Greenville Man Sentenced for 2016 Murder

Dewayne RichardsonBreaking News, Mississippi Delta DA 4th District

Greenville, MS – John Lee Eanes pled guilty to the November 2016 murder of Sophia White on August 13, 2019. He pled guilty prior to trial in front of Circuit Court Judge Carol White-Richard. Eanes, who at the time of his guilty plea was 77 years of age, was convicted of the crime of Second Degree Murder and sentenced to twenty years with the Mississippi Department of Corrections. Eanes will have to serve fifteen years of that sentence in prison.

Sophia White was initially reported missing to the Greenville Police Department by family members in December of 2016. An investigation by the Greenville Police and her family led them to make contact with Eanes, who was a friend of the victim. Officers spoke with Eanes and he confessed to killing White after an argument over a card game. While speaking with officers, Eanes admitted to stabbing White multiple times with a knife. Officers recovered a large amount of forensic evidence at his home in Greenville linking him to the murder of White. Eanes ultimately led officers to a rural part of Washington County where he had hidden White’s body days before.

This case was prosecuted by Assistant District Attorneys John Herzog Jr. Kaylon McCou, and Austin Frye. Herzog said that “to describe the killing of Sophia White as brutal does not do justice to the way in which Ms. White was murdered by John Eanes and the way in which he disposed of her body.

The murder of White could not have been solved without her family members, who never ceased looking for her, and the investigation that was conducted by the Greenville Police Department. “Justice for Ms. White would have been denied had the family not worked so hard to solve her disappearance and murder with the help of the Greenville Police Department.” Herzog said.

Contact: W. Dewayne Richardson District Attorney, Fourth Circuit Court District | 662-378-2105