By admin 
A man from Charlotte who executed a York County deputy during a Rock Hill crime spree a month after North Carolina paroled him will remain in a South Carolina prison after the state’s parole board denied his release on Wednesday, officials said.
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Dwayne Eric Forney, 59, has been in the S.C. Department of Corrections for murder since he was sentenced to life in prison in 1994 after a jury convicted him in the death of Brent McCants on Sept. 25, 1992.
The other man involved in McCants murder, Mar-Reece Hughes, was given the death penalty and remains on South Carolina’s death row.
But Forney is eligible for South Carolina parole because the law at the time of the murder allowed for the possibility of parole even in a life sentence. The board last denied Forney release in 2022.
The SC Parole Board vote
After a hearing, the S.C. Parole Board voted Wednesday to keep Forney locked up, said Kevin Brackett, 16th Circuit Solicitor. Brackett and former solicitor Tommy Pope, now a S.C. State Representative, prosecuted Forney and Hughes.
“Dwayne Eric Forney is a brutal, conscienceless killer who poses a danger to society as long as he is alive,” Brackett told The Herald after the parole hearing. “Consequently, he should remain incarcerated as long as he is alive. He had only been out on parole for about a month when he and Mar-Reece Hughes robbed two students at gunpoint and took their car. They drove down to Rock Hill and killed Deputy McCants when he pulled them over on Dave Lyle Boulevard. We don’t have to guess what he would do if they released him on parole now; he has already shown us.”
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Brent McCants was 23 years old when he was killed. Part of Dave Lyle Boulevard is now named for him.
Wednesday was the first time Forney had sought parole and McCants’ mother, Myra, was not there to oppose release. She died in 2023 at age 79 after three decades fighting against Forney’s release and pushing for Hughes to be executed.
The crime spree in September 1992
On Sept. 25, 1992, Forney and Hughes carjacked a couple in Charlotte before heading into South Carolina in the stolen car and robbing a movie theater in Rock Hill. McCants, working patrol, stopped the car for driving without headlights near Interstate 77. Forney and Hughes shot McCants several times and left his body in the road before fleeing.
The two hid in woods near the Catawba River before they were caught hours later.
What happens now?
Forney will be eligible for another parole hearing in a few years.
Hughes, 60, sentenced to death by a trial jury that found him guilty of murder and other charges, is not eligible for parole.
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