South Carolina death row inmate makes final appeal, says trial lawyer wasn’t prepared

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — A man convicted of murder who is expected to be the next inmate scheduled for execution in South Carolina is making a final appeal to the state Supreme Court, saying his trial lawyer was inadequately prepared and had too much sympathy for the victim.

According to a court order signed earlier this year, Marion Bowman Jr. will be the next inmate set for execution. The state Supreme Court has paused executions for the holidays, but could set a date for Bowman’s death as soon as Jan. 3.

Bowman is on death row for the killing of 21-year-old Kandee Martin in 2001. Martin was shot in the head and her body was found in the trunk of a car that had been burned.

Bowman’s current lawyers filed an appeal Tuesday asking to halt his execution until a full hearing can be held. They said Bowman’s lawyer at his trial called the victim, who was white, “a little girl,” while referring to Bowman, who is Black, as a man even though he was a year younger than Martin at the time of her killing.

Much of the evidence against Bowman at his trial came from friends and family members who testified against him as part of plea deals. Prosecutors produced evidence of a sexual relationship between Bowman and Martin, although he wasn’t charged with rape.

The trial attorney, Norbert Cummings, suggested at one point that Bowman plead guilty even though Bowman insisted he did not kill Martin because Cummings said it would be tough to get a jury sympathetic toward a Black defendant and a plea would keep him off death row, according to the appeal.

During a hearing on whether to overturn Bowman’s conviction in 2014, Cummings turned to him at one point and asked what he was doing in a remote area in Dorchester County the night of the killing.

“Marion, what are you doing on Nursery Road at that time of the morning with a white female and African American males in Dorchester County? Really. This is 2001 but what good are you doing out there on a dirt road?” Cummings said, according to Bowman’s latest appeal.

Cummings did not respond to a message left at his law office Tuesday.

Prosecutors failed to turn over information about the witnesses given plea deals to testify against Bowman, like psychological problems and a possible confession from one witness, and criminal charges that were hanging over another when they testified. That information could have led jurors to be more skeptical of the testimony, Bowman’s current lawyers said in the appeal.

Lawyers for the South Carolina Attorney General’s Office didn’t immediately respond to the new court filing. Bowman has exhausted all of his regular appeals with judges upholding his conviction and death sentence at each step.

Bowman, 44, has spent more than half his life on death row. Another avenue to his appeal filed Tuesday is asking justices to consider how he has matured during his 22 years awaiting execution.

They include sworn statements from several former nurses and other death row workers who said Bowman is a gentle giant who has a knack for helping inmates with mental problems cooperate with psychologists and take their medication. He also acted for years as the official intermediary between death row inmates and prison officials.

Bowman is scheduled to be the third inmate executed in South Carolina since the General Assembly passed a shield law in 2023 allowing secrecy about where the state obtains lethal injection drugs. The state didn’t execute anyone for 13 years and ran out of the drugs.

Freddie Owens and Richard Moore were both executed earlier this year. Bowman and three other inmates are out of regular appeals and have been placed on a schedule for executions as quickly as every five weeks once 2025 starts.

A federal judge earlier this year threw out a lawsuit from the American Civil Liberties Union asking that prison officials allow them to tape and air a podcast of Bowman asking for mercy and talking about his life on death row.

South Carolina’s prison system bans on-camera, in-person interviews with inmates or recording their phone calls or words for broadcast.