SC killer of 3 who wrote messages in victim’s blood receives execution date
A Sumter man who taunted cops with a message written in his victim’s blood in the middle of a killing spree has received the date of his execution.
The South Carolina Supreme Court has issued a death warrant for Stephen Bryant, 44, who murdered three people in 2004. Bryant has been scheduled to be executed on Nov. 14.
If the execution goes forward, Bryant will be the seventh person executed in South Carolina since the state resumed carrying out the death penalty in September 2024. Bryant will have 14 days to decide how he wants the execution to be carried out. South Carolina law requires death row inmates to select either lethal injection, firing squad or electric chair.
So far, four people have chosen to die by lethal injection, while two have chosen the firing squad. The execution will take place inside the state death chamber at the Broad River Correctional Institution in Columbia.
What did Stephen Bryant do?
Bryant pleaded guilty to the murders of Cliff Gainey, Willard Tietjen and Christopher Burgess during a nine-day crime spree. During those nine days, Bryant also committed multiple burglaries and shot a fourth man, Clinton Brown, in the back of the head.
Bryant was sentenced to death for Tietijen’s murder and received life sentences for the killings of Burgess and Gainey. It was a rare example of a judge imposing a death sentence following a guilty plea.
The murders were shocking for their brutality and apparent senselessness. Most of his victims were strangers and the killings took place within five miles of each other in rural Sumter County.
The crime spree began with the burglary of two homes in Sumter, where Bryant acquired the .40 caliber Smith & Wesson handgun he would use in the coming slayings.
On Oct. 9, Bryant took Gainey, a co-worker, to buy beer. The two were well acquainted — they had spent time with each other’s families and fished together. That day, Bryant shot him on the side of a road before returning to Gainey’s rented trailer to steal TV equipment, a stereo and an aquarium.
Two days later, Bryant murdered Tietijen inside the disabled 62-year-old’s isolated ranch house. Bryant shot Tietjen nine times, before pulling the Masonic ring from his finger and stubbing a cigarette in Tietjen’s eye. Bryant then prowled the house, going room to room, stealing change, jewelry and power tools. When Tietjen’s wife called to check on him, Bryant picked up the phone. “T.J. is dead,” he told her.
Before he left, Bryant used Tietjen’s blood to write, “Victem 4 in 2 weeks. Catch me if u can,” on the walls of the home.
Two days later, Bryant murdered Christopher Burgess, a stranger he met by chance in a convenience store in the early morning hours. Bryant shot Burgess twice, once in the face and once in the chest.
Attorneys later claimed that Bryant suffered from fetal alcohol syndrome and as a result was effectively intellectually disabled and struggled with impulse control.
Bryant was also diagnosed with PTSD as a result of childhood sexual abuse, which his attorneys argued led him to perceive some of the men he killed as threats.
This story was originally published October 17, 2025 at 10:35 AM.