South Carolina: Convicted Murderer Marion Bowman Jr. To Be Executed In First U.S. Execution Of 2025
(Photo via: South Carolina Department of Corrections)
OAN Staff Abril Elfi 2:50 PM – Friday, January 31, 2025
Marion Bowman Jr., who was found guilty of fatally shooting and setting a 21-year-old woman on fire in 2001, is set to become the first person executed in the U.S. in the new year on Friday — with his execution taking place in South Carolina.
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Bowman will be executed on Friday since the United States Supreme Court (SCOTUS) and Fourth Circuit Court declined to hear his case, citing overwhelming evidence in favor of his guilty verdict.
The convict reportedly had the option to request forgiveness from South Carolina Governor Henry D. McMaster (R- S.C.), but he declined to — clearing the way for his execution.
Bowman was 20-years-old when he shot and killed a woman named Kandee Martin, 21. He was later sentenced to death in 2002. After fatally shooting the woman, Bowman placed her body in the trunk of a car and lit it on fire.
Bowman’s attorney had argued that racial bias was the basis of his client’s guilty verdict in the case, as Bowman was a Black man and Martin was a White woman. He requested that higher courts halt his execution so that an additional investigation into his prosecution could be conducted.
“All confidence in Marion Bowman Jr.’s conviction and death sentence is undermined by his trial attorney who filtered his professional judgment through a presumption of racial bias by Bowman’s jury, only to repeatedly introduce and assign pernicious and prejudicial racial stereotypes to Bowman and the victim in the case,” Bowman’s lawyers had said in court filings, according to the State.
Meanwhile, Bowman has still maintained his innocence throughout, explaining that he would allegedly sell drugs to Martin, the 21-year-old victim, and that she was a personal friend of his. He also blamed her death on a “cousin who testified against him.”
“I am so sorry for Kandee and her family, but I didn’t do it,” Bowman wrote in a recent online statement. “Her family has suffered a loss that can not be undone. They have been through trials, and appeals, but they have never heard the truth from me. I know this won’t bring them satisfaction, but this is my truth.”
“I just don’t want to be executed or imprisoned for life for a crime that I didn’t commit,” he wrote.
Next Friday, South Carolina will conduct it's first execution of the year, Marion Bowman who was convicted of the murder of Kandee Martin in 2001, justice will be served in 7 days. pic.twitter.com/KSeCw7toEo
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