The Architect of Modern Law Enforcement in South Carolina

Wallace Leo Jenkins (1896-1941) of the South Carolina Highway Patrol was a pioneer in the modernization of law enforcement in South Carolina. Jenkins established the first criminal justice information system, the first statewide fingerprint repository, and the first statewide crime lab. He was an expert in fingerprints, ballistics, and questioned documents and was personally involved in virtually every major criminal investigation in the state throughout his tenure as the head of the Patrol's Identification Bureau. The Bureau was moved to the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division after his untimely death and became the model on which that agency has evolved. The book, Leo Jenkins, The Architect of Modern Law Enforcement in South Carolina, by Buddy Wilkes, 2017, is reprinted below in its entirety. Paperback and Kindle versions are available on Amazon.

Leo Jenkins

The Architect of Modern Law Enforcement in

South Carolina

by Buddy Wilkes

Copyright © 2017 Buddy Wilkes

All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1533297181

ISBN-13: 1533297185

CONTENTS

1 Birth of the Highway Patrol

2 Cheating Death

3 The Great Palmetto Bank Robbery

4 South Carolina’s Military Coup

5 The Kiss of a Red-Haired Woman

6 The Murder of Corporal Joe Byrd

7 The Legacy of Leo Jenkins

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Many thanks to Leo Jenkins’ grandson, Mr. Charles Laughinghouse, Jr., and his great-granddaughter, Ms. Amy Laughinghouse, who graciously shared the Lieutenant’s scrapbook with the author, supplying insight into the life of a remarkable man.

1 Birth of the Highway Patrol

To understand law enforcement in South Carolina you have to go back in time a few hundred years. New England was founded by penniless Pilgrims who would have starved to death without their Native American friends. South Carolina was founded by mega-rich British plantation owners who expanded their operations from Barbados, where they had been planters for generations. They were independent in the sense they were peers of the King of England and no qualms about arguing with him. After all, the King was receiving a healthy cut of their immense profits in exchange for very little effort in the Carolina Venture.

As the colony matured these super-wealthy planters formed a General Assembly to advance the cause of making even more money for themselves and the King, which was the sole reason for the founding of South Carolina.

The King appointed a Royal Governor to represent his interests, that is, to make sure he got his cut. The planters, from the beginning, basically ignored whomever happened to be the Royal Governor and did as they pleased. They were simply too rich and powerful to be bothered by what they considered a petty bureaucrat. After all, each had his own kinship or friendship with the King himself.

The political power structure between the General Assembly and the Governor in South Carolina exists to this day. The General Assembly, controlled by the ideological descents of the planter class, routinely ignores the Governor’s budget proposals and overrides vetoes at will. Real power rests with the Legislature, which actually appointed the Governor from the time of the Revolution until the Civil War. Tradition dies on a Jurassic timetable in South Carolina. Even after Governors came to be elected by the people, they were granted little legal authority. This explains how the Highway Patrol, in spite of the South Carolina and United States Constitutions, remained under the control of the Legislative rather than the Executive branch of government for its first sixty years.

South Carolina was slower than virtually all other states in creating a Highway Patrol. Twenty-two years after Henry Ford started rolling out automobiles by the thousands, the General Assembly finally started the process.

Most in the General Assembly saw a driver’s license as a matter of right, like the right to bear arms or the right to secede from the Union. As long as you were twelve years old, the presumptive age of being tall enough to see over the steering wheel, you got your license, a shiny brass tag with your name and particulars stamped on it. A modest fee for the license funded the Highway Patrol, whose mandate was to promote and enforce safe driving. This funding method was the only option, since South Carolina’s economy was still in the tank sixty years after the Civil War. This method also meant that the Highway Patrol budget was stable and scale-able so it could grow as the population grew.

Even though the cost of a license was minimal, the fee was debated for months as being an onerous and unbearable tax on the working man. Proponents of the Highway Patrol pointed in alarm to the huge number of citizens being slaughtered on the highways. In 1929 there were over 14,000 vehicle accidents and 213 people killed on South Carolina’s roads. Smooth new roads were being built with a mixture of Federal and State funds. Faster cars shared these roads with horse-draw wagons, a deadly combination. Opponents, such as Horry County Representative G. Lloyd Floyd, speechified that if created, the Highway Patrol would consist of “about 100 men riding up and down the highways, taking away the rights of the people...the patrol would have the right to take away a man’s license and he would not be able to get home.”

South Carolina’s genetic predisposition against government authority resulted in amendments to the bill creating the Highway Patrol that mandated “distinctive” uniforms, clearly marked vehicles, and included the clause “no arrest would be binding if the officer was in hiding or had set a trap for motorist.” In its final form, the new statute strictly limited the authority of the Highway Patrol to the enforcement of laws pertaining to motor vehicles or highways. Once the scope of their legal authority was limited, Legislators started fighting to make sure they got at least one Highway Patrolman for their county. After all, fines collected for driving violations were deposited into the county treasury where the offense occurred.

As mentioned, law enforcement is, and always was, clearly the responsibility of the executive branch of government. The General Assembly, however, was not about to give this powerful new police force to the Governor. Instead, they gave it to Chief Highway Commissioner Ben Sawyer.

A close ally of the General Assembly, Sawyer was far more powerful than any of the many Governors who came and went during his long tenure as head of the Highway Department. His budget nearly equaled the rest of all other state agencies combined. He employed thousands of employees scattered throughout every nook and cranny of the state. Senators lobbied him, not the other way around, since he decided which roads got paved and when. He was smart enough to keep the Senators happy, and Senators in turn took care of his budget.

Despite this cozy good-old-boy system, Sawyer proved to be a wise and strategic leader for the new addition to his agency, the Highway Patrol. He knew it was all about the attitude. Sawyer instilled in the Highway Patrol the idea of prompt and courteous service. Patrolmen were dispatched to towns across the state to assist people in getting their driver’s licenses and registering their cars, all done in a friendly and helpful manner. Sawyer also made sure that every Sheriff and Chief of Police knew that Patrolmen were there to assist them, never to interfere or compete.

It worked. In short order newspaper editors were unanimous in their praise for the Highway Patrol. The number of highway accidents and fatalities declined. Feedback from the public and local law enforcement was positive. A police force whose creation had engendered fear and suspicion became a welcome part of the communities it served.

A few persistent critics of the Highway Patrol remained. For years to come, bills were introduced in the General Assembly to abolish the agency or transform it into a general police force. Each of these proposals was swatted down by the many supporters of the Highway Patrol. The Patrol grew as the population and number of motor vehicles grew. It helped, of course, that Ben Sawyer’s public relations campaign was not fluff – his Highway Patrolmen were the real deal, an exceptionally talented group of capable men.

In 1930 the South Carolina Highway Patrol began with a total of 69 civilians and officers. As promised during negotiations to create the agency, each of South Carolina’s 46 counties had at least one Patrolman in residence.

2 Cheating Death

Wallace Leo Jenkins was a member of the first class of Highway Patrolmen. The word “class” is used loosely here, since Patrol folklore holds that these men were issued a Harley-Davidson motorcycle, a ticket book, and instructed to go be a Highway Patrolman. Training would later become a lasting priority, but the first class had to wing it.

