St. Francis County Sheriff Bobby May has said that while his department is waiting on lab reports to determine actual cause of death, trans woman Marcal Camero Tye — found dead early Tuesday near a rural highway outside of Forrest City, Ark. — appeared to have been shot in the head and then dragged by a car, according to WREG tv station out of Memphis.
WREG said Tye was 25, while other news outlets have said she was 24.
May also said he had reports that people nearby the scene had heard two gunshots in the area. Investigators have made plaster impressions of tire tracks at the scene that they hope will help them identify suspects in the murder.
Jennifer Bohannon, identified by WREG as a friend of Tye’s, said she had seen the victim just hours the shooting at her cousin’s house, and that Tye left there saying she was going home. Bohannon said Tye did not try to hide the fact that she was transgender, and Bohannon suggested Tye had been picked up by someone high on drugs and looking for sex, “And when they brought him down here they probably figured out, you know, noticed that he was a “dude” and probably took it from there and shot him and killed him.”
The first reports by WREG identified Tye as “a man wearing women’s clothes,” and used male pronouns to refer to her. However, after complaints by commenters online who suggested the station contact the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation for guidelines on reporting on transgender people, the station’s  latest reports identify Tye as transgender, saying she was “born male, but lived as a woman.”
Even though WREG changed its language, other news outlets in Arkansas have not. The Daily World out of Helena, Ark., which identified Tye as a former Helena-West Helena resident, reposted WREG’s original story including the “man in a dress” language. KTHV in Little Rock identified Tye as a “transgender man” and used male pronouns in its online story. And The Republic in Columbus, Ind., posted a story online calling Tye “a man dressed in women’s clothing.”