Shelton Sanders
On the evening of 19 June 2001, 25-year-old Shelton Sanders disappeared en route to his family’s home in Rembert, South Carolina. In the immediate aftermath, it became clear that an individual that had been with Shelton that evening was the prime suspect…
Shelton John Sanders was one of four siblings born to his parents, William and Peggy. As one of the oldest in the family, Shelton was a role model for his other siblings.
Shelton grew up in an era where computer technology was evolving alongside him and became enamored with computing early on. However, he was also involved in other hobbies; regular childhood stuff like being a member of the Boy Scouts and spending time outdoors. He loved animals and cooking and played percussion in his high school's marching band. He graduated from Hillcrest High School in 1994, and later enrolled at the University of South Carolina, located in the city of Columbia, where he majored in administrative information management.
At work and school, Shelton became known as a "computer guru" who was as dependable and reliable as anyone he worked with. While taking classes at the University of South Carolina, he also worked as a computer systems manager at the USC School of Medicine and planned to continue a career in computer programming after he finished his degree. With a 3.5 GPA, he stood a good chance of finishing his degree in the final half of 2001, the same year that Shelton turned 25 years old.
At that time, Shelton still lived with his family in Rembert, South Carolina, making the lengthy, 40-mile drive to work and school almost every day. Shelton was already making plans for his next steps after school, however, and planned to open up his own computer programming company, among other business ventures he had in mind.
Unfortunately, he would never get the chance.
This is the story of Shelton Sanders.
June 19th, 2001 - the final day of Spring - was the last day that Shelton Sanders was seen alive.
That morning, as recounted by Shelton's family, started like any other day for the aspirational 25-year-old.
The last activity from Shelton's cell phone came at around 9:00 PM on the evening of June 19th, 2001. He called his family from Columbia, letting them know that he would be home in approximately two hours; and then, about ten minutes after this, used his cell phone to try and call Mark Richardson, the friend-of-a-friend that had been acting as his bachelor party accomplice that evening.
After making these two phone calls, Shelton and Mark would hit up at least three hotels in the Columbia area, hoping to find the right fit for their planned bachelor's party.
However, towards the end of this escapade, things start to get a bit murky...
After booking a room at the Residence Inn along Stoneridge Drive, Shelton and Mark would drive back to Mark's residence. There, Mark alleges, the two went their separate ways, and Shelton began making the 40+ mile drive back home to his family's home in Rembert.
Unfortunately, neither Shelton nor the vehicle would be seen again for quite some time.
The following morning - June 20th - Shelton's mother received a phone call from Shelton's employer, asking if she knew where he was... which she, and the rest of their family, were unable to do.
The Sanders family would attempt to get in contact with Shelton but were unable to track him down. Calls to his cell phone went straight to voice mail, indicating that the phone had either died or had been turned off. Since Shelton was known as a reliable and trusted communicator - someone that was close with his family and always kept them in the loop, lest they worry - this disappearing act became noteworthy. No one, not even investigators, believed that Shelton would have gone off the grid willingly.
In the wake of Shelton Sanders' disappearance, police in Sumter County would keep an eye on Shelton's bank accounts and cell phone records for any sign of activity. But none of his accounts or his cards were touched after his disappearance, and his cell phone activity came to an end that same evening, with his final call being the one made at 9:07 PM to his friend Mark Richardson, who said that he'd lost his own cell phone and asked Shelton to call it to help him locate it.
Police would scour the area between Sumter and Richland Counties, the stretch of road that Shelton had become intimately familiar with during his regular commutes. They were looking for not only Shelton but the vehicle he had been driving: his brother's 1988 Oldsmobile Regency. Police would search local highways, just in case Shelton had gotten into a car accident, and would even bring in a helicopter to scour the area alongside the road, which might have been obscured to them at ground level.
Authorities would even authorize a search of local waterways for any sign of Shelton, having been told by anonymous tipsters that his body had been dumped in the Wateree and Congaree Rivers.
Investigators would briefly look into the possibility that Shelton had been targeted because his father, William, had been a local magistrate that handled bond hearings at the Sumter County Correctional Center. But just like their other leads, this proved to be an investigative dead end, and police would drop this theory days later.
In the months to come, police were unable to find any evidence of wrongdoing, and Shelton's body was never found. A $20,000 reward raised by the Sanders family for information leading to the recovery of his remains went unfulfilled, and neither Shelton nor the items he had with him at the time (including a black Movado watch) would be seen again.