Jenkins was born on February 18, 1896 in Santuc, a remote settlement in the rolling hills of Union County, an area settled by Scots-Irish in the 1700’s. The ruling class in Charleston had arranged for these “arrow catchers” to settle on free land in exchange for being human buffers between the Cherokee and the rich Low Country planters. The area remains sparsely inhabited and is now part of the Thomas Sumter National Forest.

Jenkins was a tall, fair-haired young man when he registered for the draft in 1917. He listed his occupation as a mechanic for the Overland Piedmont Company in Spartanburg. When the United States entered the Great War, Jenkins had been attending Columbia University in New York City for two years. He volunteered for the Navy and was assigned as an officer in the mechanical branch of Naval Aviation.

After the war Jenkins returned home and continued to work in the automobile business. He also ran his own bus line in Union, home of the massive Monarch Cotton Mill. When the Highway Patrol was formed in 1930, Jenkins was among the first to apply. He was promptly hired and stationed in Lancaster, another cotton mill town in the Upstate.

On October 12, 1931 Jenkins and his partner, Ralph Waldo McCraken, were riding their motorcycles south on Highway 215 in Fairfield County just a few miles from Santuc. They were bound for Patrol Headquarters in Columbia for a special detail. As they topped a hill the road before them was completely blocked with stopped cars. The local mailman, “Judge” Shelton, had crossed over to the wrong side of the road to deposit a letter in a mailbox. Several cars that had been stuck behind him on his stop-and-go mail route filled the other lane. Unable to stop, Jenkins miraculously threaded the needle and emerged unscathed. McCraken’s motorbike hit Shelton’s car head-on. Instantly he became the first South Carolina Highway Patrolman to lose his life in the line of duty.

A week later Jenkins was in a motor vehicle accident in the Sand Hills northeast of Columbia. His patrol car collided with one driven by a local man, Leon Sanders, who died in the wreckage. Jenkins survived, but he was seriously injured.

Recovery was too slow for Jenkins, and he returned to work before he should have. On April 19, 1932 Jenkins was on patrol a few miles outside of Lancaster when he stopped a car for drunk driving. Jenkins had no way to know that the driver, Grady Contz, was an escaped convict. As Jenkins dealt with Clontz, his two passengers jumped Jenkins from behind. The three of them beat, kicked, and pistol-whipped Jenkins unmercifully. Clontz was about to shoot Jenkins with his own service revolver when he and his comrades were scared away by an oncoming car. Jenkins had survived his third brush with death in six months.

During his convalescence Jenkins studied fingerprinting so he could continue his career in law enforcement even if he were physically unable to return to duty as an officer.

When he did return to work, word of his fingerprinting skills spread. Although working crime scenes was not a function of the Highway Patrol, Chief Commissioner Ben Sawyer saw this as a logical extension of assisting local law enforcement, and there was no other agency in existence that could provide this service.

At the same time, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) opened its national crime laboratory and set out on a campaign to enlist local and state law enforcement agencies in a scientific war on crime, including the collection and comparison of fingerprints. The South Carolina Association of Police Chiefs lobbied the General Assembly to create a state bureau of identification to serve as a repository for fingerprints and a clearinghouse for communications between South Carolina, the FBI, and other states.

As stated, these duties would not have ordinarily fallen to the Highway Patrol, since they were outside the scope of the law that created the agency. The more likely candidate would have been the State Constabulary, a small group of political appointees who served as law enforcement officers at the direction of the Governor. The Constabulary, however, was completely shut down due to the Great Depression. This “obituary” appeared in the February 22, 1932 edition of The State newspaper:

Fourteen automobiles, part of the equipment used heretofore by the governor’s constabulary, were resting quietly last night in a garage where they have been placed after having been turned in by members of the force, which was disbanded yesterday. The constabulary was formed in 1893 to enforce the liquor law. Yesterday, it passed from the picture. Faced with the prospect of virtually no appropriations for continuing the force, Governor Blackwood announced several weeks ago he would not recommission the 15 officers…. Although originally formed to enforce prohibition laws...the duties of the constabulary have been broadened in recent years.

The Highway Patrol was the only state-level law enforcement agency left, and it was thriving due to its stable income from driver’s licenses and its solid reputation. Ben Sawyer moved decisively to leverage Jenkins’ knowledge to put the Highway Patrol in the fingerprint business, as printed in The State newspaper on September 15, 1933:

Finger-print sets were delivered yesterday to each of the 78 patrol-men of the state highway department by Officer Leo Jenkins, an expert finger-print man with the law enforcement division, set out immediately to instruct the others in using them. A. R. Ward, assistant chief of the law enforcement division, said the finger-print system will be put in use by the highway department in co-operation with the United States department of justice. Prints of each suspicious person arrested will be sent to Washington where they will be investigated and copies of the originals returned to the highway department for filing.

This endeavor marked the beginning of crime scene investigation and a statewide fingerprint repository in South Carolina, with Leo Jenkins at the helm. Jenkins set out to demonstrate the real world utility of the system.

St. Matthews was, and is, a picturesque town in Calhoun County surrounded by pecan orchards and cotton fields. When the pharmacy there was burglarized, Jenkins helped the local law enforcement officers set up a fingerprint system of their own. Every person arrested was fingerprinted. After a few months, Jenkins returned to St. Matthews and compared fingerprints from the burglary to those in the growing file. Prints from the cash register matched those of one the men arrested and fingerprinted for some other crime. There was no other evidence whatsoever, but the man knew he was caught and confessed. Similar episodes played out around the state as Leo Jenkins spread the gospel of fingerprinting.

The next step was for Jenkins to move into a more accessible role, as set forth in the following press release to The State newspaper on June 12, 1934:

The assignment of Patrolman Leo Jenkins, formerly of Lancaster, to duty as special investigator and “night man” with headquarters in Columbia was announced yesterday…. Jenkins will be on duty from 5 o’clock in the afternoon until 2 in the morning in the highway department offices….He will have access to the registration files and the directory of all peace officers in the state, thereby giving information to other officers in the state when such is wanted….Mr. Jenkins is also a finger-print expert and in case of a very serious crime where his services as a fingerprint examiner may be required we shall be glad to have you call on him in this connection.

Jenkins’ assignment filled a huge need for information and expertise and was instantly popular with local law enforcement agencies across the state. Through his clearinghouse, officers around the state could make inquiries on wanted persons, have fingerprints checked, and send and receive information, photos, and fingerprints from the FBI and other police agencies around the nation. The Criminal Justice Information Services (CJIS) unit of the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division can trace its roots directly back to Leo Jenkins, whose title “night man” did not do justice to the revolution in law enforcement communications he spearheaded in South Carolina.

The stars had aligned. Jenkins possessed the technical and leadership skills needed to transform his duties as “night man” into the State Identification Bureau, in demand for some time by Chiefs of Police and Sheriffs. South Carolina now had a state-level law enforcement unit to leverage the vast resources of the FBI and to enlist the assistance of agencies in other states.

The new level of communications and scientific crime-fighting came none too soon. The crime wave of machine-gun gangsters had taken hold in Chicago and was spreading nationwide. FBI Agent Melvin Purvis from Timmonsville, South Carolina, had become a national celebrity by leading the captures of the famous outlaws John Dillinger, Baby Face Nelson, and Pretty Boy Floyd. It was now Leo Jenkins’ turn to go up against a band of organized gangsters.

