Teens Prey on Teens in Vile Rampage: James Terry Roach, Joseph Carl Shaw, Ronald Mahaffey

Joseph Carl Shaw, known to his fellow scumbags as “J.C.” was the leader of this group of murderers. James Terry Roach went by Terry, and Ronald Mahaffey preferred Ronnie. Shaw was an Army soldier, a former Military Police officer until his drug use and other problems led to him being removed from that position. He befriended Roach and Mahaffey, and together they committed a truly atrocious murder, taking the lives of Carlotta Hartness and Tommy Taylor, two high school students at the now-defunct Wildewood Academy in Columbia, South Carolina. Shaw also managed to get an Army buddy named Robert Williams involved in the murder of Betty Swank.

Watch the Video

Notes

Victims: Tommy Taylor 17, Carlotta Hartness 14
Left Hartness home at noon to check various places for a paper on the Camden Historic Preservation Society that Taylor was writing for a class
Were supposed to be home by dark
Reported missing at about 7:30 pm
Found by an officer slumped under the steering wheel of father’s car near Polo Road Park, near Wildwood school where they were students
James T. Roach, 17, Seneca, SC
Joseph Carl Shaw, 22, Fort Jackson soldier and former MP
Ronald Eugene Mahaffey, 16, Columbia, SC
Charged with shooting death of Betty Swank on 10/18
Taylor-Hartness murder motive: Robbery
Thousands of phone calls
Hartness shot 5 times in back of head
Swank shot once in the stomach, once in the arm