The man accused of killing the attorney for the Claiborne County Board of Supervisors and wounding another county employee has hired an attorney and asked for a preliminary court hearing.

Carl Brandon, 52, has retained Canton attorney Ed Blackmon and requested an immediate hearing in Claiborne County Justice Court, Court Clerk Mary Curry said Monday.

Blackmon is also a member of the Mississippi House of Representatives, serving several terms starting in 1979.

In about 20 minutes beginning about 8 a.m. on March 17 attorney Allen Burrell, 54, was shot and killed while arriving for work at his Market Street office and county road-department administrative secretary Loretha Porter was shot in her office on Mississippi 18.

In between, shotgun blasts were fired at the home of County Administrator James Miller, who was home alone, but was not injured.

Brandon surrendered at the Claiborne County Sheriff’s Department about 8:30 and has been jailed since on charges of murder, aggravated assault and shooting into an occupied public dwelling.

He has spoken only in a March 20 initial court appearance before Judge Daniel Lucas of Claiborne County Justice Court. At that time, Brandon said he had &#8220been made a criminal through the system here.” He was denied bond at the request of District Attorney Alexander Martin.

Blackmon confirmed that Brandon had hired him and said his request was for a preliminary hearing, at which &#8220bond may be requested.”

Curry said a hearing had not been scheduled but may be Wednesday.

Brandon, who was working as a special populations teacher in the Vicksburg Warren School District, was fired as Claiborne’s road manager in 1997 after being accused of sexual harassment. He appealed, unsuccessfully, through the court system. The state Supreme Court declined to hear his appeal in 2002.

At his initial court appearance Brandon asked for further investigation into his firing. He maintained that the accusation for which he was fired was false and was a pretext.

After being shot in the abdomen with a handgun, Porter was taken to University Medical Center in Jackson, where she was hospitalized for about two days before being released.