Defendants sentenced in Leaphart murder case

The remaining four defendants in the kidnapping, torture and murder on Jeremy Leaphart were sentenced Tuesday.

Over two days, all eight of those charged in the case have been sentenced to a combined 186 years in jail. The group of Aiken County and Batesburg men snatched the cognitively delayed Leaphart on Christmas Eve 2007. They beat him to extort information he did not have, tortured him with fists and a hot clothes iron before one of them executed him and then threw his corpse to rot on a trash pile.

One man, Frankie Gantt pleaded to the murder of Leaphart and received a 45-year sentence that he will serve day-for-day.

Seven others who were in some way involved in the kidnapping pleaded to that crime. The three most culpable, Johnnie Walker, Sheldon Oakman and Darrell "Stevie" Williams, all received the maximum term for the crime - 30 years.

Walker brought the victim to the site of the beating, Walker burned Leaphart with the iron and Oakman gave Gantt the final shotgun shell used to execute the victim. These four were sentenced Monday.

On Tuesday, John O. Oakman, Andre Norris, Marrion Abner and Ronnie Bower faced Circuit Court Judge Doyet "Jack" Early and each was given 17 years in prison.

Unlike Monday where the four were individually sentenced, Tuesday's three all had a chance to plead their case and then at the end of the day Early brought all four and their attorney's back to court to sentence them as one.

Early addressed the court after an in-chambers discussion and explained the two levels of involvement in the crime. He dubbed Gantt, Walker, Sheldon Oakman and Williams as the "major players."

Each of the other four defendants had pleaded with the judge of their limited, or even complete lack of involvement. However, when peppered with questions from Early, asked why they did not run away, call police that day or two week later or at least tell the grieving family where the body of the victim was disposed of, all balked or cited fear of coconspirators.

"These young men, I don't feel their involvement is as important as those yesterday," Early said. "My assessment, pretty much, coincided with how law enforcement looked at it."

Solicitor Strom Thurmond Jr. thanked all involved in the case after it was completed, including his own Chief Assistant, Bill Weeks, who has been working on this case for more than a year.

He noted that this case included more codefendants than any other in recent history.

"Any multi-defendant case is inherently difficult in prosecution due to the multiple statements," Thurmond said

Weeks described cases of this magnitude, which hinge on the statements of eight self-serving codefendants as "like threading a needle out the window of a moving car."

Thurmond also reserved special praise for those who have lost most.

"The family has been exceedingly gracious under some difficult circumstances," Thurmond said.

Contact Mike Gellatly at mgellatly@aikenstandard.com.