Southeast
South Carolina convict inches closer to first US death by firing squad in 15 years
A South Carolina death row inmate who gruesomely killed his ex-girlfriend’s parents with a baseball bat in 2001 is scheduled to be executed by firing squad on Friday – the first execution of its kind in the U.S. in 15 years.
Brad Sigmon, 67, who admitted to the killings because his ex-girlfriend refused to get back to him, will be blindfolded and strapped to a chair at around 6 p.m. before three volunteers armed with rifles about 15 feet away will fire bullets into his heart.
Each will be armed with .308-caliber, Winchester 110-grain TAP Urban ammunition often used by police marksmen. The bullet is designed to shatter on impact with something hard, like an inmate’s chest bones, sending fragments meant to destroy the heart and cause death almost immediately.
Brad Sigmon will be put to death by firing squad Friday. (Kinard Lisbon/South Carolina Department of Corrections via AP, left, South Carolina Department of Corrections via AP, right.)
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Just a few hours before the death sentence, the U.S. Supreme Court denied an emergency motion to suspend the execution.
It is scheduled for 6 p.m. ET at the Broad River Correctional Institution in Columbia.
The execution will go ahead if South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster and South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson signed off on it. Sigmon’s lawyers have asked McMaster to commute his death sentence to life in prison, arguing that he is a model prisoner and works every day to atone for the killings he committed after succumbing to severe mental illness. But no South Carolina governor has granted clemency in the 49 years since the death penalty resumed.
Sigmon chose the firing squad method over the electric chair which would “cook him alive,” or a lethal injection, whose details are kept secret in South Carolina, his lawyers said.
South Carolina keeping information secret about how it conducts lethal injections led him to decide on the firing squad, which he acknowledges will be a violent death, his lawyer said. On Thursday, Sigmon’s lawyers asked the Supreme Court to delay his execution because the state doesn’t release enough information about the lethal injection drug.
Sigmon said he carried out the brutal slayings because he was angry that victims Gladys and David Larke had been evicted from a trailer they owned. They were in separate rooms of their Greenville County home and Sigmon went back and forth attacking them until they were dead, investigators said.
He then kidnapped his ex-girlfriend, Rebecca Armstrong, in his car but she jumped out of the moving vehicle and was able to escape. Sigmon shot at her as she fled, but missed, prosecutors said.
A graphic depicting the firing execution scheduled to take place Friday. (AP)
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“My intention was to kill her and then myself,” Sigmon said in a confession typed out by a detective after his arrest. “That was my intention all along. If I couldn’t have her, I wasn’t going to let anybody else have her. And I knew it got to the point where I couldn’t have her.”
He told jurors during his trial that he was obsessed with her. “Did I love her? More than anything else in the world.”
Armstrong told USA Today this week that the killings ripped her family apart and that “he should answer for what he’s done.”
She said that her parents were simple country folk who had five children and were always looking out for everyone and that they’ve missed the births of some of their eight grandchildren and five great-grand children since they were murdered.
“They were the glue of the family,” Armstrong said, adding, “He took that away.”
Armstrong said she doesn’t believe in the death penalty and won’t attend the execution, although her son Ricky Sims will be there.
Sims told the Greenville News that he will be wearing a pair of boots that were the last gift his grandparents ever gave him.
“He’s going to pay for what he’s done,” Sims told the outlet. “He took away two people who would have done anything for their family. They were the rock of our family … They didn’t deserve it.”
Five states — Idaho, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Utah — authorize the use of firing squads in certain circumstances.
Just three inmates — in Utah in 1977, 1996 and 2010 — have faced a firing squad in the U.S. since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976. Ronnie Gardner was the last prisoner to be executed by firing squad, in Utah in 2010.
This photo provided by the South Carolina Department of Corrections shows the state’s death chamber in Columbia, S.C., including the electric chair, right, and a firing squad chair, left. (South Carolina Department of Corrections via AP)
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Executions in South Carolina resumed in September, when the state – once one of the busiest for executions – ended a 13-year pause in carrying out the death penalty.