For the first few days, Shelton's father, William, attempted to track down his son by reaching out to his friends. Knowing that Shelton had been hanging out with his friends on the night he disappeared, William would dispatch his two other sons - Shelton's brothers - to reach out to Shelton's friends and find out who had seen him last. During these first few days, it would be noted that almost all of Shelton's friends were cooperative and helpful... with one notable exception: Mark Richardson.
Mark, the last person to have seen Shelton Sanders alive, seemed less-than-interested in helping Shelton's family track him down. During conversations with Shelton's family and other friends, Mark expressed the sentiment that he had never really liked Shelton to begin with and wasn't close to him by any metric.
On June 26th, days after Shelton's family had filed a missing persons report in Sumter County (where Shelton had last been seen), Mark abruptly changed course and agreed to speak with the Sanders family. During this conversation, Mark explained away his own bizarre actions and said that Shelton had dropped him off at his own house sometime between 11:00 and 11:30 PM on June 19th. A police officer that was present during this conversation later recalled that Mark acted nervous and defensive throughout, and kept asking if he was a suspect.
On April 26th, 2003 - nearly two years later - a noise disturbance would be called into the Sumter County Sheriff's Office. This disturbance was reported at the Greenbrier Apartments located off of Parklane Road in Columbia, South Carolina, near the Columbia Place Mall... and just a few miles away from where Shelton Sanders had last been seen.
There, between Buildings 18 and 20, officials with the Sheriff's Office would discover the Oldsmobile Regency that had disappeared with Shelton Sanders nearly two years prior. This vehicle had been backed into a parking spot facing the apartment building, and police later stated that the vehicle had been there for some time... at least two months, but likely closer to two years. The tires were flat, the gas and oil were almost completely empty, and a decent amount of black fluid had leaked out of the vehicle and dried up on the pavement below it.
Unfortunately, no evidence could be recovered from the vehicle: no fingerprints, no DNA evidence, etc. Other potential evidence may have been compromised by police at the scene, with news reports detailing that the door handles had been touched by investigators before they dusted for prints and that the large oil stain under the vehicle was not promptly tested.
Despite this vehicle being discovered in Sumter County, the vehicle would be handed over as evidence to the Richland County Sheriff's Office, who had taken over the missing person case in the interim months, and news of this discovery would be withheld from the public for upwards of two years.
Mark Anthony Richardson, the last known person to have seen Shelton Sanders alive, would remain investigators' top suspect in this case, believing that he had shot Shelton to death and then covered up the crime afterward.
Mark had been a loose friend of Shelton's and had been with him during his final known hours. If you remember, Mark had told investigators that Shelton had dropped him off at his home along Columbia's Olympia Avenue sometime between 11:00 and 11:30 PM on June 19th, 2001. However, Mark's cell phone records indicated that he had attempted to make several phone calls less than two hours later, needing another ride from a separate area of town... an area close to where Shelton's vehicle was found nearly two years later.
Despite Mark being the last person to see Shelton alive - and having a host of circumstantial evidence alluding towards his involvement in or knowledge of Shelton's disappearance - investigators would have a hard time uncovering any evidence that pointed towards Mark's guilt.
In October of 2005, more than four years after Shelton's disappearance, 30-year-old Mark Richardson was arrested and charged with the murder of Shelton Sanders. While his trial wouldn't begin until 2008, prosecutors - having to try the case without Shelton's body - tried to paint a convincing argument centered around Mark's deteriorating mental health and his sketchy behavior at the time of Shelton's disappearance.
You may recall that Mark had reportedly started to show signs of untreated mental illness between 1999 and 2000, having told friends at the time that he was hearing voices, which were encouraging him to do violent things to others. Acquaintances of Mark's described him as a paranoid and strange individual, whose behavior had grown scary during this time period.
Prosecutors would also present the witness statements from Mark's neighbors, who recalled hearing three gunshots in his home on June 19th, 2001; the timing of which correlated to when Shelton had dropped off Mark at his home (according to statements from Mark himself). One of the neighbors, who came over to Mark's house to check in on him, was told by Mark that the sound had been his car backfiring in the garage.