3 The Great Palmetto Bank Robbery

Just as the Identification Bureau began to gel, Leo Jenkins was presented with the opportunity to solve the biggest bank robbery in the history of South Carolina. Reporter W. E. Abrams filed this story that appeared on the front page of The State newspaper on September 5, 1934:

Excitement is running high at Lake City because of the bold bank robbery which occurred here this morning around 8 o’clock. Fred Stalvey, cashier, interviewed after his return to town, estimated that the robbers got as much as $115,000. About 7 o’clock three men, unmasked, went to the home of J. Hoyt Carter, bank president, where they easily gained admittance. The door was open as the young son, Jimmie, 11, had got up early and had gone out of doors to play. Mr. Carter was just finishing his bath. Mrs. Carter was busy about breakfast. Miss Athalie Carter, 16, had not yet arisen. The robbers did not hesitate to state the nature of their business. They wanted Mr. Carter, they said, because they knew he could lead them to the bank’s money. They stood guard over him while he dressed. They were at the house about an hour and assured the Carters that they were prepared to take care of every emergency and would not hesitate to do so. At first it seemed their intention to take both of the children with them in their car. Jimmie had come in from play while they were there. They had made him sit down and told him not to dare make a noise of any sort. They had compelled Athalie to get up and dress and she had to plead with the man in her room to turn his back on her while she dressed. On the mother’s persistent pleading the robbers were persuaded not to take the children. Mrs. Carter assured them that the children would obey her and would make no effort to make any alarm before her return. They used wide adhesive tape to bind the children by the wrists and ankles to the bed. Jimmie still had the tape around his ankles when your correspondent saw him. Athalie had removed the tape but still bore the marks of it. When they were about to bind Athalie the mother asked if she might be permitted to put on hose to prevent unnecessary pain when the adhesive would be removed. Athalie reached for a pair of hose and her mother told her to use an old pair. The bandit said to use the pair in her hands and contemptuously tossed a dollar towards her to use to buy another pair. One of the three robbers stripped pillow cases from two pillows in which to carry the loot and threw $1 down on the bed to pay, as he said, for another pair. While in the Carter home the robbers made free and easy with the family belongings, helping themselves to things from the Frigidaire. They made no effort to conceal their identity nor to avoid making fingerprints. They told the Carters that they had been watching them for three days and nights and had familiarized themselves with their habits and hours. Facetiously they proposed trading cars with the Carters. Apparently their long stay at the house was time to get to the bank at about the time the bank vaults would open with the time clock. Finally, they made Mrs. Carter get into their car with two of the bandits and Mr. Carter get in his own car with the third of the gang. They left by the back door. A neighbor, Mrs. R. L. Coleman, saw them leaving and called to Mrs. Carter to go to town with her to make some purchases for the noon meal. The robbers made Mrs. Carter answer as naturally as possible. The Carter home is on Blanding street about five blocks from the bank. Arrived at the bank, two robbers remained in the car with Mrs. Carter and kept a gun at her back until she persuaded them to believe that she would make no outcry or do nothing to give the alarm. The third went with Mr. Carter into the bank where Mr. Stalvey the cashier was. One of the gang had evidently been hanging around the bank and followed the other robber with Mr. Carter into the building. The robber approached Mr. Stalvey as if to shake hands and frankly told him his purpose and upon the cashier’s statement of incredulity called upon Mr. Carter for verification. The robbers compelled the two bank officers to enter the vault and get the money. They took only currency, no silver, to an approximate value of $115,000. They stuffed the money into Mrs. Carter’s pillow cases, using one inside of the other for added safety. They compelled Mr. Carter to carry the loot from the bank to the car. They they made Mr. Stalvey get in the front seat with the driver and Mrs. Carter and Mr. Carter they made get in the back seat. They had repeatedly assured Mrs. Carter that all they wanted was the money and that no harm would come to either of the officials if their instructions were followed. About halfway between the bank and where Main street crosses highway route 17 they let Mrs. Carter out of the car. This necessitated Mr. Stalvey’s getting out and while the movements were underway a machine gun was kept trained on him. They told Mrs. Carter that they would release the officials about a mile from town. As it turned out they were released about three miles from Lamar, and when they were released the robbers gave a $5 bill to each of them. When Mrs. Carter was released from the car she made her way as quickly as possible back to the bank and soon after she got in touch with Frank Sims, her husband’s partner in the feed business, and then hurried back in her car which had been left parked near the bank to her home and children where she found them as she had left them. Mr. Sims lost no time in getting news of the robbery on the wires and to county officers. After something more than an hour a telephone message came from Mr. Carter from Lamar telling of their release where upon McIver Bowen and Lanham Askins hurried in their car to bring them home. Mrs. Stalvey, who was ill at the time, was not informed of the robbery until word had been received that her husband and Mr. Carter were both safe and unharmed.

Leo Jenkins arrived in Lake city and quickly determined there were no fingerprints that would help. What Jenkins used to solve the case was a combination of behavioral science, criminal profiling, and the analysis of criminal intelligence, although those terms were unknown at the time.

Jenkins meticulously interviewed each and every witness. He found people who had seen some of the gangsters in Lake City during the days leading up to the robbery, a store clerk who had sold tape to two of the men, and, of course, the Carter family who had spent a good deal of time up close with the three main robbers, including their red-headed leader.

One thing that stuck out is that they were all polite. Even when they were holding someone hostage, they went out of their way to be nice, as if they saw themselves as Robin Hoods. Jenkins put together a clear narrative account of events, including detailed descriptions of the robbers. He compared their behavior with the modus operandi of gangsters known to have committed similar crimes, including those who were escapees, since one of the robbers had offhandedly remarked to a witness that he had escaped from prison. This new-found wealth of information from jurisdictions around the country was available because of the new role that Jenkins played – he was the one-man hub of criminal justice communications, tied into the growing network that would become CJIS.

After exhaustive study, Jenkins narrowed the group down to 16 suspects. As he checked their fingerprints against his own growing file and that of the FBI he discovered that eight of them were in jail or prison at the time of the robbery, a feat that would have been impossible for any officer in South Carolina prior to this time. He traveled back to Lake City with photos of the remaining suspects. Seven witnesses pick out the leader, Frank “Red” English.

Up until this time, criminal intelligence in South Carolina was shared within a single county, maybe to those adjoining. Jenkins had put in operation a system by which such information was shared nationwide, a technical innovation that revolutionized criminal investigations in the state.

Based on Jenkins’ methodical, meticulous work and his use of new technology, Red English was located and arrested in Louisville, Kentucky. On his way back to South Carolina he told officers that a few days earlier he and his wife had eaten breakfast in a restaurant in Omaha, Nebraska. He looked up during his meal to spot the famous FBI Agent from South Carolina, Melvin Purvis, seated at the next table. English thought he was a goner, but quickly got out of the restaurant without being recognized. At one point during their get-away, English’s gang had driven within a stone’s throw from the farm outside of Timmonsville where Purvis was born and raised.

English was tried and sentenced to a long prison term. A small amount of the stolen bank money was recovered. Leo Jenkins emerged from this episode as the super-sleuth of South Carolina and became famous in his own right. From that point onward, Jenkins was called for on virtually every serious crime in the state. Newspapers chronicled his exploits, and he became so well known that when his daughter had a fender-bender it made the front page of The State newspaper.

