Mississippi pawnshop sued in Chicago cop’s death

By Annie Sweeney, Chicago Tribune reporter -6:45 a.m. CDT, April 25, 2013

Mississippi attorney Don Barrett knows well the worries of gun owners. After all, he’s one himself.

“We don’t want anybody messing with our guns,” he said.

But what happened to Thomas Wortham IV is different, says Barrett, who joined with the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence to sue a Mississippi pawnshop that sold a handgun used to kill the off-duty Chicago police officer three years ago.

The lawsuit, filed Wednesday in Oxford, Miss., on behalf of Wortham’s parents and sister, accused the pawnshop of negligence for failing to recognize clues that the gun’s buyer was making an illegal purchase and then blocking the sale.

As appeared in newspaper, with Tribune 2010 photo of Ed’s Pawn Shop, in Byhalia, MS.