Execution set for S.C. double murderer in a case with Augusta ties

COLUMBIA, S.C. - A South Carolina man who was twice sentenced to die for killing two people nearly two decades ago has now been scheduled to be executed on June 13 for a case that has an Augusta connection.

The state Supreme Court issued the death warrant against Stephen Stanko for the Horry County shooting death of a friend. Stanko is also on death row for killing a woman he was living with in Georgetown County and raping her teenage daughter.

Stanko is the first person whose death has been scheduled in South Carolina’s since leaving him in agonizing pain beyond what’s expected

Stanko will get to decide if he dies by firing squad, lethal injection or the electric chair. The deadline for his decision is May 30.

The crimes

Stanko, 57, is being executed for killing his 74-year-old friend Henry Turner. Stanko went to Turner’s home in April 2006 after lying about his father dying and then shot Turner twice while using a pillow as a silencer, authorities said.

Stanko stole Turner’s truck, cleaned out his bank and then spent the next few days in Augusta, where he told people in town for the Masters golf tournament that he owned several Hooters restaurants.

He stayed with a woman who took him to church.

She then called police once she saw his photo and that he was wanted for murder, police said.

LOCAL CONNECTION

Death row: Aiken County offender is a condemned man

• Donnie Council is among the men on South Carolina’s death row. He was sent to prison in 1996, convicted of tying up a 72-year-old widow, sexually assaulting her, forcing her to drink cleaning solution and suffocating her.

Hours before killing Turner, Stanko beat and strangled his girlfriend in her home and raped her daughter before slashing the teen’s throat. The daughter survived and testified against him at one of his trials.

Greg Hembree, who prosecuted one of the trials, later became a state senator and was the chief sponsor of the 2021 law that allowed South Carolina to use a firing squad.

Stanko itted to the killings. His defense said he had problems with the frontal lobe of his brain that left him aggressive, unable to control his impulses and without empathy. They argued that he was either not guilty by reason of insanity or that he at least shouldn’t get the death penalty because of his mental illness.

In his appeals, Stanko said his trial attorney ruined his chance at a fair trial and lost any sympathy with jurors by calling him a “psychopath.”

Firing squad problems

Any final appeals by Stanko in the weeks before his execution will likely include the problems Mahdi’s lawyers raised after his firing squad death.

The only photo of Mahdi taken at his autopsy shows two apparent chest wounds. Officials said all three bullets fired by the three volunteer prison employees hit Mahdi, with two going through the same hole.

During the state’s first firing squad death, the autopsy found that Brad Sigmon’s heart had been destroyed. Just one of the four chambers of Mahdi’s heart was perforated, which likely meant he didn’t die in the 15 seconds experts predicted he would have if the squad’s aim was true, according to his lawyers.

Witnesses said Mahdi, who had a hood over his head, groaned 45 seconds after he was shot.

South Carolina’s busy death chamber

Stanko will be the sixth inmate killed in South Carolina since an unintended 13-year pause on executions ended in September 2024.

The state struggled for years to get the drugs needed for lethal injections until it ed a shield law that allowed the execution procedures, and the names of the drug supplier and execution team , to remain secret.

Three South Carolina inmates have died by lethal injection over the past eight months, while two have chosen the firing squad.

Across the U.S., 16 executions have taken place in 2025, with at least six more scheduled before Stanko is set to die.

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