4 South Carolina's Military Coup

The South Carolina Highway Patrol had grown into a well-run and well-respected law enforcement agency. Greed for political power put the future of the Patrol, and the work of Leo Jenkins’ new Identification Bureau, in jeopardy.

Olin Johnston wanted to be the Governor of South Carolina. O.K., back then, nobody wanted to be the Governor of South Carolina. But that was the accepted way, the necessary stepping stone, to becoming a US Senator. The tradition was to get elected Governor so you could travel the state for free while you politicked for the Senate. Since Governors had very little authority to do anything, they had all the time in the world to do this. Johnston needed a villain to campaign against, some cause to attack and conquer in order to make him look like a knight in shining armor out to save the common folk. He picked Chief Highway Commissioner Ben Sawyer.

Johnston traveled the state painting Sawyer as the devil incarnate, and represented the Highway Department as a massive corrupt agency that enriched cronies on the backs of the working man. His solution was for the Highway Department to be under the control of the Governor instead of a Commission beholden to the all-powerful Senators in the General Assembly.

The tactic got him elected by the people, but it backfired on him with the entrenched power structure. His attacks bounced off the State House like Sherman’s cannon balls during the War, leaving barely a mark.

The stakes were high. Governor Johnston plotted to expand the power of his office in one fell swoop at the expense of the immovable Senate. With no hope of winning a frontal assault, Johnston planned a sneaky end-run to carry out his mission.

The Governor had the power to appoint Highway Department Commissioners, but they had to be approved by the Senate. In real life this meant that only those hand-picked by the Senate were allowed to serve.

Johnston waited until the Senate was in recess and appointed enough new Commissioners to carry out a hostile takeover. Johnston then got a an old buddy of, a National Guard Captain, to station his machine-gun company around the Highway Department building to deny entrance to the ousted Commissioners, including Chief Commissioner Ben Sawyer. Modern-day politics do not hold a candle to those of old-timey South Carolina.

Johnston required all employees of the Highway Department, including the Highway Patrol, to tender their resignations. He then hired them all back so it would be crystal clear for whom they worked. In blatant violation of the law that created the Highway Patrol, he commissioned them all as state constables, thereby reminding them all that they served at the “pleasure” of the Governor.

When the General Assembly re-convened, it did so under an American flag flying upside-down atop the State House, the international sign of distress. The showdown went on for weeks. Fortunately, none of the victims of the coup tried to cross the machine-gun lines. Ben Sawyer spent the time quietly at home and never entered the public fracas. The General Assembly sued Governor Johnston, and the South Carolina Supreme Court ruled that the Governor had acted unconstitutionally. In a broader legal sense, the ruling confirmed that Olin Johnston was an idiot. The General Assembly stripped the Governor of his authority to appoint Highway Commissioners, a law that has remained in effect til this day.

Partly as payback for Johnston’s attempted takeover of the Highway Patrol, the General Assembly attacked the newly re-established Constabulary for looking the other way – or worse – in the face of organized crime bosses who ran illegal gambling and liquor operations across the state. After a year of taking testimony and investigation, the Joint Committee to Investigate Law Enforcement had plenty of criticism for the Constabulary, but no criminal charges were filed. The Committee did, however, make recommendations on the structure of state-level law enforcement that were eventually adopted:

...the Committee does not recommend the supplanting of local law enforcement agencies by any centralized state police system. One of the foundation pillars of the American system is local self-government...the Committee recommends that the General Assembly set up...a Bureau of Investigation, to be composed of a personnel of technically trained men, selected on the basis of experience and training, and not subject to political influences...Only the larger cities have available funds to employ trained detectives, fingerprint experts, etc. At present, there is only one public agency in this state which can give this aid to the counties and smaller towns, namely, the Fingerprint Bureau of the State Highway Department. There was a great need for such a bureau, and it has rendered valuable services to the state, but the Committee is of the opinion that it should be separated from the highway patrol and become part of the Bureau of Investigation...We recommend that the state constabulary and the Fingerprint Bureau of the State Highway Department be supplanted by a State Bureau of Investigation.

The General Assembly ignored this forward-thinking advice from the Committee. The embittered Governor campaigned to do away with the Highway Patrol entirely, replacing it with a state police force answerable to him. Neither his proposal, nor the Committee’s recommendations, gained traction and the Highway Department and Jenkins’ prize unit maintained the status quo.

Like other Governors before him, Johnston was elected to the US Senate, where, in the tradition of South Carolina politics, he remained until he died in office.

5 The Kiss of a Red-Haired Woman

The story of Leo Jenkins’ most widely publicized case came as his Identification Unit had reached it prime. Jenkins was a rock star. The press fed accounts of his exploits to an eager and admiring public. Jenkins became a star attraction at the annual State Fair in Columbia, where he manned a display of the most modern crime-fighting technology. A natural-born teacher, Jenkins thoroughly enjoyed explaining the art and science of modern law enforcement. Because of his un-assuming nature, Jenkins was equally popular with the political side of law enforcement, the Sheriffs and Chiefs of Police who had the ears of their respective Senators.

The Kiss of a Red-Haired Woman case had it all – an evil and desperate criminal, a beautiful woman gone astray, a good and righteous cop shot down in his prime, the work of a super-sleuth, followed by a manhunt, a high-speed chase, a shootout, and then an ending with high drama in a packed courtroom. The newspaper accounts that followed the case as it unfolded read like pulp fiction. Jenkins’ own account was characteristically humble, as printed in the September 1938 edition of Fingerprint Magazine.

Prints Jail Murderer for Life

by Lt. Leo Jenkins, Supt.,

South Carolina Highway Patrol

Bureau of Identification

I became a member of the South Carolina Highway Patrol in June, 1930. After several short departmental assignments, I was stationed in the northeastern part of the state. While there I was severely injured in an automobile accident, and was disabled for months. It was during my convalescence from this injury that I became interested in the science of fingerprints.

Feeling that I would never again be able to perform the duties I fulfilled before my accident and desiring to continue to be active in law enforcement, I decided to enroll for the course offered by the Institute of Applied Science. Shortly after being graduated from the school I was called upon to investigate several crimes throughout the State of South Carolina, thereby gaining practical experience which later stood me in good stead.

July 6, 1936 I was transferred from territorial assignments to the state capital at Columbia to set up an identification bureau for the Highway Patrol. I was made a lieutenant in the patrol, and since that time I have been superintendent of the bureau. Our bureau has grown by leaps and bounds. Since its organization we have prepared 132 cases of scientific evidence for trial, ranging from petty larceny to murder. Of these, 93 have been cases with finger print evidence alone, in only one of which a conviction was not obtained.

My 113th case came to my attention at an early hour on the morning of July 4, 1937 when I was called upon over the telephone to make a hurried trip seventy-four miles away to Lancaster County where a police officer had been brutally slain by someone using a shotgun loaded with buck shot.

Within the shortest possible time to make the trip, I arrived at the scene of the murder, and found a wrecked automobile bearing out of state license plates. The chance of ever breaking the case seemed pretty slim at first. What appeared to be almost useless clues gradually worked themselves out, however, and it was not long before we began to pick up details of what had transpired.

