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Bobby Stone South Carolina Death Row

Bobby Stone was sentenced to death by the State of South Carolina for the murder of Sumter County Sheriff Sergeant Charlie Kubala. According to court documents Bobby Stone would shoot and kill Sumter County Sheriff Sergeant Charlie Kubala when he responded to a domestic violence call. Bobby Stone would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death

South Carolina Death Row Inmate List

Bobby Stone 2021 Information

Admission Date: 01/29/1997

Location: Broad River

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This case arises out of the shooting death of a Sumter County Sheriff’s Deputy. According to Appellant, he began the day leading up to the fatal encounter by purchasing some alcohol and two firearms. Appellant spent the remainder of the day wandering in the woods near what would become the crime scene, shooting the firearms and becoming increasingly intoxicated. Towards the end of the day, Appellant attempted to visit the home of an acquaintance near the woods.

The acquaintance asked Appellant to leave her property, and the acquaintance later reported the incident to the police. After hearing banging on a door to her home and gunshots outside her house, the acquaintance phoned the police again. The victim was the first officer to respond to the call, and the evidence at trial established that Appellant was on the acquaintance’s porch near a side door when the victim arrived at the scene. The occupants of the home directed the victim towards the porch as the source of the disturbances, and as the victim neared the side porch, he sustained two fatal gunshot wounds. While the State alleged that Appellant shot the victim intentionally, Appellant claimed that he was startled when the victim turned a corner outside the home and yelled “Halt!” or “Hold it!” and that the gun fired accidentally.

A jury convicted Appellant of murder and sentenced him to death

https://caselaw.findlaw.com/sc-supreme-court/1388852.html

Sammie Stokes South Carolina Death Row

Sammie Stokes was sentenced to death by the State of South Carolina for the sexual assault and murder of Connie Snipes. According to court documents Sammie Stokes was paid $2000 by Patti Syphrette to kill her daughter-in-law, 21-year-old Connie Snipes, The victim would be picked up and brought to a wooded area where she was sexually assaulted and then murdered. Sammie Stokes would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death

South Carolina Death Row Inmate List

Sammie Stokes 2021 Information

Admission Date: 10/31/1999

Location: Broad River

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U.S. Supreme Court refused Monday to consider the appeal of a death row inmate convicted of murdering a woman in Orangeburg County.

Sammie Stokes admitted to a role in the 1998 contract killing of Connie Snipes. But he appealed the results of his 1999 trial, noting the attorney who represented him also prosecuted him seven years earlier.

Keir Weyble, Stokes’ attorney in the Supreme Court case, said his client will have several options to appeal the case at the federal level. He said the case is currently pending in U.S. District Court.

Should the federal district court refuse to hear Stokes’ case, it would go up to the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals and then the U.S. Supreme Court again, if needed.

“There is a fair amount of standard litigation to go,” Weyble said Monday.

An execution date has not been scheduled for Stokes.

The high court rejected three other death penalty appeals Monday.

Stokes was charged after the nearly nude body of 21-year-old Connie Snipes was found in Branchville in May 1998.

She had been shot twice in the head and an autopsy showed she had been sexually assaulted. Stokes and Snipes had been acquaintances prior to the mutilation and killing of Snipes.

Stokes was promised $2,000 for Snipes’ death.

Stokes was sent to the South Carolina Department of Corrections on Halloween Day 1999 after being found guilty on charges of murder, kidnapping, criminal conspiracy and first-degree criminal sexual misconduct.

In his appeal, the 49-year-old Stokes said defense attorney Thomas Sims also prosecuted him seven years earlier for assaulting his ex-wife and never informed the judge about the earlier case.

During the penalty phase of his trial, Sims asked the jury not to give Stokes the death penalty because he had shown remorse.

Sims never told the judge of his prior involvement in prosecuting Stokes, or that the earlier case relied in large part on the testimony of Stokes’ ex-wife, Audrey Smith, according to Stokes’ current lawyers.

When prosecutors called Smith to testify in the sentencing phase of the murder trial, Sims pulled his punches, Stokes’ lawyers wrote in their Supreme Court filing.

Sims rejected the idea that he did anything wrong. Sims said he and Stokes discussed the matter and that Stokes said he wanted Sims to remain as his lawyer.

Sims told the Associated Press, “I fought for Sammie and I wanted him to live out his life.”

