South Carolina’s longest-serving demise row inmate dies of pure causes after 42 years in jail

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — A South Carolina inmate who spent 42 years on demise row has died of pure causes at a jail hospital, in response to the state Division of Corrections.

Fred Singleton, 81, was sentenced to die in 1983 for raping and strangling a girl in Newberry County and stealing her jewellery, in response to courtroom data. He was the state’s longest-serving inmate on demise row.

Singleton spent his final three a long time in jail in authorized limbo after the state Supreme Court docket dominated he wasn’t competent to be executed as a result of he did not perceive he might die within the electrical chair and solely answered questions from his attorneys with “sure” or “no.”

However the justices additionally determined in 1993 that Singleton’s demise sentence ought to stay in case advances in psychology allowed him to get higher and that he could not be compelled to take remedy to enhance his psychological state solely so he might be executed.

Prosecutors mentioned Singleton broke into the house of 73-year-old widow Elizabeth Lominick in 1982. Two of her sisters and her niece discovered her physique. She had been strangled with a bedsheet. Singleton’s fingerprints have been discovered on the display to a toilet window.

When Singleton was arrested in Georgetown County, he had Lominick’s diamond and gold rings in his pockets and her automotive, with Singleton’s fingerprints in it, was discovered close by, police mentioned.

Singleton’s demise leaves 24 males on South Carolina’s demise row. The state had 48 inmates on demise row on the finish of 2014.

South Carolina has executed six inmates since then, all in 2024 or 2025. The others off demise row have both had convictions overturned and been resentenced or died of pure causes.

The longest-serving inmate now on demise row is Jamie Wilson, 56, who has been there for 34 years.

Wilson killed two 8-year-old women and injured a number of different lecturers and college students in a 1988 capturing at a Greenwood County elementary college.

Wilson is in an analogous authorized limbo to Singleton. Wilson was thought of mentally sick on the time of his trial. He had a competency listening to in 2011, however the choose apparently has not issued a ruling in his case.