A spectator to the shooting gave me a statement to the effect that a man and a woman were the sole occupants of the car, and that the man had done the fatal shooting. One person out of over 120,000,000 in the United States had committed the deed, and it was our job to trace him through his wrecked car.

Through the helpful assistance of authorities in other states we learned that the license plates had been stolen in Atlanta, Georgia some ten days before the murder. The police of Asheville, North Carolina reported that the automobile had been stolen from there two days before that.

The question was still, “Who is the killer?” He was known to have commandeered, at the point of a gun after the shooting, the car of a passing motorist, forcing him and his family from their car at the point of his death dealing sawed-off shotgun. While he kept them herded like cattle, he transferred his baggage from the wrecked automobile to the one he had just appropriated. Thereupon, he hurried from the scene and headed away for places unknown.

With this much information about the culprit, I decided to search the wrecked car for fingerprints. The instrument panel, doors, windows, et cetera were all powdered and many fine latent impressions came out. My elation was soon destroyed, though, by one of the attentive throng who remarked, “Maybe those are my prints. I have touched the car with both hands, and undoubtedly left some prints.” No one, though, admitted having touched the rear view mirror. It was soon dusted, both front and back, and to my great satisfaction the tell-tale designs, which in a few hours were to mean so much in solving the horrible crime, jumped up sharp and clear.

A careful scrutiny was made for further evidence, but none could be found so I returned to Columbia with the intention of searching our files for duplicates of the latent prints. Detailed search of the files revealed that the patterns belonged to an escaped criminal from another state. He was badly wanted there, too, so we redoubled our efforts to apprehend him.

Hours rolled by without any leads as to the murderer’s whereabouts or the location of the commandeered car. The vehicle was eventually found abandoned in the mountainous section of North Carolina. I proceeded there immediately, and an examination of the automobile revealed duplications of the same fingerprints we had found on the other car.

Encouraged by our discovery, the police of North and South Carolina and the Federal Bureau of Investigation began an intensive hunt for the man I had named as the killer. About a week later, on the morning of July 13, the fugitive was sighted some 250 miles from where he had abandoned the commandeered machine. When ordered to surrender by Lieutenant Kinsey of our patrol and his men, augmented by the sheriff’s forces, he drove away, wrecking another stolen car after a thirty-mile chase. There he was arrested and charged with the murder of the police officer. His trial came up on September 23, and he was found guilty of murder without recommendation of mercy. He received a life sentence in the South Carolina Penitentiary.

Had it not been for fingerprints, he might never have been identified and tried for his crime. Possibly some innocent person would have been accused of it, and the finger of accusation would have left an indelible stigma in the minds of many. I want to quote the words of this man while in prison awaiting trial to show how far flung among criminals the science of finger prints is appreciated. In a a letter to his mother he wrote, “I am charged with the 4th of July slaying of a patrolman in Lancaster County, South Carolina. They have my prints taken from a machine used then and another abandoned that day. I think that anyone should be pessimistic. Neither should anyone overlook facts, so I must say I’ll be lucky if they don’t give me the electric chair.”

These were the words of a man living in the shadow of the “hot seat.” When he was told that we were not trying to identify him by what anyone had said or might say, and that if he could explain why his finger prints were on the rear view mirror of the two automobiles and why he was not guilty of the charge, we would then have to seek other evidence. His answer was, “Yes! I did the shooting. I had to.” The sawed off shotgun recovered from the car when he was arrested was identified as being the same gun that fired the fatal shell found at the scene of the murder.

I believe this is one of the most worthwhile identifications ever effected. It relieved the minds of many to know that this man had been apprehended and tried for the crime. Not everyone was satisfied with the sentence, but the officers interested in the case had the satisfaction of obtaining justice and ridding society of one of the most ruthless killers we have met in a long time.

I am gratified that through my study of finger prints I was able to connect the criminal with this dastardly crime, and thereby remove the stigma of accusation from anyone but the true criminal. Had we not been able to so identify him, I am certain that several would have been named as suspects in the crime. Let’s not forget that the science of finger prints protects the innocent and convicts the guilty.

Jenkins wrote this sterilized account for a scientific journal, so he naturally omitted personal details. The incident began when Lancaster City Policemen Frank Sowell and Hoyt Barton saw a strange car parked downtown in the early morning hours of the 4th of July. They investigated and found a young couple engaged in – well, let’s say they were pre-occupied with one another. The officers requested that the driver, Bobby Smith, identify himself and the red-headed woman with him, but he could not. He was a very violent escaped convict from a remote prison farm in North Carolina who was on a crime spree of kidnapping and armed robbery. If he were caught, he would be returned to the prison farm to finish his long sentence with more time piled on top.

Smith told the officers they were not doing anything wrong and should be left alone. The officers persisted and Smith cranked up the stolen car and sped away.

The officers pursued the car north on the highway to Charlotte. A few miles out Smith side-swiped an oncoming car occupied by two local men and ran off the road. Just then a car coming from Charlotte stopped to help. The driver, Charles Stroupe, his wife, and their two kids were on their way to Myrtle Beach at this ungodly hour to beat the heat and the 4th of July traffic. At the same time the officers pulled up from the other direction.

Officer Frank Sowell walked toward the wrecked car, still clueless that Smith was a desperate criminal. Suddenly Smith emerged from the wrecked car, covered in blood, and shot Sowell dead with a sawed-off shotgun. Smith then grouped everyone together and took over the Stroupe’s car. When he had it ready to go, the beautiful red-headed woman emerged from the wreckage and walked over to him. They vanished into the night, leaving those assembled in a state of shock.

Hoyt Barton called Chief H. A. Montgomery to the scene. The officers had little hope of identifying, let alone capturing, the shooter. But the Chief knew exactly who to call – his old friend and now famous lawman Leo Jenkins.

Jenkins knew all of these officers, having worked side-by-side with them when he had been stationed in Lancaster. Now he was in a position to help – or disappoint – on a grand scale.

No one knew but the few officers working the case that Jenkins had identified Smith. They needed the edge that would give them as they tracked him down.

Governor Olin Johnston, whose attempted takeover of the Highway Patrol had ended in humiliating defeat lashed out in the press.

“The whole case seems to have been badly muddled,” the Governor told the Associated Press five days after the murder. If only the Highway Patrol had been abolished and transformed into a State Police Department under his control, as he had advocated at every opportunity, the killer would have been caught.

Of course, had the Governor not been blinded by anger and envy, he would have known that the Highway Patrol in general and Lt. Leo Jenkins in particular had been an integral and very successful part of virtually every major criminal investigation in the state since the inception of the Identification Unit. Not only was Jenkins’ Unit known for their scientific knowledge and investigative prowess, they had a knack for coordinating the efforts of multiple agencies on an investigation without ruffling feathers or taking credit. In the face of this undeserved public dressing-down by the Governor, Leo Jenkins and Chief Commissioner Ben Sawyer remained silent.

