Stephen Stanko Executed After 20 Years on Death Row— Killed His G/F And Raped Her Daughter

Hinzugefügt: 2026-06-01

[00:00:00]June 13th, 2025.

[00:00:02]6:06 p.m. Broad River Correctional Institution, Columbia, South Carolina. A 57-year-old man is strapped to a gurney.

[00:00:13]A first dose of pentobarbital enters his veins. He turns his head toward the families watching through the glass. His lips are moving, mouthing words as the drug begins to take hold. His breathing slows. The color drains from his face, from his hands. At 6:20 p.m., a second dose is administered. At 6:34 p.m., 28 minutes after it all began, Steven Christopher Stanko is pronounced dead by lethal injection. The families in that witness room do not look away, not until long after he has stopped breathing. It took 20 years to get to that moment. 20 years of trials, appeals, courtrooms, and closed doors. While the people who loved Laura Ling and Henry Turner had no choice but to wait. In this video, we are going to cover everything. The crime Stanko committed in two separate counties in less than 24 hours. The teenage girl who survived a slit throat and made the 911 call that caught him.

[00:01:20]The nationwide manhunt. The two trials.

[00:01:24]The two death sentences. 20 years of appeals that reached all the way to the United States Supreme Court. His last meal. His final words. And the execution that closed this case for good. But before we get into any of that, here is the detail that changes how you see this entire case. Steven Stanko was not a stranger to the criminal justice system.

[00:01:49]He had already been convicted of assault and kidnapping. He had already served eight and a half years in prison. He had a parole officer checking on him. He had a published book written behind bars about the very system that had held him.

[00:02:06]People knew who he was. And he walked out of prison in July 2004. Less than a year later, two people were dead and a 15-year-old girl was lying on the floor of her own home with her throat cut, somehow still alive. This is the full story of Steven Stanko. To understand what happened in April 2005, you need to understand what led up to it. Steven Christopher Stanko was born on January 13th, 1968 at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba.

[00:02:40]His father was in the military. From early on, people who knew him described him the same way: smart, polished, well-spoken, the kind of person who could hold a room. He was also, by his mid-20s, already building a criminal history. In 1996, Stanko was convicted of assault and kidnapping. He received a 10-year sentence. He served eight and a half years, and during that time, behind bars, he did something unusual. He co-authored a book. The book was called Living in Prison: A History of the Correctional System with an Insider's View. It was published in 2002, written with the assistance of professors at East Tennessee State University. It got him attention. It gave him a reputation, not as a criminal, but as an intellectual, a man who had reflected on his past, a man who had something to say. He was released in July 2004. After his release, Stanko moved to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. He had trouble finding work. His background made employers cautious. He rented a room.

[00:03:55]His parole officer checked in and by his own account he was struggling to rebuild. Then he began working on what he claimed would be a second book. That research took him to the local library and that is where he met Laura Ling.

[00:04:11]Laura Ling was 43 years old. She was a librarian, the kind of person who shows up, does the work, takes care of her family. She had a teenage daughter. She had a life she was living. Stanko and Laura became close. Eventually, he moved in with her at her home in Mills Inlet, a quiet coastal community in Georgetown County, South Carolina. He was her boyfriend. He was living under her roof.

[00:04:41]Her daughter was in that house. Through the same library, Stanko also developed a friendship with a 74-year-old man named Henry Lee Turner, a retired Air Force Master Sergeant. Turner was a regular patron. He was jolly, according to his son, kind-hearted, a loving father. He had no reason to fear Steven Stanko. He considered him a friend. Both of these people trusted him. Both of them would pay for it. After the murders, police searched Stanko's home.

[00:05:15]What they found stopped investigators cold. Articles, clippings, research on serial killers, Jeffrey Dahmer, Gary Ridgway, the Green River Killer. Pages and pages of material on men who had killed many times. A police spokesperson said plainly, "He either was just interested in serial killers or he was becoming one."

[00:05:39]April 7th, 2005, inside the Mills Inlet home he shared with Laura Ling, Steven Stanko attacked. He bound her. He beat her. He strangled her to death. Laura Ling's 15-year-old daughter was in that home. She witnessed what was happening to her mother. And Stanko, rather than leave a witness, attacked her, too. He beat her. He raped her. He kidnapped her. And then, in what can only be described as an attempt to erase her completely, he slit her throat. He left her for dead. She was not dead. That teenage girl, Christina Ling, found the strength to reach a phone. She made the 911 call. She is the reason investigators knew what had happened.

