A man allegedly held at least four people captive in his basement, abused them, stole their money, and left a woman to die.
Donnie Ray Birchfield Jr, 35, is accused of imprisoning two women he was in relationships with, as well as a couple that he acted as a sole caregiver for, inside his home in Lancaster, South Carolina.
Officers went to Birchfield’s home on Churchill Drive on July 25 after receiving a report of an ‘unintended death’, according to the Lancaster Police Department.
Investigators found a woman’s body and determined that she had died the day before, stated police warrants obtained by The Post and Courier. She appeared to have suffered physical abuse, malnourishment and seemed to have needed medical treatment.
Birchfield was caregiver for the woman who died and her husband, who were both vulnerable, according to the warrants.
The two other people Birchfield allegedly kept in his basement were in romantic relationships with him, with one woman living with him since last September and the other one since 2015, state court documents.
Birchfield is accused of strangling the victims, dictating when they could eat and use the bathroom, and stopping them from using their mobile phones to seek help.
The victims could not leave Birchfield’s basement without his permission, the warrants indicate.
On top of that, Birchfield is accused of using the couple’s credit cards to pay for $2,000 in Walmart purchases since 2021, with 32 of them for his personal use, according to a police report. This year, he took more than $11,800 from the couple’s bank account to pay off credit card debt, court documents state.
Birchfield allegedly threatened to kill one woman and hurt he family, saying that he was experienced in disposing of and hiding a body.
‘That’s a sick individual right there,’ a neighbour, Darryl Evans, told WSOC-TV.
‘He’s a sick person to do something like that.’
Birchfield has been charged with more than a dozen felonies including false imprisonment, abuse of a vulnerable adult, exploitation of a vulnerable adult and financial transaction card theft, according to the Lancaster County Detention Center.
He is being held at the detention center without bail.
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