Lancaster Mayor F. B. Porter, however, did not remain silent. He knew the investigation was in the best possible hands and took great offense at the Governor throwing Leo Jenkins under the bus for his own political purposes. The next day the Mayor released a letter to the press that he had sent to Jenkins, which read in part:

I notice in today’s press sharp criticism of you and other officers with regard to your failure to identify and apprehend the slayer of Frank Sowell, who was murdered here last Sunday morning. As mayor of the town of Lancaster, I have been intimately associated with you, day and night, in your efforts to arrest the man who did the shooting. In justice to you I want to say that it is my opinion that you have done all that any living man could do under the circumstances in your efforts to apprehend the slayer. On behalf of the city council and the officers of Lancaster I want to express to you my sincerest thanks for your fine work in this case, and I feel certain that your efforts will be rewarded with success.

A few days later, when Smith was spotted at a Myrtle Beach tourist camp, he led officers on a wild 30-mile chase to Georgetown. Every time the officers got within shooting range they opened fire and Smith returned it.

By the time it was over, both cars were covered in bullet holes.

The pursuit ended when Smith’s car careened out of control on Front Street and flipped over several times. The officers jumped out of their car and trained their weapons on the wreckage. Smith crawled out of the smoldering heap of twisted metal and struggled to his feet. On the edge of consciousness and very unstable, the killer pointed his pistol at the officers. For some reason, the officers did not kill him. Smith crime spree ended only when he collapsed due to shock from severely broken bones and a nearly fatal loss of blood. His legs were virtually useless to him the rest of his life.

That night Smith was transported to the State Penitentiary in Columbia, nine days after he gunned down Officer Frank Sowell. On July 15, 1937, the editors of The State newspaper had high praise for the work of Leo Jenkins and blistered Governor Johnston:

The work of the crime-detecting bureau of the highway department, in which Lieutenant Leo Jenkins stars as a finger-print expert, has been forced upon the attention of the public by the capture of an escaped convict from the North Carolina penitentiary who is charged with the recent murder of Policeman B. Frank Sowell in Lancaster, South Carolina. Highway patrolmen, acting upon information which they were not broadcasting for the benefit of the criminals, acted in concert, and were supported by law officers of the counties. There was organization, there was information, and there was intelligent, effective action. In this case the authorities of Lancaster county, left as in former times to depend upon their own information and resources, would have been quite impotent to cope with criminals who could within thirty minutes place themselves in another state, or within two hours change their location from the foothills of the Blue Ridge to Myrtle Beach. The change in means and method of travel has been to the tremendous advantage of criminals. The United States government, in its fight against kidnappers and bank robbers, found it necessary to abandon old practices and, in the pursuit of suspects, to have one organization operating regardless of state lines. The states were helpless when criminals could, within a few minutes or within an hour or two, put themselves beyond the jurisdiction of the officers of the state in which the crimes were committed. The same difficulties confront the county officers in cases like this murder of the Lancaster policeman. It is here that the organization within the highway department becomes an invaluable asset to the state. Someone has said that is it not the proper function of the highway department to hunt down criminals. Perhaps it is not, if one indulges in hair-splitting. But if the legislature is willing then it is a proper function. The fact is that the department has gone ahead and developed this important organization to operate against outstanding enemies of society; the fact is that its work in a number of cases has been notable. It is developing experts. An additional fact is that no other department of the government has attempted to do this work in defense of society; nor is any other department prepared to attempt it. Unquestioningly, the major criminals are unanimously against this feature of the highway department’s activities. The State hopes that Governor Johnston will recognize the value to South Carolina of the efficiency of this service, that he will also feel that a grave injustice has been done to some of these men through untimely criticism, and he will give public recognition, as governor, to their latest notable achievement.

Needless to say, Governor Johnston did not heed the advice of the editors of The State.

The Lancaster courtroom was packed for the trial, in part, perhaps, for the chance of seeing the defendant’s mysterious red-headed companion. Jenkins had tracked down and arrested a red-headed woman who confessed, but she later recanted and said she had lied just “for the thrill.” The Solicitor decided not to prosecute her, wisely avoiding a side-show that would have done nothing to help convict Smith, who never confirmed her identity.

A conviction for killing a police officer was a sure-fire way to die in the electric chair. Without comment, however, the jury found Smith guilty in a manner that allowed only life in prison. After he was sentenced, Smith reflected on the seemingly random nature of events that had led to the tragedy: “Had it not been for the kiss of a red-haired woman, Sowell would be alive today.”

6 The Murder of Corporal Joe Byrd

Before daylight on the morning of March 13, 1936, Corporal Joe Byrd left his home on the way to work at the South Carolina Penitentiary on Broad River Road. He never made it. His co-workers feared the worst, and they were right to do so.

Byrd’s burned-out car was found the next day on the other end of Richland County off Bluff Road near Gills Creek. His body was in the back seat. The back of his skull had been crushed and his body was no longer recognizable, the result of being soaked in gasoline and set on fire. The investigation focused on released convicts that may have had a reason to kill Byrd. A week into the investigation Sheriff T. Alex Heise had no new developments to report and tried to generate leads by upping the reward from $25. to $50. Another week passed, the reward was again increased, suspects were picked up and interrogated, but the officers were getting nowhere. Leo Jenkins had re-created the crime based on the physical evidence: someone had laid in wait for Byrd and struck him from behind with an ax missing from Byrd’s home. The killer then drove the car to the spot near Gill’s Creek, doused the car and Byrd’s body in gasoline taken from the car’s gas tank and set it on fire. Byrd’s service revolver was missing. The investigators now knew what happened, but they still did not know why it happened or who did it. Besides Sheriff Heise and Lt. Jenkins, the task force included Penitentiary Captain Olin Sanders and Chief J. Henry Jeanes of the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED), the 1935 reincarnation of the defunct State Constabulary.

Finally a call came in about a stolen revolver being in a liquor house on Whaley Street in Columbia. Deputy Sheriff Wade Rawlinson went to investigate. Ed Mankin, who lived in the house, told Rawlinson that Robert Ashley had left it there. The gun fit the description of the one issued to Corporal Byrd. Officers split into teams and traveled to various parts of the state to places Ashley was known to frequent.

Sheriff Heise’s team caught up with Byrd at his parent’s house in Parker’s Ferry in Charleston County. Byrd gave up without a fight and told the Sheriff that he had killed Joe Byrd. Heise recounted the following information that appeared in The State newspaper on April 11, 1936:

[Ashley] took a path leading towards the Byrd home and hid in the grass within sight of the house. He saw Corporal Byrd leave the house that night and later return. After the house grew quiet, Ashley went up to the house and slept for a while in a wagon in the yard. He woke up during the night, went to the wood pile and got the ax, which was later found missing, and got into the back of Corporal Byrd’s car. He again went to sleep, his story continued, and did not awaken until the jolting of the car along the rough side road leading from Byrd’s home to the main highway jarred him awake. When he moved after waking, he attracted Corporal Byrd’s attention…

Byrd ordered Ashley to get into the front seat. As Ashley started to do so, Byrd put his eyes back on the road. Ashley picked up the ax and smashed in the back of Byrd’s skull. Ashley managed to get the car stopped, put Byrd’s body in the back seat, and drove aimlessly around downtown Columbia, then out Bluff Road. The article continued:

He then drove up into the bushes on the creek bank. He opened the back of the car, and with the ax used in slaying Corporal Byrd, knocked the drain plug off the bottom of the gas tank. He caught the gas in the halves of a pasteboard box found in the back of the car...and poured the gasoline over Corporal Byrd’s body and the interior of the car and set it afire. Ashley had taken Corporal Byrd’s pistol…,[he then] went to Mankin’s home on Whaley Street and left the pistol there.

