A man who had been scheduled to die on April 8 for the kidnapping and murder of a Charleston woman 12 years ago, has been granted a stay of execution so he can pursue federal appeals. The stay for Joseph Gardner was granted U.S. District Judge Henry Herlong, according to the South Carolina attorney general's office. Gardner was convicted of the Dec. 30, 1992, killing of Melissa "Missi" McLauchlin, who was raped, tortured, shot five times in the face and left to die by the side of a road in Summerville. At the time of the shooting, police said Gardner and some other men made a New Year's resolution to rape and kill a white woman as retribution for 400 years of oppression of black people. Gardner, who was later arrested in Philadelphia, was the trigger man.
...Three black men, Matthew Mack, Matthew Williams, and Joseph Gardner ... watched a television news account of the biggest stories of 1992. When the videotaped beating and arrest of Rodney King came on the air, the third man, Gardner, spoke of “four hundred years of oppression,” and made a “New Year’s resolution” to “kill a white bitch.”
... soon the men were raping her. They put out the word within the trailer park that they had “captured a white woman,” and three other blacks arrived and raped her. Two black women, girlfriends of some of the rapists, were present in another room of the trailer, but did nothing to stop the attack. After they had enough, the men decided to get rid of the evidence—including Missi McLauchlin. They soaked her in bleach and hydrogen peroxide, and scrubbed her under the shower with a nylon brush, in the hope of ridding her skin of sperm or other evidence that could be linked to them. They forced her to scrub out her vagina with the same chemicals. They also talked openly of killing her. The men handcuffed her, blindfolded her, and put a heavy coat over her head. They then took her to a car, and forced her down onto the floorboards in the back. After they had driven for some time, she managed to get out of the handcuffs and began to struggle. Joseph Gardner, who was sitting in the front passenger seat, reached over the seat, held back her head, and shot her twice in the face. The driver pulled over 14 miles outside Charleston, where Gardner shot her three more times in the face and once in the arm. The men dumped her on the side of the road, drove back to Charleston, and went nightclubbing. A passing driver found Missi McLauchlin, miraculously alive, but she died before the ambulance arrived. It took police four days to identify the body, and a day later they located the trailer where Missi McLaughlin was raped. By January 9, 1993, police had arrested seven people including two of the ringleaders—Matthew Mack and Matthew Williams—and two women, Edna Williams and Indira Simmons, who were charged with being accessories to murder and sexual assault. Three of the rapists were sailors stationed at nearby Charleston Naval Base. The only suspect not in custody was the triggerman, Joseph Gardner, who had carried out his New Year’s resolution. Gardner, who was AWOL from the Navy, eluded police for nearly two years, and might never have been caught had the FBI not put him on the “ten most wanted” list. He was living in Philadelphia when someone saw his picture in the post office and tipped off the police. He was arrested on October 20, 1994, and is now on death row. Police suspected a racial motivation from the start, since they found a “crudely written racial diatribe” in the trailer, complete with racial epithets about white oppression, which claimed blacks were “justified in seeking revenge.”
that is sickening. It's been happening lately and more and more of that. I couldn't even think of such crimes. That is totally uncall for.
In fact, I believe this is the best post in this thread and possibly the entire internet! In fact, when I win the 2016 presidential election, I'm going to nominate shel90 for Supreme Court. Not just once, but 9 times. In other words, she will be the Supreme Court. It shall be renamed the Shel Judgement Factory, and all criminal cases will go through it. If she finds you guilty (which she probably will, because she's Shel), she will personally (and literally) throw you in the federal penitentiary, which shall be renamed Shel's Hell. The beds will be made of nails, the floors of glass, the walls of radium, and the ceilings will contain asbestos (out of necessity since the guards will be given flame throwers instead of guns or clubs). This country's justice system is about to see some change... with a vengeance! :rl:
It reminds me of another awful crime that happened in my area a few years ago.
