SC

SC Corrections: Prison? Or Playtime?

Remember Carter Strange? He was the then-19-year-old white kid who was nearly beaten to death in downtown Columbia, S.C. in the spring of 2011 by a mob of black teenagers. We wrote last February about the total lack of justice in this case, highlighting how Strange has had to undergo multiple…

Remember Carter Strange? He was the then-19-year-old white kid who was nearly beaten to death in downtown Columbia, S.C. in the spring of 2011 by a mob of black teenagers.

We wrote last February about the total lack of justice in this case, highlighting how Strange has had to undergo multiple surgeries to repair the damage done to his face (and his brain) – leaving his family with a stack of unpaid medical bills. Meanwhile the thugs who beat him to within an inch of his life largely evaded accountability for their actions … which is sort of par for the course in Columbia, S.C. thanks to incompetent law enforcement and lenient judges.

Oh, and downtown Columbia, S.C. remains as violent as ever … 

One of the only attackers sentenced to jail time in the Carter Strange beating was then-19-year-old Tyheem Henry – who is currently serving a fifteen-year sentence at Lee County Correctional Institution, which is part of the S.C. Department of Corrections (SCDOC).

How has Henry’s taxpayer-funded stay been? According to social media posts discovered by the website Charleston Thug Life, he’s been living large – recording music, getting tattoos and smoking tons and tons of marijuana.

“(Henry) started posting to his (Facebook) page from behind bars on 16 September, 2012 and has been going pretty much non-stop since,” the website reports.

Here are a few of the pictures the website posted …

tieem 001 tieem 002 tieem 003

For many more pics (and a number of revealing – yet very explicit – text entries), check out the full Charleston Thug Life post by clicking here.

Oh … and before anybody accuses this site of being racist for picking up this story, we’d like to point out that we previously exposed the jailhouse social media habits of a white, redneck hoodlum named Nick Macklin, who was sentenced to 27 years in prison for burglary in the first degree and leaving the scene of a deadly accident. The nephew of Lisa Cleary – wife of S.C. Senator Ray Cleary – Macklin and his accomplice slammed their boat into another craft on the Intracoastal Waterway in 2008, killing a 13-year-old boy.

White or black, it doesn’t matter … this is getting ridiculous.

“The perpetrator of one of the most notorious race related crimes in the state in recent years and a known, documented and self-admitted gang member has unfettered access to cell phones, the internet, Thugbook, marijuana and tattoos while he is in the “care” of (SCDOC),” Charleston Thug Life’s piece concludes.

We concur …

S.C. Gov. Nikki Haley made headlines last week when she named a political appointee with no prior correctional experience to lead the SCDOC. Democrats pounced on the announcement, referring to it as part of “the pattern of incompetence and culture of secrecy that comes from having Governor Haley’s team of political appointees in cabinet and cabinet-level positions.”

Looks like Haley’s new prison czar is in for an eventful first week …

Related posts

SC

Flooding Temporarily Shuts Down Hunting Season In South Carolina

Erin Parrott
Crime & Courts

Combating Human Trafficking: ‘TAT’ Honors South Carolina Store Manager

Will Folks
SC

John-Paul Miller Versus ‘Jesus?’ A Not-So-Holy War Continues

Callie Lyons

37 comments

TontoBubbaGoldstein September 9, 2013 at 1:40 pm

Oh … and before anybody accuses this site of being racist…

From the tats the gentleman appears to be Jewish. Yet, TBG thought Judaism forbade tats.

Oy vey!

Reply
? September 9, 2013 at 2:11 pm

He’s not an Orthodox Jew, he’s a show business Jew.

:)

Hence all the writing.

Reply
Guest September 9, 2013 at 1:44 pm

Dats mashugana.

Reply
TontoBubbaGoldstein September 9, 2013 at 1:48 pm

TBG almost wishes that they hadn’t fried ol’ Pee Wee Gaskins. If he were still around, he could make a jailhouse radio/walkie-talkie for this guy……

Reply
shifty henry September 9, 2013 at 2:04 pm

That is an extremely strange coincidence. I was relating Gaskins’ story on Friday to the father of a nine-year old son who was murdered in another State.

Reply
Frank Pytel September 9, 2013 at 2:18 pm

’15 years…’. Yeah, that’ll be 2.5. 1/2 of that in a release center where he can go back to work so he’s got money in da bank. What a joke.

Reply
Henry Minton September 9, 2013 at 2:38 pm

That ‘Star of David’ tattoo is not related to Judaism, in this instance. It is a signifier of the Gangster Disciples.

Reply
? September 9, 2013 at 4:07 pm

I thought for sure that it was going to have some deeper meaning, like the systemic oppression of blacks in the judicial system being similar to the Jewish experience, or something like that.
*sarcasm font off*

Reply
TontoBubbaGoldstein September 9, 2013 at 4:32 pm

There goes TBG’s “street cred”…..

Reply
? September 9, 2013 at 6:47 pm

You can’t lose something you didn’t have to start.