Ashley’s confession contained all of the many details that Leo Jenkins had re-created from the physical evidence. At trial Ashley maintained that he had only wanted to knock out Byrd and steal his car, but he was quickly convicted of murder. The jury did not recommend mercy and the Judge sentence him to the electric chair. Ashley’s behavior during the trial was such that the Judge also ruled that the convicted killer be evaluated at the State Hospital. The doctors found that although Ashley was not legally insane, he had the mentality of a ten-year-old. Based on that finding, Ashley’s attorneys appealed to Governor Olin Johnston for executive clemency. Johnston refused to even consider the request, saying that Ashley was almost successful in covering up the crime, and besides, he explained, it cost good money to conduct the investigation. On June 26, 1936, a little over three months after the murder, the 17 year old Ashley was administered 2,300 volts of electricity in the electric chair.

7 The Legacy of Leo Jenkins

In the 1930’s Leo Jenkins was a bone-fide celebrity in South Carolina. Some of his exploits, gleaned from newspapers of the time, are included here in the final chapter.

While stationed in Lancaster, Leo Jenkins was patrolling down Main Street one day when he noticed a large truck with an auxiliary fuel tank. The General Assembly had banned such tanks as way of collecting a tariff from Yankees. Without extra tanks, long distance truck drivers were forced to buy fuel as they passed through South Carolina.

Jenkins stopped the truck and something about the cotton bales on the back didn’t look right. He kept poking and prodding and discovered that the fake cotton bales concealed a tank holding thousands of gallons of bootleg liquor.

Another time Jenkins and a fellow officer were on their way to California to pick up a convicted killer who had escaped from the State Penitentiary several years earlier. The Los Angles Police Department had picked up the movie-house projectionist on some minor charge – a fingerprint check revealed his true identity.

This was in the middle of the Great Depression and hitch-hiking was common. Just outside of Denver Jenkins spotted a young man thumbing in the opposite direction. Jenkins recognized the kid as being from Lancaster. He was trying to get home, so Jenkins loaded him up and took him on to Los Angeles, picked up the convict, then returned to South Carolina. Thanks to Jenkins, the young hitch-hiker covered 3,500 miles on one thumb, all the way back to his family’s front door.

Jenkins was reading the newspaper one Sunday morning at his home in the Shandon neighborhood of Columbia when he came across the heart-rending story of a pretty young woman who had taken her own life at a New York City bus station. The tiny nameless girl had left a note that was printed in the article:

To whom it may concern: I am drinking this poison in hope that it may rid this world of a pest. This is my story. (Please, when I die, print this in hopes it may help some other poor girl.) I started out when I was 14, running away from home, although I was careful of the company I chose. Time and again I was brought back and my dearest of all mothers would plead with my father and also with the authorities to give me into her care. This I never thought was anything more than her duty. I did not realize the sacrifice she was making for me. Then my father left home to go to another state to work and while he was gone my mother and I really became closer to one another than we had ever been. But when my father came home it was the same old six and seven. I stood it as long as I could (or thought I could) and ran away with a boy. That was my downfall. Since that time: there is hardly a state in the East I have not been in, and I am now known and recognized as a woman with a bad reputation, who could take your money and cut your throat without a moment’s hesitation. And now, to top it off, I have a venereal disease. I am broke, hungry (I haven’t eaten a meal in three days); no place to sleep: so I took my last money to buy this paper and poison, and if it will help a girl who has had even the first thought of leaving home then I have not done this in vain. For it is the first thought that brings on the second. I am leaving no name or address, just when I am buried (I don’t really care whether I am or not) I want people not to pity or to scorn...You will have no more heartaches and grieving to do over an erring daughter. So I say not goodbye but Aloha, and I have no one but myself and my father to blame it on. As to you, Dad, I’ll see you in hell – The Little Girl in Grey.

As Jenkins read the article, he thought he recognized certain details about the girl. He wondered if she were the same girl arrested by the Columbia Police Department a couple of months prior. Jenkins had fingerprinted a pretty young transient who listed her weight as 90 pounds. He went to his office, pulled her file, and sent her prints and information to the New York Police Department. His hunch was right, and authorities were able to get in touch with her mother.

Although this type of police work is commonplace and computerized today, it would have been impossible in South Carolina at that time without the State Identification Unit that Leo Jenkins had built from scratch.

Jenkins’ office and lab were just a stone’s throw away from the office of SLED Chief J. Henry Jeanes, in the shadow of the State House. One day Chief Jeanes walked out to his car about lunchtime only to discover that someone had pried open his glove box. He checked and found that his service revolver was missing. Jeanes backed off and studied the people in the area. After a while he noticed a well-dressed young man who walked by with a screwdriver sticking out of his pocket. The Chief spoke with the man but wasn’t satisfied with his explanation for the screwdriver. He took the man back to his office and called for Jenkins. The two of them interrogated the man thoroughly but were getting nowhere. Chief Jeanes ducked out of the office and borrowed an identical pistol from one of his Agents. He came back in the room and put the pistol on his desk. Jeanes and Jenkins sat in silence. Finally the man could stand it no longer and told the men he was glad the Chief had gotten his gun back, and confessed to stealing it and selling it at a nearby pawn shop.

Leo Jenkins loved to spread the word. He was a favorite on the civic club circuit, where he showed slides of fingerprints and other evidence, revealing to eager audiences how science and technology were being used to solve crimes. He teamed with the University of South Carolina to host numerous free seminars for law enforcement officers from around the state. Speakers included prosecutors, lawmakers, and FBI Agents. Jenkins always made sure he had a spot on the schedule to offer the services of the Identification Unit, whose officers were ready to assist them on a moment’s notice. As mentioned earlier, Jenkins became a featured attraction at the annual State Fair where his scientific crime-fighting displays always drew large crowds. Perhaps one of his most gratifying engagements came when the LeConte Scientific Society of the University of South Carolina invited him to speak, by which his body of work was validated by some of academia’s brightest minds.

Jenkins set the standards for ballistics examinations in South Carolina. On February 17, 1937, The State newspaper reported on a murder case in Hampton County in which Frank Rushing, a local Constable, was accused of shooting Dick Powell, a Game Warden. Jenkins offered his expert testimony, taking the time to explain his findings to the jury so they understood exactly how he arrived at his conclusions. Judge G. Duncan Bellinger of Columbia commented into the record that “’this was one of the few times he had seen scientific evidence submitted in such a concrete and clear way as submitted by Lieutenant Jenkins this afternoon.’ He added that he expected to see today’s demonstration of scientific evidence as a forerunner to the way it should be presented.”

Jenkins’ interest in science was boundless. His study in the field of questioned documents and handwriting led to the murder conviction of Charlie Dornberg in Greenwood County in 1939. Dornberg’s brother John had disappeared without a trace. Search parties came up empty day after day until a note appeared in a relative’s mailbox giving directions to John’s body in a wooded area near the family home. The young man had been shot to death and left in a shallow gully.

Jenkins examined the note, collected handwriting samples from family members and suspects, and determined that John’s brother Charlie had written the note. It was then discovered that Charlie had multiple life insurance policies on his brother naming himself as the beneficiary. Charlie Dornberg was convicted of murder on the expert testimony of Leo Jenkins.

