SLED: Gun, cash, cigarettes stolen from dead man's truck in 'Final Disrespects' investigation

by: Jody Barr

Posted: Aug 1, 2023 / 10:46 PM EDT

Updated: Aug 3, 2023 / 09:09 AM EDT

MARLBORO COUNTY, S.C. (QUEEN CITY NEWS) — It took two and a half days for the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division to disclose the details of an arrest warrant for former Marlboro County Deputy Probate Judge Tammy Bullock following two arrests connected to our ‘Final Disrespects’ investigation.

SLED agents arrested Tammy Lear Bullock and Charlotte Green at the Marlboro County Detention Center last Friday. Bullock is the former Marlboro County Deputy Probate Judge, and Green is a friend of Bullock.

Both women were captured on video recordings in January 2021 plundering a dead man’s home and pick-up truck in Bennettsville. That man, Hollis Slade, died on Jan. 24, 2021, after complaining of stomach pains in the days before his death.

SLED and the South Carolina Attorney General’s Office spent the past two years and one-month investigating theft claims against Bullock, Green, and two other men who showed up on Slade’s home security recordings. SLED turned its case file over to the AG’s office on June 10, 2022, but it took the AG’s office another 13 months to decide to file charges.

Those charges resulted in a single charge of grand larceny for Bullock and Green.

The arrest warrants show the women are accused of stealing $2,203 and a pistol out of Slade’s home in the hours following his death. Prosecutors also accused the women of stealing four packs of cigarettes out of Slade’s truck while it sat in his driveway.

“Me and Tammy got four packs of cigarettes out of it (the truck); figured he didn’t need them no more,” Green was captured telling the group gathered at Slade’s home. Slade’s wife, Joyce, was inside their home throughout the two days the group spent “ransacking” the Slade home and property.

Slade’s security cameras also captured Green telling the group, “I got that pistol out that drawer,” and an apparent admission of taking money from Slade’s home.

“I told her I got that money,” Green told Bullock standing in Slade’s driveway, “I said, ‘I’m not going to leave that money sitting in that house for complete strangers to come,'” the recording showed. The recording indicates Green was referring to a conversation she had with Linda Hood, Joyce’s hired caretaker.

The recordings were captured on Jan. 23 and 24, 2021. Slade’s sister, Beth Boling, found out about her brother’s death late in the day on the 23rd and left her home in Indiana the next morning to travel to Marlboro County to figure out what to do with Slade’s estate and to establish full-time care for Joyce.

While Boling was en route to South Carolina, the recordings show Bullock, Green, Ricky Gardner (Green’s live-in boyfriend), and Matthew Tomlinson (Green’s son) going in and out of the Slade home. Those recordings also showed Gardner and another man carrying property from inside Slade’s home and loading it into the back of Gardner’s truck.

Boling said she became suspicious of the group soon after she arrived. Hood, the caretaker, told Boling she gathered a large bag full of Slade’s cash and a pistol and hid it in Joyce’s dresser drawer.

Those things later went missing.

“When we arrived at the house, the caretaker, who had taken care of my sister-in-law that night, said to me, there were some things that were taken by one of the individuals that you need to be sure you get back. I asked her what those things were, and she said there’s a Ziploc bag full of cash. There’s the truck keys, there’s a handgun, and Hollis’s checkbook,” Boling told Queen City News Chief Investigative Reporter Jody Barr in August 2021.

“Did she say who took them,” Barr asked. “Yes,” Boling said, naming Charlotte Green.

Boling decided to go public with QCN in August 2021 after she found out the Marlboro County Sheriff’s Office did nothing to investigate the theft claims in the days following her brother’s death.

SLED also didn’t initially investigate Bullock and the theft claims, claiming Boling’s complaints were “a civil matter.” We filed a request with SLED for records in the case, and the agency denied our records request, citing an open criminal investigation in September 2021.

Boling asked the group to return the property the caretaker told her about. Ricky Gardner then asked to meet with Boling privately.

“He returned a box with a Ziploc of cash, the handgun and I think by then, somebody had already brought the truck keys back. So, I walked back into the house, and the caretaker was there, and she said, ‘Did he give you the things – she was very earnest about; did he give you the things that you asked for?’ And I said, ‘Yes.’ And she said, ‘Is the cash there?’ And I said, ‘Yes.’ And so, she said, ‘Can I see the bag?’ And so, I just lifted up the bag and she said, ‘That’s not nearly the cash that was in that bag,'” Boling recalled of her conversation with Linda Hood.

“She said, ‘Let me ask you this: are there any $100 bills in there?’ And I said, ‘I don’t know.’ So, I looked like, kind of thumbed through, and there was not a single $100 bill in there. So, I said no. And she said, ‘There were a lot of $100 bills in there.'”

When Boling returned to Indiana, she unpacked the plastic bag and photographed each bill inside. Her final count was $2,203, the same amount listed in the grand larceny arrest warrant filed against Bullock and Green.

The initial cache of video recordings also showed Ricky Gardner carrying property from Slade’s home and loading it into his truck. Neither warrant showed any trace of the dog collars or any other property included in the charges.

We asked South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson’s press office on Monday whether Bullock and Green’s charges ended the Hollis Slade investigation or if additional charges might come, but Spokesman Robert Kittle did not respond with an answer. Kittle said Joel Kozak, the prosecuting attorney in the Slade case, was out of town in a trial on Monday.

Kittle still has not responded as of this report.

A Marlboro County magistrate set Green’s bond at $5,000 and Bullock’s bond at $2,500. Both were freed from the county jail at around 3:30 p.m. Friday, immediately following their bond hearings.

The grand larceny charge is a felony and would carry up to five years in state prison or a fine if convicted.

Neither Bullock nor Green would provide comment when contacted last week or provide the name of their attorney handling their case.

QUEEN CITY NEWS