[00:06:26]She is the reason this case exists. She survived. The next morning, April 8th, 2005, Stanko drove north to Conway, in Horry County. He went to Henry Turner's home. Henry Turner let him in, because Henry Turner had no reason not to. This was someone he knew, someone he trusted.

[00:06:49]Stanko shot him dead with a.357 Magnum revolver. Then, he took Turner's truck.

[00:06:56]He went to Turner's bank. He emptied the account, and he drove out of South Carolina. Two murders, one rape, one attempted murder, two counties, less than 24 hours, and then he disappeared.

[00:07:12]What followed was a five-day nationwide manhunt. Stanko's face went on America's Most Wanted. A $10,000 reward was posted for information leading to his capture.

[00:07:25]Law enforcement across multiple states was looking for him. And where was he?

[00:07:30]Augusta, Georgia. The 2005 Masters Tournament was underway. Thousands of people had flooded the city. Hotels were packed. Streets were crowded. And Steven Stanko, a man whose face was on national television, moved through it all without being found. Whether that was calculated or just fortunate, investigators couldn't say. But it worked. For 5 days, he hid in plain sight among golf fans and tourists. On April 12th, 2005, tips from the public, spurred by the reward, led US Marshals to Augusta. They located Stanko and took him into custody without incident. He did not resist. He was escorted out of the law enforcement center calm, composed, looking to those watching more like a man who had been expecting this than one who had been caught. He was extradited back to South Carolina. The charges against Stanko were extensive. Two counts of murder, Laura Ling and Henry Turner.

[00:08:37]First-degree criminal sexual conduct, the rape of Ling's teenage daughter.

[00:08:42]Three counts of kidnapping, assault and battery with intent to kill for slitting the girl's throat. Three counts of armed robbery and assault. He would face two separate trials, one in Georgetown County for the murder of Laura Ling and one in Horry County for the murder of Henry Turner. Two different juries, two different counties, and ultimately two death sentences. The first trial was held in Georgetown County in August 2006. Stanko's defense team entered a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity. They argued he suffered from mental illness, a central nervous system dysfunction, that should exempt him from full criminal responsibility. The jury did not buy it. On August 18th, 2006, Steven Stanko was convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of Laura Ling. Along with that came 110 additional years for the criminal sexual conduct, kidnapping, and armed robbery charges tied to the assault on her daughter. He became the first person sentenced to death in Georgetown County in nearly 11 years. The second trial came in November 2009 in Horry County for the murder of Henry Turner. The physical evidence was overwhelming.

[00:10:04]Ballistics confirmed that the.357 Magnum revolver found in Turner's stolen truck was the same weapon that fired the bullets recovered from Turner's body.

[00:10:15]The defense again pursued the insanity angle pointing to Stanko's mental health and alleged brain defect. The jury deliberated for exactly 1 hour on November 19th, 2009, Stephen Stanko received his second death sentence. He was now on death row twice over. What followed the trials was two decades of legal proceedings for the families of Laura Ling and Henry Turner. Those years were a prolonged wait for a resolution that kept being delayed. For Stanko's attorneys, they were an exhaustive effort to find any legal ground that might overturn or reduce his sentences.

[00:10:58]In September 2007, Stanko's attorneys appeared before the South Carolina Supreme Court in an appeal of the Georgetown County conviction. Their argument, the trial judge had made critical errors. She had not allowed defense attorneys to ask potential jurors their views on the insanity defense during jury selection. She had not allowed the defense to present Stanko's mental and developmental background as a mitigating factor during sentencing. The South The Supreme Court reviewed the case and affirmed both the conviction and the death sentence. In February 2013, Stanko lost the appeal in the Turner murder case as well. Again, the Supreme Court affirmed the conviction and sentence. Then came 2015.

[00:11:49]A post-conviction relief hearing was convened. Testimony was presented from Stanko's own trial attorney, Bill Diggs, who stated under oath that Stanko had suffered from a brain defect that had never been fully presented to or considered by the jury. The court considered it. On May 24th, 2016, the judge reaffirmed his conviction. In May 2025, 20 years after the crimes, Steven Stanko's petition to the United States Supreme Court was denied. Every appeal, every hearing, every legal avenue exhausted. The South Carolina Supreme Court issued an execution notice on May 16th, 2025. Stanko was given a date, June 13th, 2025. In South Carolina, condemned inmates are given a choice of execution method, lethal injection, electric chair, or firing squad. If no choice is made by the deadline, the electric chair is selected by default. Stanko had until May 30th, 2025 to decide. Just 2 months before Stanko's execution, Michael Moudy had been executed by firing squad on April 11th, 2025. Moudy's attorneys claimed the execution may have gone wrong because only two of the three bullets reportedly struck his heart, though state officials denied the allegation.