The pause was caused in part by the state having difficulty obtaining lethal injection drugs after their supply expired because of pharmaceutical companies’ concerns that they would have to disclose they had sold the drugs to state officials. The state legislature then passed a shield law allowing officials to keep lethal injection drug suppliers private.
Twenty-five executions were carried out in the U.S. last year. Five have already been carried out in 2025, per the Death Penalty Information Center.
Fox News’ Landon Mion and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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Southeast
Florida teens in custody after 14-year-old girl found shot to death, burnt: sheriff
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Two teen boys in Florida are accused of fatally shooting a 14-year-old girl and setting her on fire along a wooded walking trail last week in what authorities are calling a “horrific” killing.
Santa Rosa County Sheriff Bob Johnson told reporters Thursday that the body has been identified as Danika Troy. He said Danika’s mother reported her as a runaway on Monday.
“Unbeknownst to the mother, Danika was murdered the previous night,” Johnson said.
A passerby discovered Danika’s body along a wooded area off Kimberly Road in Pace, a town about 16 miles northeast of Pensacola, and called 911, Johnson said.
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Santa Rosa County Sheriff Bob Johnson told reporters that the suspects were supposedly friends with the victim from school. He said investigators were still working to determine a motive. (Santa Rosa County Sheriff’s Office)
Investigators quickly identified the suspects as 14-year-old Kimahri Blevins and 16-year-old Gabriel Williams and took them into custody.
“This is where it gets really horrific,” Johnson said.
Kimahri Blevins, 14, is facing premeditated first-degree murder charges. Authorities are seeking to charge him as an adult. (Santa Rosa County Sheriff’s Office)
Williams allegedly stole his mother’s handgun and shot Danika.
“It’s bad enough you kill a 14-year-old. You’re 14. You’re 16,” Johnson said. “Shoot her multiple times, and then they set her on fire.”
Gabriel Williams, 16, is facing premeditated first-degree murder charges. Authorities are seeking to charge him as an adult. (Santa Rosa County Sheriff’s Office)
Johnson said investigators are still working to determine a motive.
“They have been interviewed, but the motive that they’re giving doesn’t fit the forensics or any facts of the case, so we don’t have a legit motive,” he told reporters.
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Blevins and Williams supposedly knew the victim from school, according to Johnson. He believed the two teens have had previous “run-ins” with law enforcement, though he could not immediately say if they had earlier arrests.
Blevins and Williams are being held at the Department of Juvenile Justice on premeditated first-degree murder charges.
“You don’t want to go out and see a burnt child with bullet holes,” Johnson said. “That’s not something you sign up for.”
Johnson said no parents have been charged at this time, though investigators are “looking into it.”
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The sheriff’s office is working with the State Attorney to charge both teens as adults.
“If you do an adult crime, you gotta do adult time,” Johnson said.
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Southeast
Florida college student who allegedly shipped 1,500 rounds of ammo to dorm had AR-15 under bed
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A Florida college student who allegedly ordered 1,500 rounds of ammunition to his dorm room also had a semi-automatic rifle under his bed, according to authorities.
Constantine Demetriades, a 21-year-old senior at Rollins College, was arrested by Winter Park police on Wednesday and charged with possession of a weapon on school property after the ammunition order was reported to police by the school’s assistant campus safety director, according to an arrest affidavit, WKMG reported.
After the purchase was flagged, the assistant safety director searched Demetriades’ dorm and allegedly discovered an unloaded AR-15 under his bed inside an unsecured black carrying case with one loaded magazine and five empty magazines, as well as a tactical vest, knives, a black security vest and ear protection.