:)

Reply
TontoBubbaGoldstein September 9, 2013 at 7:07 pm

Fo shizzle.

Reply
CorruptionInColumbia September 10, 2013 at 1:11 pm

Are you any kin to a guy named Wyatt with the same last name? Tall guy, close to 7 feet.

Reply
Smirks September 9, 2013 at 2:38 pm

Pretty shameful that the “thug life” stands a greater chance at dispensing justice to these criminals than our justice system, whether by a random thug getting them first, a rival gang shooting them, or being shot by someone who is armed and able to defend themselves.

Reply
EJB September 9, 2013 at 3:59 pm

Accidentally posted this under another story;

Well, if experienced and qualified administrators let it get to this point how much worse can it get under the inexperienced and unqualified Bryan Stirling? The only thing missing is riots and if riots break out under Stirling then Haley will finally have to do something about corrections. Maybe he won’t be weighted down by whatever let the other administrators run the department into the ground. I thought the inmates were limited to periodic phone calls and now I find out they have internet access, there’s tax payers that don’t have internet access.

Reply
Elea Phat In The Room September 9, 2013 at 4:03 pm

Is it nigger season yet…..DNR needs to issue some tags like they do for gators!

Reply
Soft Sigh from Hell September 9, 2013 at 7:20 pm

See, the redneck white trash in prison have Net access too.

Reply
jimlewisowb September 9, 2013 at 4:06 pm

Quite amazing the times we live in

Our Government can listen to our phone calls 24/7, it can fire a missile from thousands of miles away to knock an ant off a Rino’s left nut but it can’t find a way to stop thugs from taunting their victims from prisons

Reply
? September 9, 2013 at 4:09 pm

It’s only because he’s not taunting a pol, cause if he was his shit would be toast.

No one gives a shit about us mundanes, until we don’t pay our tax bill that is.

Reply
Crooner September 9, 2013 at 5:02 pm

Was your reference to “unpaid medical bills” a suggestion that the Strange family should file a civil suit against his attackers to recover the cost of medical care? ‘Cause I’m betting there isn’t any money there.
More likely, the medical bills will bankrupt the family, resulting in losses to their creditors beyond just health care providers. And those with medical insurance will make up the loss to health care providers in the form of increased costs.

Reply
9" September 9, 2013 at 7:00 pm

Go Cocks!

Reply
Squishy123 September 9, 2013 at 7:34 pm

The only way to do away with this is to penalize those caught with contraband. Get caught, parole dates get moved back two years. Get caught again, 5 years added to sentence. If serving more than 5 years and get caught, two years in isolation.

Reply
Anon. September 9, 2013 at 8:22 pm

“the pattern of incompetence and culture of secrecy that comes from having Governor Haley’s team of political appointees in cabinet and cabinet-level positions.”SCDOC, SCDEW, SCDSS, and SCDHEC… WTF? Why is this scumbag Tyheem Henry on FaceBook? Why does he have a cell phone? Why does he have internet access? Why does he have access to Pot? The pictures on Charleston Thug Life
look like he’s on Spring Break. The Warden of Lee County Correctional Institution should be an inmate! Carter Strange was beaten nearly to death! THIS IS NOT JUSTICE!

Reply
TheCoast September 10, 2013 at 6:08 am

Let’s remember that our governor named both the current agency director & the newly appointed agency director. Fault for allowing this type of “freedom by inmates” falls directly on the governor, her appointee and his chain of command going down to the warden & his/her employees. Sadly, the only employees that are usually disciplined are the lowest level employees. If everyone in the chain of command was held accountable, you would see far less of this behavior.

Reply
? September 10, 2013 at 9:17 am

“Why does he have a cell phone? Why does he have internet access? Why does he have access to Pot?”

Because it’s jail. Those are common items inside, contraband is every where.

He also gets 3 free meals paid, for by you, a day. Access to a gym so he can work out all day, so when he gets out he can more effectively physically handle anyone resisting his attempts to steal from them and/or beat them(and you’ll have to wait for that CWP if you decide otherwise as the SLED head doesn’t want you getting it so easily).

I hate to say this, but the justice system has been broken for quite some time.

Let’s paint a different picture for a moment and pretend some other system was in place that was harm/property oriented:

Criminal has a trial, gets convicted. Judge decides that criminal needs to pay restitution to strange, starting immediately. He immediately is put to work and if he has no skills he is still put to work at the lowest level job for his skill set…digging ditches, whatever. Most of his pay goes to Strange…most likely for years until Strange is fully compensated as determined by a panel of arbiters. He keeps only what they deem necessary for him to live until he makes full restitution and no one has to support his incarceration…further the people enforcing/checking up on him get a piece of the pie too.

Maybe said criminal even gets a choice, if he doesn’t want to do restitution in that manner and Strange’s relatives are game…maybe it’s a family jump in where criminal is beat to within inches of his life like Strange and then left to fare on his own….or some combination.

But in the end, the victim gets compensation(which is the most important point) and the criminal isn’t further damaging everyone else by living off the taxpayer.