A search of Mark's home in 2001 had uncovered a Glock .45-caliber pistol, and it was reported by some of Mark's friends that in the days after Shelton's death, he had been attempted to sell a separate .38-caliber revolver, which he told friends "he didn't need anymore." However, without a body, the recovery of these weapons would prove to be virtually useless.
Cell phone records also indicated that Mark had been near the location that Shelton's vehicle was abandoned, the Greenbrier Apartments, approximately two hours after saying goodbye to Shelton. While trying to rouse his siblings for a ride home, Mark's cell phone had pinged off of cellular tower #147, which was incredibly close to the apartment complex along Parklane Road that Shelton's vehicle was found at in April of 2003.
Prosecutors also presented Mark's half-confession to police from 2005, during which, he had asked, as recounted by Richland County Sheriff's Sergeant Walter McDaniels:
"How do I explain getting rid of a body?"
Mark's confession, which he had backtracked on almost immediately, seemed to point to a situation where he expressed remorse for accidentally killing Shelton. However, without him fully confessing, this was just a guess on behalf of authorities trying to figure out why he might have wanted to kill Shelton Sanders.
The defense provided a much less exhaustive case; instead, arguing that there was enough doubt in this case to acquit Mark Richardson. Their argument boiled down to the belief that without a body, it was impossible to prove that a crime had taken place at all... and that Shelton Sanders was still technically just a missing person.
Mark Richardson's trial concluded in April 2008, nearly seven years after Shelton's disappearance. Because of the successful arguments of his lawyers, the jury would remain deadlocked, and after being unable to come to a unanimous decision, a mistrial would be declared. Mark Richardson may be tried again in the future if new evidence were to be uncovered in this case.
Sadly, not a lot has been written about Shelton's case over the past twenty years.
While his case hadn't attracted a lot of attention early on (only one South Carolina newspaper covered it for the first few years), that attention seemed to virtually disappear after Mark Richardson's case resulted in a hung jury. It wasn't until 2018 that Shelton's younger sister began to breathe new life into the story.
Wilveria was only 11 years old at the time of Shelton's disappearance but continues to adore him a lifetime later. She continues to search for her big brother and is determined to either find him... or find out what happened to him.
Wilveria has been making the rounds between investigators, attorneys, government officials, journalists, and anyone with an interest in this case in order to raise awareness for her brother's case. Not only has she been successful in raising the profile of the case on several outlets in South Carolina, but she has had billboards with Shelton's picture and the reward put up throughout the state.
Wilveria insists that she and her family aren't in this for vengeance... they're even willing to settle for something less than justice, as long as it leads to the return of Shelton's body. She and her loved ones just want to be able to put Shelton to rest after twenty years, which would allow them to finally begin properly mourning his loss.
As of this episode's recording, the story of Shelton Sanders remains unresolved.
Episode Information
Episode Information
Writing, research, hosting, and production by Micheal Whelan
Published on on April 17th, 2021
Producers: Producers: Roberta Janson, Ben Krokum, Gabriella Bromley, Steven Wilson, Quil Carter, Travis Scsepko, Laura Hannan, Bryan Hall, Damion Moore, Scott Meesey, Amy Hampton, Scott Patzold, Marie Vanglund, Astrid Kneier, Aimee McGregor, Jo Wong, Sara Moscaritolo, Sydney Scotton, Thomas Ahearn, Marion Welsh, Patrick Laakso, Rebecca O'Sullivan, Meadow Landry, Tatum Bautista, Sally Ranford, Kevin McCracken, Ruth Durbin, Michele Watson, Jared Midwood, Teunia Elzinga, Ryan Green, Jacinda C., Stephanie Joyner, Cherish Brady, and Lauren
Special thanks to Wilveria Sanders, Shelton's sister, for agreeing to speak with me for this episode. If you would like to learn more about Shelton's case and show your support, please follow along at the social media links below:
https://twitter.com/FindingShelton
https://www.facebook.com/findingsheltonsanders/
https://www.instagram.com/findingsheltonsanders/
Music Credits
Original music created by Micheal Whelan through Amper Music
Theme music created and composed by Ailsa Traves
Sources and other reading
The Charley Project - Shelton John Sanders
News19 - “Family searching for missing South Carolina man’s remains 19 years later”
WIS News 10 - “Family of missing Rembert man looks for answers”
ABC 4 News - “Family seeking closure nearly 20 years after Columbia man disappears”