Executions and new death sentences have been declining in recent years in the U.S. Twenty inmates in five states have been executed in 2016, the lowest number since 1991, when 14 people were put to death. No more executions are scheduled this year.

https://thetandd.com/news/local/death-row-appeal-rejected/article_2873fb76-286b-5e38-ba3c-951d2e09e448.html

Stephen Stanko South Carolina Death Row

Stephen Stanko was sentenced to death by the State of South Carolina for the murders of Laura Ling (43) and Henry Lee Turner (74) . According to court documents Stephen Stanko would break into a home and murder Laura Ling and Henry Turner and sexually assault a female teen. Stephen Stanko would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death

South Carolina Death Row Inmate List

Stephen Stanko 2021 Information

Admission Date: 08/18.2006

Location: Broad Creek

Stephen Stanko More News

Death row inmate Stephen Stanko is scheduled to be transferred to Georgetown County for a hearing on Jan. 28, Clerk of Court Alma White has confirmed.
White says she has not been told the exact purpose for the hearing but, she said, he is in the appeals portion of the process.
Stephen Stanko, now age 50, is housed at Kirkland Correctional Facility in Columbia.
He has been given two death sentences. One by a jury in Georgetown County and the other by an Horry County jury.
Stanko was arrested in April 2005 for the death of his girlfriend, Laura Ling, the brutal attack and attempted murder of Ling’s daughter – who was 15-years-old at the time – and the shooting death of Henry Turner of Horry County.
Stanko met Laura Ling at the Socastee Library where she was a librarian. They struck up a relationship and Stephen Stanko moved in with Ling and her daughter in their Murrells Inlet home.
Ling and Stanko were also friends with Turner who frequented the library quite often.
On the morning of the crimes, Stephen Stanko stabbed Laura Ling repeatedly inside the home they shared as Ling’s daughter watched in horror.
He then stabbed and raped the teen before fleeing the home in Laura Ling’s vehicle. After withdrawing cash from Ling’s bank account, Stephen Stanko drove to the home of Turner. He shot the 74-year-old man and stole his vehicle
After a nationwide manhunt, based on tips received after the posting of a $10,000 reward for information leading to his capture, Stanko was arrested without incident by the U.S. Marshals Service in Augusta, Georgia on April 12, 2005.
Stephen Stanko stood trial in Georgetown County in 2006. His Horry County trial was in 2009.
During his trials, and in subsequent appeals hearings, Stanko’s lawyers have argued he suffers from a brain defect which caused him to commit the crimes.
GAB News has reached out to Stanko’s attorneys for more information about the upcoming hearing but, as of this posting, no response has been received.
According to court documents filed Jan. 2, Stephen Stanko is now being represented by Lindsey Vann of Columbia and Florence attorney Henry Anderson Jr.

According to those latest court filings, Stephen Stanko says during his trial he was deprived of qualified counsel.
The documents state Stephen Stanko is asking for $10,000 from the state to pay Dr. Joseph Wu, an expert on psychiatric disorders and brain scanning.
Of that amount, $9,000 will be for the doctor’s time (he charges $300 per hour) and $1,000 will be for his travel expenses.
In the filing, it is said the money is needed to make sure Stanko can have adequate resources for his appeal. A date for that appeal has not yet been set.
During Stanko’s trials and Post Conviction Relief (PCR) hearings, his defense presented evidence indicating a brain issue played a major role in the murders of Ling and Turner and the attack on the teen.
During his trial in Horry County in 2009, Dr. Wu testified Stanko has “significant impairment in detecting right from wrong and controlling his impulses.”
However, another doctor, Mark Einhorn said most of his tests on Stephen Stanko done while he was in prison came back fine.
State law, according to the document, allows death row inmates the chance to seek expert witnesses if a court rules such witnesses “are reasonably necessary for the representation of the defendant.”
If a court determines the expert is needed, the court “shall order the payment of fees and expenses.”
Stanko’s lawyers, in the documents, say because a capital case is “an extraordinary proceeding” where the defense is “charged with the awesome responsibility of defending a person’s life”, expert testimony is “particularly essential.”
The documents state Stephen Stanko has an IQ of 143 “and little history of violent behavior.” It notes the crimes were “extremely violent and poorly planned” and were “an aberration” from Stanko’s “known character.”
The attorneys are also asking the court to allow Dr. Wu to examine Stanko’s life history, something – the documents state – has not been done previously.

http://gabnewsonline.com/death-row-inmate-stephen-stanko-seeks-for-his-appeal-hearing-set-f-p2511-170.htm

Fred Singleton South Carolina Death Row

Fred Singleton was sentenced to death by the State of South Carolina for the sexual assault and murder of an elderly woman Elizabeth Sease Lominick. According to court documents Fred Singleton would break into the home of Elizabeth Sease Lominick, sexually assault the 73 year old woman before murdering her and robbing her home. Fred Singleton would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death

