In the early morning hours of March 6, 2019, events unfolded in Ninety Six, South Carolina, that would end the life of 42-year-old Marty Anthony George. The strange and tragic narrative began when the mother of Mark Anthony Hailey Jr. placed a 911 call, reporting that her son had arrived home in an unfamiliar car, acting erratically and speaking of a shooting.
She suspected he was under the influence of drugs, a behavior she had witnessed before.
When Greenwood County Sheriff's deputies arrived at the residence on Booker Road, they found Hailey in a highly agitated and hallucinatory state. There was blood on the window of the car he had been driving. Initially, Hailey was incoherent, but he eventually disclosed to the deputies that he had shot a man he considered his 'brother' and left him on Warner Road. Following this disjointed confession, deputies began a search of the area.
It was on the side of the rural Warner Road that authorities discovered the body of Marty Anthony George. He had sustained a fatal gunshot wound to the head. As the investigation progressed, Mark Anthony Hailey Jr. was taken into custody. After an evaluation at a local healthcare facility, he was transported to the Greenwood County Detention Center.
Mark Anthony Hailey Jr., who was 32 at the time, was subsequently charged with murder and possession of a weapon during the commission of a violent crime. The case proceeded to trial, where a Greenwood County jury deliberated for approximately five hours before finding him guilty on both charges. In September 2020, Hailey was sentenced to 35 years in prison for the murder and a concurrent five-year sentence for the weapons charge. The motive for the killing was attributed to drug-fueled paranoia and erratic behavior.
