No amount of money can replace a father.

And so 18-year-old Sabrina DeLaughter wept Tuesday night whenthe Masons of Fair River Lodge presented her with a scholarshipworth $4,000 per semester in honor of her late father MikeDeLaughter, who was killed while cutting hay in a Bogue Chittofield this summer.

“I’d rather him be here than to get that money,” she said.

Sabrina is attending Copiah-Lincoln Community College this year,playing softball for the Lady Wolves while planning a transfer tothe University of Southern Mississippi, where she will major inelementary education. She’s short, blonde and cute, like countlessother college girls in Mississippi, but few others have had to dealwith the news that she has faced in her young life.

“It’s been rough,” she said. “My faith and my family have keptme going.”

Mike DeLaughter, 58, cut hay for a living, and died whilecutting it, too. His body was found with a gunshot wound to thehead on June 14 in a field near Bogue Chitto Road. Authorities saidhe may have been dead there for 24 hours, and his body appeared tohave been moved from the site of the killing.

No arrests have been made in connection with DeLaughter’sdeath.

Family matriarch Beth DeLaughter said her slain husband placedgreat emphasis on his children’s education. Last year, she said, hewas particularly excited when he received information from thelodge about the scholarship Sabrina ultimately received thisweek.

“I said, ‘Honey, you have to be deceased for that.’ I put it upin the closet,” she said in recalling last year’s incident. “Ididn’t look at it again until after (Fair River Lodge) called meabout it.”

Since DeLaughter was a member of the Fair River Lodge and aMason in good standing, his children are eligible for suchscholarships. Younger daughter Madeline, a junior at BrookhavenHigh School, will be eligible when her day comes as well.

With current tuition prices per semester at USM totalingslightly less than $4,000, the scholarship should provide a majorboost in funding Sabrina’s college education.

“There are no words to explain how much help that is, that’stremendous,” said Beth DeLaughter. “(Sabrina) was working and wewere planning on government assistance.”

Lodge Master John Alfred Brock said the scholarship, which isfunded through the Grand Lodge of Mississippi, should be sufficientto cover tuition costs at any of the state’s major universities. Hesaid Fair River Lodge members were adamant about pursuing thescholarship for Sabrina as a way to honor Mike DeLaughter.

“He was as fine a person as you’d ever want to meet,” Brocksaid. “He was a No. 1 person. Why something like that would happento him, that’s just something we couldn’t understand. I have noidea why anyone would have wanted to have done something likethat.”

The Lincoln County Sheriff’s Department continues to investigateDeLaughter’s death, but Sheriff Steve Rushing said no developmentshave arisen. He said the department is still awaiting completeresults from fingerprint tests done on DeLaughter’s truck, whichappeared to have been concealed in the bushes, and the few suspectstargeted in the case “haven’t panned out at this point.”

“There’s just not a whole lot of information to go on at thispoint,” Rushing said. “It was a real isolated area, and not a lotof information is panning out at this point.”

Rushing said anyone with any information regarding DeLaughter’sdeath should call the sheriff’s department at 601-835-5231 or CrimeStoppers at 601-823-0150.

Beth DeLaughter said she still checks on the status of herhusband’s case often. She keeps it off her mind by staying busy andplaying with her grandchildren.

“Try not to think a lot about it. When it gets quiet at night,that’s when you really start thinking about it,” she said.