Man Pleads Not Guilty in Transgender Death

A Navy sailor from New Orleans has pleaded not guilty to charges accusing him of stabbing and slashing a transgender woman 119 times in a Jackson County hotel room.
Twenty-year-old Dwanya Hickerson is charged with capital murder of 25-year-old Dee Whigham.
Hickerson entered the plea Thursday in state court in Pascagoula. He was stationed at Keesler Air Force Base when Whigham was killed July 23rd in St. Martin. Whigham was visiting with friends who found her body in a hotel room shower.
Investigators identified Hickerson as a suspect after releasing surveillance video of a man leaving the room with his shirt around his neck.