Man sentenced to life for hammer beating death | Crime

MADISON COUNTY, MS (WLBT) - A Byram man was sentenced to life in prison after being convicted of capital murder in the beating death of a man in October 2011.

Madison and Rankin Counties’ District Attorney Michael Guest says Jonathan Scott Keen, 29, approached 50-year-old Kerry Prisock, a handy man living in his van at the Reservoir, and beat him to death during a robbery. After killing him with a hammer, Keen stole the van with Prisock’s body still inside.

Mississippi Department of Transportation employees found the van off Interstate 55 in Jackson with Prisock’s body inside.

Jackson police determined Prisock was killed in Ridgeland and the van was stolen and abandoned.

“Keen is both a liar and a murderer who stole money and a van from the victim.  Keen struck Prisock in the head with a claw hammer more than 40 times until his death and then drove around the Jackson area buying drugs with the dead body of the victim inside of the van.  Keen was high on marijuana, cocaine and alcohol at the time he killed Prisock,” Guest stated in a news release.

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