From that article:
Connections
Brown's investigative work reveals many tangled connections between victims, suspects, and the police.
[2][6] Most of the victims knew each other well.
[3] Some were related by blood (such as cousins Kristen Gary Lopez and Brittney Gary) or lived together (Gary lived with Crystal Benoit shortly before her death).
[2] The victims also shared in common traits such as poverty, mental illness, and histories of drug abuse and prostitution.
[1][2]
The women all also served as informants for the police about the local drug trade and often provided police with information about other Jeff Davis 8 victims before their own deaths.
[2]
Kristen Lopez, one of the victims, was present when police shot and killed a drug dealer named Leonard Crochet in 2005 along with several individuals connected to the Jeff Davis 8 case, including Alvin "Bootsy" Lewis, who fathered a child with victim Whitnei Dubois and is also the brother in law of the first victim, Loretta Chaisson Lewis.
[2] A grand jury investigated the shooting and determined there was no probable cause for a charge of negligent homicide against police even though a Louisiana State Police investigation into the Crochet shooting concluded that he was unarmed when he was shot to death by law enforcement.
[2] However, witnesses told investigators they believed the police had killed many of the victims because of what they knew about the shooting of Leonard Crochet.
[2]
Investigation
In December 2008, a task force consisting of 14 federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies was formed to solve the killings.
[4][5] From the outset, the task force was searching for a serial killer.
[1] However, Brown's recent investigative work exposing connections between victims, suspects, and the police casts doubt on the theory that the Jeff Davis 8 is the work of a serial killer.
[4][6] Family members of the victims suspect the police are actually responsible for the deaths.
[4]
Allegations of misconduct
Task force investigative reports reveal a series of witness interviews in which local law enforcement were implicated in the murders.
[2] Statements from two female inmates portrayed suspects working with the sheriff's office to dispose of evidence in the Lopez case.
[2] However, the sergeant who took the statements was forced out of his job, and the allegations were ignored by law enforcement.
[2]
Sheriff's office chief criminal investigator, Warren Gary, was also accused of purchasing a truck suspected of having been used to transport a body for the purpose of discarding evidence.
[4][7]
In 2009, the sheriff ordered that every investigator working the Jeff Davis 8 case be swabbed for DNA in response to the accusations against investigators.
[2] However, the office refuses to comment on the results of the DNA testing.
[2]
Suspects
Police have arrested or issued warrants for the arrest of four people in connection with the case.
[1] Two people were held on murder charges for months before being released due to issues with evidence.
[1]
Frankie Richard, a local strip club owner and suspected drug dealer
[1][2] admitted to being a crack addict and to having sex with most of the victims.
[1] He was among those last seen with one of the victims, Kristen G. Lopez.
[1] Law enforcement's own witnesses have connected Richard to the Sheriff's Office.
[3] The two female inmates who stated the Sheriff's Office disposed of evidence in the Lopez case alleged that the evidence was discarded at the behest of Richard.
[2]
Byron Chad Jones and Lawrence Nixon (a cousin of the fifth victim, Laconia Brown) were briefly charged with second-degree murder in the Ernestine Patterson case.
[2] However, the sheriff's office did not test the alleged crime scene until 15 months after Patterson's murder, and found it "failed to demonstrate the presence of blood."
[2]