Anyway, the odds of that happening are zero…but one can dream.

Reply
ElwoodBlues September 11, 2013 at 5:58 am

He doesn’t get three meals per day, he gets two. There’s no gym for him to access, and the weights were taken off the prison yards in the 1990s when things like the shaving policy were instituted. He may get a job in PI (Prison Industries) such as making hardwood floors for Anderson Flooring and if he does he makes minimum wage. Out of his wage he pays room and board, restitution (whether or not he has a victim). It may be better than he deserves, but it’s not as good as people think. Oh yeah, there’s no cable TV either. They may purchase a 7″ tv for themselves, but it costs them around $250 Plus postage. The postage is in case they catch a charge, the TV is mailed home and once they go 1 year incident free, they can petition to purchase another one.

Reply
Frank Pytel September 11, 2013 at 6:51 am

According to Elwood, two hots and a cot +TV all day is rough. Poor Baby. :(

Reply
ElwoodBlues September 12, 2013 at 2:35 am

No, that’s not what I said. All I was attempting to do is set the record straight. Personally, I have always felt the purpose of the Department of Corrections should be to make prison a place you wouldn’t want to come back to once you’ve done your time. Unfortunately, our legislature has never agreed with that idea.

Reply
Mguzman October 22, 2013 at 7:13 am

Bring back the CHAIN GANG which worked back in the day and it surely couldn’t hurt these thugs to do a hard days work for a change……

Reply
Barack Attack September 9, 2013 at 8:30 pm

I can’t stand another speech by the President on race, so I really loathe the possibility that he might come out with a “random,” “unscripted,” moment of “pure inspiration” and let us know that 31 years ago, he could have been Tyheem Henry…merci, merci Mr. President.

Reply
The Colonel September 10, 2013 at 2:42 am

Is Yatta his “prison wifey” or his real “wifey”?

The caption for the lead in pic: “It took fo sheet a papa to stop my ass from bleeding after Yatta has his way with me that first time”

Second Pic: “So I’ve joined the prison puppet program, here I am practicing to for my role as Kermit the Frog”

Third pic: ” Sometimes, when I get nervous, I stick my hands under my armpits and than I smell them like this!”
Fourth pic: “All I know is dis guy with a “TBG” tatted on his shoulder came in my cell, said sumpin about some “yatta hey”, had his way with me and when I woke the fu up I had this tat up on my neck…”

Reply
? September 10, 2013 at 9:01 am

4th pic: lol…TBG branded his bitch. Good for him and somewhat unexpected from a person of Jewish descent.

Reply
TontoBubbaGoldstein September 10, 2013 at 9:33 pm

Some of my homies, no doubt…

TBG is wild like de Taliban
He got his 9 in his right,
his 45 inda udda hand…
.
Jess as soon pop a cap in ya as look at ya.
You don’t eff wid da TGB posse.

Go BIG or Go home.

Schvartzes….. Fo shizzle!!

Time fo sum PURPLE DRANK.

Peace !!

Reply
Home Slice September 11, 2013 at 6:15 am

+5 for effort
-2 for rapping skillz

Reply
TontoBubbaGoldstein September 11, 2013 at 6:55 am

Day-um, TBG even stole sampled about a third of that from TI’s “Rubberband Man”…

*TBG’s street cred plummets into negative territory*

Phil Ramsey September 10, 2013 at 9:36 am

For a crime of brutality prisoners should NOT be able to have any access to social media and should be separated from the prison community for the first 3 years of their sentence.
This is prison for a reason, not a Shopping Mall

Reply
ElwoodBlues September 11, 2013 at 5:41 am

As a former Correctional Officer with SCDC, I can assure you that cellphones in prison are an epidemic and the incompetency reaches far beyond Trikki Haley. When Jon Ozmint was leading SCDC, he requested that the FCC allow him to block signals inside the fences of his institutions (this would make cellphones useless) and was told that was illegal and he could not install the scramblers. Furthermore, there are individuals who for a fee will guarantee you they can get a package to the inmate of your choice for a fee and they do this by throwing loaded footballs over the fences and if they are spotted by the officers in the towers, there is nothing we could do to them by law. We were required to notify the local sheriff’s office and have them come out and investigate (the guys were always gone by then). The problem with SCDC is that EVERYONE from Trikki on down the line wants it to operate like a submarine….. silent and deep. They don’t want to fund it like other law enforcement agencies. When I worked there we were required to wear “stab vests” in our lock-up units which were actually surplus bullet proof vests discarded by the Highway Patrol several years earlier. When I inquired with Safariland (the vest manufacturer) about the vests, I received an e-mail stating the vest panels were more than 5 years old (they were manufactured in 1993 and it was 2008 at the time) and the vests offered NO stab protection. When I showed the e-mail to the Captain, he read the letter and asked me if I liked my job and if I did I would keep my mouth shut. This is the mentality of the Department of Corrections.

Reply
Cool Hand Luke September 11, 2013 at 7:47 am

Ths character is proof that it’s past time we brought back the chain gang.

Reply

Leave a Comment