I-26 shooting possibly in view of camera

Video is not recorded, but can be seen online

By ISHMAEL TATE and LEE HIGGINS - itate@thestate.com lhiggins@thestate.com

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An S.C. Department of Transportation camera on Interstate 26 might have captured clues about what happened to a woman found shot in her car Sunday.

But video from the cameras, installed on interstates around the state, isn’t recorded.

Authorities think Natasha Warren was killed between midnight Friday and midnight Saturday.

Did you see anything?

Anyone with information about what might have happened to Natasha Warren is asked to call Crime Stoppers at (888) CRIME-SC (274-6372).

Protecting yourself on the road

Tips from AAA on what to do if your vehicle breaks down

• Move off the road safely away from traffic.

• Stay inside. Keep doors locked.

• If you can’t move your vehicle off the road, ask all passengers to exit when it is safe and stand away from traffic.

• If you must walk to a telephone to call for help, keep your group together.

• Raise the vehicle’s hood, tie a white cloth to a door handle or use reflective triangles or flares.

• Roll down the window only enough to ask any passersby to call police.

• While traveling, stay on main roads and highways.

• Pack a flashlight, blanket and first-aid kit.

• Carry a cellular phone.

• Do not stop to help a disabled vehicle. Instead, call for help from a pay phone or your cell phone.

• If stopping during night travel, choose a well-lighted, populated facility and park where your vehicle can be seen.

• If approached by someone while your vehicle is stopped, keep your doors locked and roll your window down only enough to hear what the person is saying.

The 23-year-old mother of two had pulled over to the side of an exit ramp on I-26 at Bush River Road, with a flat tire.

She walked up the exit ramp to the Sunoco gas station convenience store and made her first call for help about 10:30 p.m. said Lt. Chris Cowan, Richland County Sheriff’s Department spokesman.

Investigators are reviewing surveillance footage from the station and revealed Tuesday that Warren entered the store four times after her car broke down, calling work and her family, deputies said.

Unlike the store cameras, the ones pointed at the interstate were never intended to be used for security purposes, said Pete Poore, DOT spokesman.

“The cameras aren’t there to record anything,” he said. “They’re to show real-time traffic information.”

Operators use the cameras to help guide the S.C. Highway Patrol, DOT workers and EMS to wrecks and disabled motorists, Poore said. Motorists also use the online stream from the cameras to check rush-hour traffic.

That means someone might have seen something on a Web site without knowing what they were looking at.

Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott said because the video isn’t recorded investigators have less to go on.

“We’re working from scratch, and that’s what’s frustrating to us,” he said.

The S.C. Information and Intelligence Center, the State Law Enforcement Division’s fusion center for information and intelligence sharing, is just blocks from where Warren was found, Lott said.

The center is staffed around the clock, 365 days a year.

“If those cameras at DOT were hooked up to (SLED’s system) we may have been able to prevent or solve that murder already,” he said.

The ability to do just that is on SLED’s short wish list, spokeswoman Jennifer Timmons said. The agency plans to apply for a grant that would provide money to tape and store the video next year.

“They would record it for situations such as this,” Timmons said.

This isn’t the first time video from the cameras could have helped on a case, Lott said.

Four years ago, 20-year-old Stephanie Dover was killed and her 3-year-old son injured when someone opened fire on her car as she drove on I-20 near Broad River Road, Lott said.

A Crime Stoppers tip led to the arrest of a man a year later.

Police are hoping for a similar outcome in Warren’s case.

“No matter how small that piece of information may be, we need to have that,” Cowan said.

Reach Tate at (803) 771-8549.

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