3 charged in Rock Hill crime spree involving shot dog, exploding mailbox

Three men were jailed after a weekend crime spree in a Rock Hill neighborhood that included blowing up one homeowner’s mailbox and shooting another person’s dog, according to the York County Sheriff’s Office.

Two vehicles had been broken into Saturday at a home on White Fawn Lane in Rock Hill, according to a sheriff’s report. Several other vehicles in that neighborhood had been entered and rummaged through. A homeowner on Restless One Lane reported that someone entered his garage while he was home and broke into his car, and also took two scooters from his home.

Also on Saturday, officers received a call about a dog being shot at a home on the same block of Restless One Lane. The homeowner told them he was up and feeding his dogs when he heard a gunshot, deputies said. He went outside and his German Shepherd came to him bleeding, and appeard to have been shot twice.

The homeowner said he saw “what appeared to be three suspects running up the road,” the report states. The family took the dog to the vet.

A deputy searching the area found two small scooters near the home where the dog was shot, which the homeowner said didn’t belong to his family, the report states. That deputy was then notified that a car with three occupants had been stopped nearby on Restless One Lane.

The vehicle matched a description provided by a resident of the neighborhood. The three occupants – Lawson Marshall Chapman, 20, Chase Michael Lee, 20 and Cameron James Head, 17 – were questioned and charged. The vehicle, which belonged to Lee, was released to a friend of his.

Head was jailed on more than 40 charges, including 16 counts of vehicle breaking and entering, 12 counts of larceny, five counts of criminal conspiracy, three counts of malicious injury to property $2,000 or less, two counts of financial transaction card fraud, two counts of first-degree burglary and one count each of grand larceny, unlawful carrying of a pistol, possession of a weapon during a violent crime and giving false information to police.

Chapman is charged with seven counts of vehicle breaking and entering, three counts of larceny and one count each of grand larceny, first-degree burglary and causing an explosion that damages a building.

Lee is charged with seven counts of vehicle breaking and entering, three counts of larceny and one count each of first-degree burglary, grand larceny, criminal conspiracy and causing an explosion that damages a building.

The three suspects are also accused of destroying a mailbox on Indian Trail early on Saturday. A resident said she was on her front porch just before 7 a.m. when she saw a silver four-door car occupied by four men stop at her mailbox, according to a report. The car sped away, and she heard an explosion. She also saw smoke coming out of her mailbox and her neighbor’s, both of which are enclosed in the same structure.

Another neighbor told deputies he saw the car approach, and a man with salt and pepper hair get out and place items into the mailbox. Both residents said they see the vehicle in the neighborhood “often.”

The report doesn’t indicate what kind of device was used, but says “the fuse on the mortar shell did not appear to have been lit and did not explode.”

Head was one of four suspects sought by Tega Cay Police in a rash of vehicle break-ins in the Lake Ridge community last month. It’s not clear if more arrests or charges are possible.

Check back later for more information.

This story was originally published August 19, 2015 at 10:13 AM with the headline "3 charged in Rock Hill crime spree involving shot dog, exploding mailbox."