COLUMBIA, S.C. — The Supreme Court of South Carolina has issued a decision regarding the early release of convicted killer Jeroid Price, stating he must serve all his remaining time on his sentence.
Price was serving a 35-year prison sentence for the 2002 murder of university student Carl Smalls at a Columbia nightclub when he was released from prison in March 2023. At that time, Price had only served 19 of the 35 years. He had been granted early release at the request of his lawyer, Rep. Todd Rutherford, and prosecutor Byron Gipson after Price allegedly reported another inmate's escape and kept two prison guards from serious injury during attacks. Now-retired Judge Casey Manning granted the request.
After hearing of Price's early release, SC Attorney General Alan Wilson raised objections to the release process, and Smalls' family was outraged. On April 26, the SC Supreme Court unsealed the records and ordered Price to be returned to prison to serve out the remainder of his sentence.
On June 7, a federal warrant was issued for Price's arrest in the US District Court of South Carolina for the unlawful flight to avoid prosecution.
Before his release, Price had been transferred from SCDC to a prison in New Mexico. After that ruling, a nationwide search for Price began, involving the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED), the FBI, and the New York Police Department.
On July 12, Price was located and taken back into custody by NYPD at an apartment in the Bronx. He was then transferred back to South Carolina, where he and his lawyer waited for the SC Supreme Court's decision.
On Sept. 6, in a 3-2 decision, the Supreme Court of South Carolina found that the lower court's order to reduce Price's sentence was outside the circuit court's authority and contrary to law. The justices vacated the lower court's order and remanded Price back into the custody of SCDC, where he must serve the remainder of his 35-year sentence for murder.
After the Supreme Court decision, SC Attorney General Alan Wilson released this statement: "We agree with the court's majority decision and appreciate it holding the state actors and lower court accountable for not following the law. Now that we have the full opinion, we will continue our review of the early releases from previous years. This was an unusual case, but the court's urgency to hear our original request and its ultimate decision proves no one is above the law in South Carolina."