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Constantine Demetriades, 21, was charged with possession of a weapon on school property. (Winter Park Police Department)
Demetriades, who said he likes to shoot as a hobby, told police he had the rifle on school property because he had recently returned from a Thanksgiving trip to New Jersey, where he said the guns were purchased and registered legally, according to the affidavit.
He said he did not have ill intentions and that he usually stores the firearm at a friend’s home off school property, the affidavit stated. He also said he only brought the gun to campus on one other occasion.
Constantine Demetriades said he did not have ill intentions. (Getty Images)
While Florida allows open carry, Rollins College bans all weapons on campus. Demetriades allegedly said he is aware that weapons are not allowed on campus and that his New Jersey concealed carry permit does not apply in Florida.
The college said in a statement obtained by Fox News Digital that he is banned from campus until the situation is resolved, adding that an internal investigation has been opened.
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While Florida allows open carry, Rollins College bans all weapons on campus. (Getty Images)
“On Wednesday, the College received a report indicating a violation of our weapons policy,” Rollins College said in a statement. “After receiving this information, we immediately initiated an investigation.”
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“We quickly identified and contacted the student, who cooperated fully with College officials and local law enforcement as we investigated the matter further,” the statement continued. “The student was arrested and is not permitted to be on campus while the College proceeds with the student conduct process.”
The school said Demetriades was additionally charged with a violation of the college’s weapons policy, and will go through the on-campus conduct process.
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Southeast
Marjorie Taylor Greene spars with ’60 Minutes’ host over ‘accusatory’ questions
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Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., briefly sparred with “60 Minutes” host Lesley Stahl over what she claimed was “accusatory” behavior from the journalist.
Greene gave her first sit-down interview with Stahl since announcing her resignation from Congress last month. During the segment, Stahl and Greene spoke about the Georgia lawmaker’s apology for taking part in “toxic politics.”
“I would like to say humbly, I‘m sorry for taking part in the toxic politics,” Greene told CNN in November. “It’s very bad for our country, and it’s been something I’ve thought about a lot, especially since Charlie Kirk was assassinated, is that we, I’m only responsible for myself and my own words and actions, and I am committed, and I’ve been working on this a lot lately to put down the knives in politics.”
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Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., gave her first sit-down interview with “60 Minutes” since announcing her resignation. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
“But you contributed to that,” Stahl asked Greene Sunday. “You. You, you were out there pounding, insulting people.”
Greene pushed back, claiming that Stahl had contributed to toxic politics herself.
“You’re accusatory, just like you did just then,” Greene said.
“I know you’re accusing me, but I’m smiling,” Stahl responded.
“You’re accusing me,” Greene said. “But we don’t have to accuse one another.”
The two continued to go back and forth, with Greene repeatedly insisting that Stahl should also acknowledge her own contribution to toxic politics.
“I don’t insult people,” Stahl said.
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Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., previously apologized for her role in “toxic” politics. (Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters)
“You just, you do in the way you question,” Greene said. “And you are, you’re accusing me right now.”
Fox News Digital reached out to CBS News for comment.
Greene previously sat down with Stahl in April 2023, when the two had a fiery exchange over the congresswoman’s claim that Democrats are the “party of pedophiles.”
MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE SAYS SHE HOPES TO ‘MAKE UP’ WITH TRUMP AMID ONGOING FEUD
“They are not pedophiles. Why would you say that?” Stahl exclaimed.
“Democrats support — even Joe Biden, the president himself — supports children being sexualized and having transgender surgeries. Sexualizing children is what pedophiles do to children,” Greene said.
“Wow,” Stahl reacted.
“60 Minutes” correspondent Lesley Stahl had a tense exchange with Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., over her claim that Democrats were the “party of pedophiles” during an April 2023 interview. (Screenshots/CBS News)
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Greene shocked the political landscape last month when she revealed she would leave Congress Jan. 5. Many believe her abrupt exit was the result of her soured relationship with President Donald Trump.
Fox News’ Joseph Wulfsohn contributed to this report.
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