a tree, and that he had the word “Fed” scrawled on his chest.

Beyer, a spokesman with the FBI’s Louisville, Kentucky filed office, declined to comment on the accuracy of the “Fed” detail. But he was at pains to ratchet back speculation that Sparkman was killed in an act of anti-government sentiment, saying that investigators had not yet determined even whether the death was a homicide.

Previous reporting “left the impression that [Sparkman] was found strung up in a tree because he was a federal employee,” Beyer said. “At this juncture that’s not accurate.” Beyer added that Sparkman died of asphyxiation.

Earlier this afternoon, a state police spokesman told Greg Sargent at the Plum Line that the AP report contained errors, and that Sparkman was “in contact with the ground” when he was found.

Not like it changes anything. But it does stop one narrative.