A former Greenwood County, South Carolina police officer who admitted to stealing $6,760 from the evidence room was arrested Monday, according to the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED).
Charles Michael Waters, Jr, 29, was charged with breach of trust with fraudulent intent and misconduct in office.
Waters worked for the Ninety-Six Police Department.
According to arrest warrants, he began stealing from the evidence room in 2018.
He later admitted to stealing the $6,760 from the Ninety Six Police Department.
The Ninety-Six Police asked SLED to investigate the case, which will be prosecuted by the 8th Circuit Solicitor’s Office.
On Monday, Waters was booked at the Greenwood County Detention Center. SLED did not say if Waters was fired or resigned from the Ninety-Six Police.
He faces up to 5 years in prison for the breach of trust charge.
For the misconduct in office charge, Waters could face up to one year in prison and a $1,000 fine. There is no mandatory sentence for the offense — which FITSNews founding editor Will Folks has argued against.
“The Palmetto State hasn’t had a real overhaul of its ethics laws in three decades … it is frankly past time that overhaul took place,” Folks wrote. “It is also past time for real teeth to be added to these laws, so that the public can have restored faith in the impartiality of our criminal justice system.”
A 2019 Post and Courier investigation found that nearly half of South Carolina officials who were charged with misconduct in office since 2000 were not convicted of the crime.
Ninety-Six is a small town in South Carolina’s Upstate with a population of around 2,000. It was named by traders who believed the town was 96 miles from a Cherokee settlement called Keowee, according to Discover South Carolina.
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