South Carolina Busted Arrest Records
Well-known South Carolina cases earn attention for their legal, historical, or public-interest record trail. An arrest, a charge, a plea, a verdict, a sentence, and an appeal are all separate events. The disposition is simply the result the court recorded. Outcomes can shift. The current Murdaugh order shows how a conviction changes on appeal. The table lays out the basic route. The case sections explain what each record can show.
The arrest is only the first record. Charges can change. A conviction can even be reversed. Confirm the latest entry with a case number and the court. People who get released may drop off a current locator. Keep federal prosecutions apart from county booking systems, since the arresting agency and the court that handled the charge often differ.
| Case | Year | Agency or court | Where the record lives |
|---|---|---|---|
| Richard Alexander “Alex” Murdaugh | 2021 and later | SLED, Florida law enforcement, Colleton County court | SLED release, Colleton General Sessions court, and the South Carolina Supreme Court opinion. |
| Dylann Storm Roof | 2015 to 2017 | North Carolina arrest process; federal prosecution in South Carolina | Federal docket and DOJ case record; the initial booking photo came from Shelby, North Carolina. |
| Michael Slager | 2015 | SLED, North Charleston Police, state and federal courts | SLED and Charleston County booking records; DOJ and federal court case record. |
| Susan Smith | 1994, 1995, 2024 | Union County Sheriff, SLED, parole board | Union County court file, sheriff and SLED records, and later SCDC/parole records. |
| Todd Kohlhepp | 2016 and 2017 | Spartanburg County Sheriff and Seventh Circuit | Spartanburg booking custodian and the circuit court case file. |
| George Stinney Jr. | 1944 and 2014 | Clarendon County authorities and court | Clarendon historical court records and SCDAH research routes; no original photo was verified. |
| Jason Barnes | 2022 and 2025 | Sumter County Sheriff and South Carolina Attorney General | Sumter court and detention records, plus the Attorney General’s case release. |
| Russell Laffitte | 2021 to 2025 | South Carolina Attorney General, SLED, federal partners | State grand jury and circuit court records, SLED files, and the Attorney General’s release. |
Busted Records: Murdaugh, Roof and Slager
Murdaugh's fall began in Florida. SLED and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement arrested him there on October 14, 2021. The two felony counts claimed he obtained property by false pretenses in the Gloria Satterfield investigation. He was returned to South Carolina to face them. The SLED arrest release records that event. Colleton County handled the later murder charges. Those charges sit apart from the 2021 booking. The Supreme Court's 2026 State v. Murdaugh opinion records the jury's March 2, 2023 verdict. It covered two murders and two weapons counts. Life sentences followed the next day. The court then reversed the denial of his new-trial motion and sent the case back for a new trial. The reason was improper outside influence on the jury, so the murder verdict no longer stands as final. His separate financial convictions require their own current checks. For state records, the Colleton General Sessions clerk, the county felony court, and SLED are the routes. Ask the agency holding the intake file for any booking photo. A media reproduction is not the original record. A court opinion is not a mugshot either. Match the arrest date, charge, court, and case number so later cases stay distinct. Roof's case followed a different path. He was arrested in North Carolina after the June 2015 killings at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston. His first booking and photo came from the Shelby process, not a Charleston County roster. Federal prosecutors handled the South Carolina case. The DOJ indictment statement identifies the federal case and the separate state prosecution. In December 2016, a federal jury convicted him on hate-crime, religious-obstruction, and firearms counts. The death sentence came in January 2017, and the District of South Carolina's sentencing release records that result without a booking image.
The federal release is a disposition record, not an arrest photo. Roof's arrest and first booking belong to the North Carolina route. The federal docket documents the South Carolina prosecution. Slager's case started differently. SLED arrested him after the shooting of Walter Scott. It was fatal, and it came during a North Charleston traffic stop. His state murder trial ended in a mistrial. He then pleaded guilty in federal court to depriving Scott of his civil rights. The DOJ case document records the admission and a 240-month sentence. That means 20 years. For arrest and booking records, contact SLED or the Charleston County detention custodian. The federal file holds the plea and sentence. A widely circulated image stays secondary unless an agency supplies the original.
