DESOTO COUNTY, Miss. — A manhunt intensified on Thursday for a former Memphian charged with keeping his girlfriend in a box, after she and her 17-year-old son’s bodies were discovered this morning at a home in Missouri.
Police considered James Barton Horn, Jr. to be a suspect.
Horn was convicted of kidnapping and raping other women in the past as well, including two from our area.
His ex-wife and 18-year-old son still lived in Southaven.
His former step-daughter also lived in DeSoto County.
Police were on high alert and placed the woman and her family in protective custody until Horn is caught.
Another woman in Memphis told WREG her daughter dated Horn for only five weeks before he attacked her.
“It was a nightmare,” she said.
The woman said to this day her daughter was still scared of Horn.
WREG will not identify the woman for her own protection.
She said she did not think much about it when her daughter started dating Horn about 20 years ago.
“At the beginning he was a nice person, but then when she broke up with him it was like a 380,” she recalled.
One day in February, 1992, her daughter did not show up for work.
Police said Horn broke into her house, taped her mouth, tied her hands and raped her.
“He kidnapped her and took her across the state line in his 18 wheeler,” her mother said.
Horn continued to rape her for seven hours before dropping her back off at her home.
He was convicted and went to prison.
He later got out in 1995.
Just a year later, police said he attacked a Southaven woman who was divorcing him at the time.
They told WREG he locked his stepdaughter, who was 8 years old at the time, in a closet while he raped the woman.
He then kidnapped her.
According to reports he threw her in a locked trunk and took her to a Missouri hotel where he held a knife to her throat.
An FBI swat team rescued her.
He was sentenced again and released in 2011.
Now, after an ex-girlfriend and her son in Missouri were found murdered Thursday morning, family of the local victim said they were desperate for him to be caught.
Only this time, they hoped a judge would decide to throw away the key.
Southaven police said they would be running extra patrols and have put out a BOLO in case he tries traveling to our area.