[00:13:20]The controversy was widely publicized and weighed heavily on Stanko's mind.

[00:13:26]Stanko asked the South Carolina Supreme Court to compel the state to reveal its full protocols for both the firing squad and lethal injection. He said he had been leaning toward the firing squad until Modi's execution. The court rejected his request on May 29th, 2025.

[00:13:47]The next day, Stanko made his choice, lethal injection, Friday, June 13th, 2025.

[00:13:55]Broad River Correctional Institution, Columbia, South Carolina. The execution chamber witness room held 11 people. One relative of Steven Stanko, three family members of his victims, including Roger Turner, the son of Henry Turner, Stanko's attorney Lindsey Vann, and several media witnesses. Roger Turner had said in the weeks leading up to this day that he was ready, that the execution should have happened years ago, that his father had been a kind man, a loving father, and that he would be there to see this through. At approximately 6:02 p.m., Governor Henry McMaster formally denied clemency.

[00:14:38]Minutes later, the US Supreme Court turned back a final appeal from Stanko's legal team. At 6:06 p.m., the first dose of pentobarbital was administered.

[00:14:50]Something different happened this time.

[00:14:53]A voice came over a loudspeaker announcing each dose before it was given, a procedural shift that media witnesses noted immediately. Stanko appeared to be mouthing words. He turned toward the families in the witness room.

[00:15:09]Then came several quick, shallow breaths. His lips quivered. Within a minute, he appeared to stop breathing.

[00:15:17]The color drained from his face, from his hands. At 6:20 p.m., a second dose of pentobarbital was administered. At 6:34 p.m., 28 minutes after the execution began, Steven Christopher Stanko was pronounced dead. He was 57 years old. Three of the victims' family members stared at him and did not look away. Not until long after he had stopped breathing. Stanko was the sixth person executed in South Carolina in a striking number for a state that had gone 13 years without a single execution. He was also one of four executions carried out across four states in just four days, from June 10th to June 13th, 2025. Two days before his execution, on Wednesday, June 11th, Stanko was served his last meal. He chose fried fish, fried shrimp, crab cakes, a baked potato, carrots, fried okra, cherry pie, banana pudding, and sweet tea. A southern meal, simple, familiar. Whatever you make of that, it was the last food he ever ate before the pentobarbital was administered. Steven Stanko was given the opportunity to speak. His attorney read the statement aloud on his behalf. It lasted 3 and 1/2 minutes. In it, Stanko apologized to his surviving victim, Laura Ling's daughter, who had been 15 years old the night he slit her throat and left her for dead, who had made the 911 call that brought police to the scene, who had somehow survived the worst night of her life and gone on to build a life beyond it. To the families of those he had killed, he asked not to be judged by the worst day of his life. He asked for forgiveness.

[00:17:13]As the statement was read, Stanko appeared to be mouthing the words along with his attorney. He faced the victims' families in the witness room. Whether those words brought any peace to the people sitting in that room, we don't know. That belongs to them. What we do know is that Roger Turner and the others did not look away.

[00:17:35]20 years. That's how long this case lasted. From the night Laura Ling was murdered to the moment Steven Stanko was pronounced dead. 20 years of court appearances, of appeals, of hearings, of documents filed and arguments made and rulings handed down. 20 years of Roger Turner waiting for a day that kept being postponed. 20 years during which a 15-year-old girl became a woman carrying the weight of something no person should ever have to carry. Laura Ling was 43 years old. She was a librarian. Henry Turner was 74. He was a retired Air Force Master Sergeant who considered Stanko a friend. And a 15-year-old girl survived a slit throat to make the call that caught him. That is what this case is at its core. Not the manhunt, not the Masters Tournament, not the book, not the appeals. It's those three people.

[00:18:37]So, here is the question I'll leave you with, and I want you to think about it seriously. When someone has already been convicted of assault and kidnapping, served their time, and is released back into the community, what responsibility, if any, does the system carry for what that person does next? And if something goes catastrophically wrong, as it did here, where does accountability begin?

[00:19:02]And where does it end? Leave your thoughts in the comments below.