Smith, Stinney and Kohlhepp
Union County Sheriff Howard Wells announced Susan Smith's arrest in 1994. Her two young sons had vanished. The Washington Post's contemporaneous report traces the arrest and the investigation that followed. A Union County jury convicted her in 1995. The sentence was life imprisonment. The parole board turned her down in 2024, per the Associated Press. The record chain runs from the court clerk and Union County Sheriff through SLED. It then reaches SCDC or parole records. No public official booking-photo URL exists. A newspaper scan is not an agency original.
George Stinney was 14 when Clarendon County arrested and prosecuted him in 1944. He was convicted and executed that same year. In December 2014 a circuit judge vacated the conviction, citing constitutional and due-process violations. A legislative exhibit reproduces materials from that order. SCDAH's Research and Genealogy route opens indexes, catalogs, and request options. That archive path still does not show an original photo survives.
Stinney was a child. Do not circulate an unverified face image of him. Today's juvenile-record rules govern current access, but they do not rewrite history. The 2014 vacation changed the conviction's legal standing. Yet it cannot turn a copied photograph into an official record. Nor can it confirm any original booking image exists. Cases involving children demand extra care with names and images. No authentic original photo is known.
Spartanburg County investigators arrested Todd Kohlhepp in 2016. They found a kidnapping victim on his property and tied him to multiple killings. On May 26, 2017, he pleaded guilty to seven murders. The deal spared him the death penalty. The case summary notes seven consecutive life sentences without parole. Extra terms cover kidnapping and criminal sexual conduct. The court file controls the docket. The booking record and photo sit with the Spartanburg County Sheriff and its Detention Center. Their official bookings search reflects current custody rather than a 2016 archive. Ask the custodian for a historical image. The plea stands as a separate matter from the original arrest.
Barnes and Laffitte Case Results
Sumter County connected Jason Barnes to the 2022 killing of Richard
Preusser, and he was arrested. A Sumter jury convicted him in June 2025 on murder and weapons charges. He got 38 years for murder. The weapons charge added five more. Both terms run concurrently, meaning at the same time. The Attorney General's official release credits the Sheriff's Office investigation and calls it the statewide Violent Crimes Case Reduction Unit's first trial conviction. The release shows the result, not a booking photo.
The original booking record sits in the Sumter County detention system. The official Sumter inmate search covers current custody only. Released people often drop off it, since the portal works as a live roster rather than a historical archive. The Sumter court record holds the outcome. Check the Judicial Branch case record for appeals before treating the 2025 verdict as final.
Russell Laffitte's state case grew out of the Murdaugh financial investigation. The Attorney General's Office, SLED, and federal partners drove it. In 2025 he pleaded guilty to eight state felony counts. Breach of trust, computer crime, and criminal conspiracy were among them. The Attorney General's release details the sentencing. The total state sentence runs 13 years. Active time runs with his federal sentence. A consecutive suspended five-year term adds probation and community service. No booking photo is posted in those files. Custody stage and arresting agency determine the custodian. Name the date, the agency, and the record when you request it. The state grand jury file, the circuit court record, and SLED investigative records form the official paper trail for his busted case.
Find South Carolina Busted Records
Start any search with the county that did the booking. Then find the court that handled the charge. The two can sit in different systems. A county roster shows intake and custody details, while a court roster points to public indexes and case events. Federal charges may follow an arrest. For older files, archive searches help, though photos are not guaranteed, so match the arresting agency, booking office, and court by date and case number.
- Identify the likely booking county and its original records custodian.
- Match the court county, case number, and event date before describing a dismissal, plea, mistrial, or conviction.
- For older material, follow the Old Mugshots archive route, then ask whether a photo or only a text record survives.
The South Carolina Judicial Branch Court Roster Search pulls together county and city options. It is separate from any jail intake portal. The page posts a notice about the live portal, and the search itself relies on browser JavaScript and cookies.
Apply the archive steps above to older cases. Then check the statewide South Carolina records overview for county rosters, court records, and feeds. Ask an agency for a photo only when it belongs to the record you seek. A booking image documents intake alone. Charges can be reduced, dropped, or resolved later in court. Keep the three apart. A custody page, a booking image, and a court result answer different questions. They often live in separate offices.