Authorities say Stanko also raped a 15-year-old girl who lived at the house and cut her throat, then stole Ling’s car and went on the run with money from her bank account. He is also accused of killing 74-year-old Henry Lee Turner in his home in nearby Conway, according to the April 15 Myrtle Beach Sun News.
Socastee Library Director John Gaumer said in the April 12 Sun News that Ling met Stanko when he was researching a book he wanted to write on prison life. He added that Turner often talked with Stanko and Ling when he visited the library. “Laura met Stephen in the library, and their relationship grew from there,” Gaumer said. “She was accepting of Stephen Stanko. She knew his background. He freely told people he was an ex-con.”
Stanko was released from prison last year after serving eight-and-a-half years of a 10-year sentence for kidnapping. The library’s copy of Living in Prison: A History of the Correctional System with an Insider’s View, which Stanko wrote in prison with the help of two criminology professors, was given to police investigators, Gaumer said.
Stanko has been charged with two counts of murder. He waived his right to a bond hearing on several lesser charges, including kidnapping and first-degree criminal sexual conduct.
Posted April 15, 2005.