South Carolina Death Row Inmate List

Fred Singleton 2021 Information

Admission Date: 09/19/1983

Location: Broad River

Fred Singleton More News

On September 9, 1982, two sisters and a niece of 73 year old widow Mrs. Elizabeth Sease Lominick found her body in the bedroom of her Newberry County home, strangled with a bedsheet. The medical examiner found sperm and hemorrhaging in her vagina. The appellant was arrested in Georgetown County with diamond and gold jewelry and about $100 belonging to the victim in his pockets. The victim’s car was also found in Georgetown County after the appellant identified it to a passer-by as his. The appellant’s fingerprints were found on the car and on the screen to the bathroom window of Mrs. Lominick’s house.

https://law.justia.com/cases/south-carolina/supreme-court/1985/22230-1.html

Mitchell Sims South Carolina Death Row

Mitchell Sims was sentenced to death by the State of South Carolina for a double murder during an armed robbery. According to court documents Mitchell Sims would force two employees of a Domino’s Pizza into the back of the restaurant where he would torture and shoot Gary Melke, 24, and Christopher Zerr, 24. Christopher Zerr would die immediately and Gary Melke would be able to identify Mitchell Sims as the killer before dying. Mitchell Sims is also under a death sentence in California for the murder of John Harrington and another armed robbery. Mitchell Sims would be arrested and sentenced to death in both South Carolina and California

South Carolina Death Row Inmate List

Mitchell Sims 2021 Information

Location: California Death Row

Admission Date: 06/28/1989

Mitchell Sims More News

District Attorney Steve Cooley asked the Los Angeles Superior Court today to order the execution of two long-time Death Row inmates with a court-approved single-drug protocol currently used in other parts of the country.

In motions filed by Deputy District Attorney Michele Hanisee, the court was asked to order the executions of Mitchell Carleton Sims, 52, and Tiequon Aundray Cox, 46, each of whom have been on San Quentin’s Death Row for a quarter of a century.

Mitchell Sims and Tiequon Cox were tried and convicted of first-degree murder by juries. The jurors in each case also found the special circumstances alleged against each defendant to be true. The same juries recommended that each die for their crimes. Judges reviewed the jury recommendations and agreed, formally sentencing each man to death. Each killer appealed the conviction and sentence. Every appellate court turned them down,” the District Attorney said in a written statement.

It is time Sims and Cox pay for their crimes,” he added.

“I am joining with the California District Attorneys Association and other District Attorneys throughout California in asking the Superior Courts throughout the state to hold these killers responsible for the innocent lives they took so many years ago.”

In the motions filed with the court, Hanisee asked that the executions be ordered using a single-drug method or that the warden at San Quentin show cause why the death penalty by lethal injection should not be imposed.

Executions in California have been on hold for years.

The most recent stay was granted by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals after the Riverside County District Attorney obtained an execution date for condemned inmate Albert Greenwood Brown.

The stay was based on allegations that a three-drug protocol that California used for executions put the condemned at risk of pain and suffering.

Sims was sentenced to death on May 7, 1986, after being convicted of murdering a Domino’s pizza deliveryman in Glendale on Dec. 8, 1985.

Sims was found guilty in the strangulation and drowning of 21-yaer old John Steven Harrigan.

Police found Harrigan’s hog-tied body submerged in the motel-room bathtub.

A washcloth had been stuffed in his mouth and a pillowcase tied over his head.

Sims was also is charged with two counts of robbery and attempted murder in an assault against two of Harrigan’s co-workers at the Brand Boulevard pizza establishment later that night.

Sims, a disgruntled pizza delivery driver, had fled the restaurant where he worked in Hanahan, S.C., after murdering two co-workers.

He fled to California with his girlfriend, who also was convicted and is serving a life sentence.

Sims was also sentenced to death in the South Carolina murders.

Cox, a Rollin 60s gang member, slaughtered a grandmother, her daughter and two grandchildren – one 8 and the other 13 – on Aug. 31, 1984.

Armed with a .30 caliber military rifle, Cox shot the grandmother three times in the head and went on to execute her grandsons as they slept in their beds. The 24-year-old mother of the two boys woke up and screamed before Cox shot her dead.

A 14-year-old male cousin hid in a closet, which saved his life.

Hanisee noted in her motions filed today with Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Patricia Schnegg that the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has acknowledged at various court hearings – one as recent as Feb. 14 of this year – that it is fully capable of performing a single-drug execution.

“It is time to enforce the law of the state and carry out the death sentences that have been returned by juries, imposed by trial judges and affirmed by our appellate court system,” Cooley added.