QUITMAN COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI — A man who forced his way into the home of a woman that he had been dating was fatally shot by the woman on January 14th. Sherron Daniels fired one shot from a deer hunting rifle, striking and killing Billy Earl Macknally after he broke into her front door.
The two had been dating since May 2020, without any issues…until this week. Daniels says Macknally hit her with a whiskey bottle and started beating her. “He was nice up until Monday night, and something just snapped in him, and he was just going crazy,” she said. “I thought I was going to die. He beat me for 10 hours. Beat and tortured me for 10 hours.”
She drove herself to a Batesville hospital on Tuesday. “My head was bleeding real bad but I didn’t have any broken bones or anything like that.” When she was discharged Wednesday, she went straight to Justice Court in Marks to get a warrant, fearing something worse was going to happen. “I had my friend come spend the night with me Wednesday night ‘cause I was scared. Scared he was gonna come back,” she said. “He did come back.”
Before Quitman County deputies could locate Macknally, he showed up on Daniels’ front porch. Daniels said she was ready with a high-powered rifle. “Me and my friend was so scared,” she said. “I grabbed my gun, she ran to the bedroom. He busted out the front glass window and got in the house and was coming the bedroom where we were at. And I shot him.”
Daniels said she was told the shooting was “justified” and has not been charged. The Quitman County coroner confirmed that the man killed was Macknally.
While this wasn’t a matter of concealed carry, the woman was in fear for her life and did use her gun to defend herself and her friend against a man with a history of violence against her.
