SC man pleads guilty to after-murder role in Fort Mill killing 11 years later
A man already in a South Carolina prison has pleaded guilty to accessory after the fact to murder in York County’s oldest homicide court case, court statements on Friday showed.
Eric Neal Patton, 40, admitted to his role Friday in York County criminal court 11 years after LaCharles Govan, 29, was found shot twice in the head near a Fort Mill church in June 2015.
Patton had originally been charged with murder but that charge was dropped as part of a plea deal, lawyers in the case said in court.
York County prosecutors and Patton’s lawyer, Jack Swerling, worked out a plea for Patton to get a 15-year sentence to run concurrent with an 18-year sentence he is serving for other crimes he pleaded guilty to in 2017 that include armed robbery, the lawyers said. Visiting Judge D. Shawn Graham accepted the plea and sentence.
Graham said in court the plea was for accessory after the fact to murder in that he helped an unknown person escape from arrest and that he knew the crime had been committed.”
Case went without arrest for 3 years
Govan’s death went without arrest for three years after the 2015 killing.
While Patton was in prison in 2018, Fort Mill Police Department officers charged him with murder in Govan’s death. Yet nothing happened in court for another eight years until Friday’s plea. The case is now over, prosecutor John Anthony said.
Patton receives credit for 2,814 days since he was charged with murder toward the 15-year sentence.
Govan and Patton had been involved in a series of car break-ins together and Patton believed Govan was giving information to police when Govan was killed, Anthony said. After the killing, Patton deleted contact information about Govan from his cellphone, Anthony said in court.
No one else has been charged in Govan’s death.
Govan’s daughter and father, Charles Govan Jr., told the judge they had been waiting over a decade for some justice.
Defense: Patton looks forward to release from prison
Patton told the judge in court that he and Govan were involved in criminal activity.
“We both was out committing crimes, it just played out that way,” Patton said.
Swerling, one of South Carolina’s most well-known defense attorneys with over 40 years of experience, told the judge he believed Patton would be convicted of accessory after the fact to murder if the case went to trial, so he agreed with the guilty plea. Patton has been in prison since 2017 on his other convictions from the other crimes, Swerling said.
“He’s looking forward to getting out in a few years,” Swerling said.
