SC resident who shot, burned, buried men granted bail thanks to STAND YOUR GROUND.
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Moncks Corner — A Goose Creek resident panicked earlier this year after fatally shooting two intruders in his home, so he burned and buried their bodies in his backyard instead of calling police, his attorney said.
James Edward Loftis’ eagerness to make the self-defense argument in court helped sway a judge Monday to grant bail to the 39-year-old as he prepares for trial on a pair of murder charges. He fatally shot taxi driver Guma Oz Dubar, 46, and James Cody Newland, 32, on March 5 at his house on South Pandora Drive.
Loftis was expected to post $250,000 bail and be freed sometime this week, said his attorney, Stephen Harris of Charleston.
The case poses new questions about the S.C. Protection of Persons and Property Act, a “stand your ground” law that gives homeowners the right in many circumstances to use deadly force against people breaking into their houses.
Authorities have said Loftis’ account of the episode has varied, but his attorney insisted that one aspect has remained constant: the two people he shot had confronted him in his own home. He did, though, call his client’s actions afterward “heinous.”
“He’s a human being,” Harris said. “He freaked out and thought he was going to prison, so he tried to hide the bodies. Nobody knows how you’re going to react when you kill two people.”
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