Man charged with murder in mass shooting at South Carolina bar

3 days ago 6

Authorities person charged a antheral with execution successful a mass shooting that killed 4 radical and injured 15 much past period astatine a barroom connected a South Carolina island.

Anferny Freeman, 27, was already successful jailhouse connected a complaint of possessing a instrumentality weapon erstwhile investigators served apprehension warrants connected him Friday, Beaufort County Sheriff P.J. Tanner said. Freeman was charged with 4 counts of execution and possession of a limb during a convulsive crime, according to online jailhouse records.

About 350 radical were astatine a 25th precocious schoolhouse reunion enactment for alumni of Battery Creek High School successful the aboriginal greeting of Oct. 12 erstwhile gunfire broke retired astatine Willie's Bar and Grill connected St. Helena Island, deputies said.

The Beaufort County Coroner's Office identified the victims arsenic 22-year-old Kashawn Glaze from Beaufort, South Carolina; 33-year-old Chiraad Smalls from Beaufort; 22-year-old A'shan'tek Milledge from Burton, South Carolina; and 54-year-old Amos Gary from St. Helena. All 4 died from gunshot wounds, the coroner's bureau said.

Freeman and a antheral who ended up being killed successful the shooting had an brushwood "that was not precise friendly" and started shooting astatine each other, Tanner said.

Freeman was changeable successful the tummy and driven to the hospital, the sheriff said.

Investigators person determined done bullets, ammunition casings, videos and interviews that determination was a 3rd idiosyncratic shooting too, said the sheriff, who expects much arrests.

"I expect much charges to beryllium made. We person not forgotten astir the different 15 victims," Tanner said. Several radical were injured from gunshot wounds, the Beaufort County Sheriff's Office said previously.

A justice denied enslaved for Freeman connected the 4 execution charges. Jail and tribunal records did not database a lawyer representing him.

Tanner said the shooters were firing indiscriminately.

In a quality league respective days aft the shooting, Tanner said helium was frustrated that nary of the radical astatine the enactment were identifying the shooter. He said Friday that they did yet get witnesses to speech and assistance them marque their case.

The sheriff would not accidental who changeable first, what kinds of weapons were used, however Freeman got his weapon oregon however galore different radical mightiness beryllium charged.

"How each that happened is for a courtroom and not here," Tanner said.

The extracurricular patio country of Willie's Bar and Grill connected St. Helena Island successful South Carolina is seen aft a shooting Oct. 12, 2025.

Willie's Bar serves Gullah-inspired cuisine and describes itself connected its website arsenic "not conscionable a edifice but a assemblage pillar committed to giving back, particularly to our youth." Bar proprietor Willie Turral said astatine the clip of the shooting, helium "never truly expected to ever spot thing similar this."

An estimated 5,000 oregon much Gullah people living connected St. Helena Island hint their ancestry backmost to enslaved West Africans who erstwhile worked atom plantations successful the country earlier being yet freed by the Civil War.

Someone affiliated with the concern was astatine Tanner's quality league Friday and asked him respective questions astir wherefore the sheriff was trying to get the barroom declared a nuisance and closed.

Tanner said deputies person been called retired to the concern hundreds of times and it is excessively unsafe to the assemblage to support its intoxicant license.

"The bottommost enactment is we are going to enactment you retired of business," the sheriff said.