Another Greenwood case put Jenkins’ interpretation of fingerprints to the test. Jenkins had matched the fingerprints found on broken windows at a burglary to a local suspect, J. D. Anderson. Anderson was described as “smart and quick-witted” and represented himself at trial. He explained that he had installed the window panes on the building for the owner in the past, so naturally his fingerprints would be on them. After hearing this testimony, Jenkins examined the broken pieces of glass again. He was able to determine, and more importantly, demonstrate and explain to the jury, that Anderson’s fingerprints came to be on the glass after it was broken. He was quickly found guilty and sent to prison.

By the end of the 1930’s Jenkins’ laboratory was equipped to analyze evidence with stereo-microscopic photography, ultra-violet light rays, and a variety of chemical tests. The lab had equipment for the examination of fingerprints, questioned documents, and ballistic comparisons. These services were available to any peace officer in the state just for the asking.

On May 28, 1940, Jenkins received the highest honor of his career, the Distinguished Service Award from the South Carolina Association of Police Chiefs. The award recognized Jenkins’ complete body of work, his contributions to the advancement of the law enforcement profession in fields of science, education, information sharing, and the promotion of cooperation among law enforcement agencies.

In 1940 war seemed inevitable and Jenkins re-directed his expertise to assist the US Army. Fort Jackson was one of the largest training installations in the country and the Army needed help in weeding out recruits who may have been wanted and those with criminal records.

As usual, Jenkins approached the request for assistance with gusto. In one week alone eleven men were identified as wanted fugitives and placed under arrest. Many others had their criminal histories exposed and were dealt with accordingly.

Jenkins remained in the service of others until he could physically do no more. In January 20, 1941, Jenkins became gravely ill and died four days later. The article about his death was the last in a long line of front page articles in The State newspaper about Leo Jenkins.

Lieut. Leo Jenkins, 44, identification officer of the South Carolina highway patrol, died at midnight last night at the Providence hospital. He had been in declining health for several years, but had been seriously ill but a few days. He was admitted to the hospital Monday night.

Lieutenant Jenkins had been connected with the highway patrol since June 25, 1930, and was promoted to the post of lieutenant July 1, 1935, at which time he took over the identification office.

A master technician in the field of criminal identification, he was called on every day by law enforcement officers in South Carolina and other states for assistance in solving crimes of high and low degree. He had a part in the investigation and solving of almost every major crime which had occurred in the state since he took over the identification office.

Among the notorious cases he helped solve was the killing of a Lancaster patrolman for which Robert Smith is now serving a life sentence in the state penitentiary. Smith was trailed through several states and finally trapped in Georgetown after a mad chase from Myrtle Beach which saw both the highway car and the car driven by the fleeing gunman riddled by bullets. Lieutenant Jenkins worked day and night on the case, identifying Smith from fingerprints found on the rear-view mirror of the automobile.

Another famous case which Lieutenant Jenkins helped solve was that which landed Frank English behind the bars in connection with the daring $106,000. robbery of a Lake City bank. English was given 25 years and a small part of the loot was recovered.

Other cases in which Lieutenant Jenkins played a prominent part include the capture of bandits who robbed a bank at Smoaks, the apprehension and conviction of the slayer of Cpl. Joe Byrd, penitentiary guard, and the Colin Cain case. Cain died from bullet wounds received in a gun battle with a highway patrolman and his body was later found and his companions captured, largely through Lieutenant Jenkins’ efforts.

When working on a case, Lieutenant Jenkins was untiring. Often he worked night and day at his appointed task of running down criminals and no case was too small to receive his attention when it was brought to his department. Recently Lieutenant Jenkins had devoted much of his time to assisting Fort Jackson authorities weed out undesirables with criminal records, offering the full facilities of his office as well as his own time, despite his illness.

In his death the highway patrol has lost one of its most valued men, a man loyal and devoted to his job until the end.

Lieutenant Jenkins was born at Santuc in Union county February 18, 1896. After having been graduated from high school he attended Columbia university in New York City for two years. He joined the Navy during the World war and was assigned to the mechanical division of the naval air force.

After the war, Lieutenant Jenkins operated a bus line at Union and later was connected with an automobile concern.

He then joined the highway patrol and devoted his talents to the work which brought him national recognition in the identification field. He attended the Institute of Applied Science in Chicago to assist in his preparations for his work.

In recognition of his ability and service, he was named state vice-president of the International Association for Identification, a post he held for six years and until his death. He was one of five officers cited by the South Carolina Association of Police Chiefs for outstanding service and received the distinguished award of that association.

He was a Mason and a member of the Woodmen of the World in Union.

Lieutenant Jenkins is survived by his widow, a daughter, Mrs. Charles Laughinghouse of Columbia; his mother, Mrs. B. J. Jenkins of Abbeville; a sister, Mrs. Maude Cook of Abbeville; and a brother, Laurie Jenkins of Columbia.

World War II put most civilian endeavors in a holding pattern, including the Identification Bureau created by Jenkins. Each new Governor introduced bills to create a state police force and each one was ignored or swatted down. Over time, every major newspaper in the state came to support a state police system. Whereas Governors held very little political power, newspapers editors did.

In January 1947, Sol Blatt, the all-powerful long-time Speaker of the House of Representatives, had a Concurrent Resolution passed to move the Identification Bureau, now under the direction of Leo Jenkins’ close friend and successor, Lt. Joel Townsend, to the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division.

Blatt’s move was masterful. The Highway Patrol would return to enforcing laws pertaining to the highways and motor vehicles, as their founding legislation mandated, and Townsend would take control of SLED as its new Chief. If the new Governor, Strom Thurmond, screwed up the arrangement, Speaker Blatt could simply undo the Concurrent Resolution, which was not a law or even a regulation.

In hiring SLED Agents, Thurmond took the political route like Governors before him. The State newspaper quoted him as saying he wanted men with a general understanding of the law and who had “strong legs.” Once he personally interviewed and hired the men he wanted, he answered all other applicants with a form letter saying that Chief Townsend, not he, was in charge of hiring.

Thurmond spent his first two years as Governor running for President and became the nominee of the segregationist Dixiecrat Party. He spent his last two years as Governor running for the US Senate. He lost both races but later was elected Senator for life, following in the footsteps of his role model, Pitchfork Ben Tillman.

James Byrnes, who referred to Thurmond as “that energetic idiot” took office as Governor in 1951. Byrnes had already served as a US Senator, the US Secretary of State, and as Franklin Roosevelt's “Assistant President” during World War II. He was a man who dealt decisively with an issue and then moved on to the next one.

His first official act as Governor was to re-create SLED in the image of Leo Jenkins’ Identification Bureau. He did so in a memo to Chief Townsend’s successor, Chief O. L. Brady.

The memo, distributed to reporters at Governor Byrne’s first press conference, made it clear to everyone who was in charge of SLED by stating “I shall name no employees of the law enforcement division except you as its chief.” Brady was instructed to “employ experts in ballistics, finger-printing, photography and accounting, and some investigators. These experts and investigators would be available at all times to assist local law enforcement agencies when called upon to do so. Also, the constabulary force must be ready to enter into investigations upon any instructions to you when I may deem it necessary.”

Byrnes made it clear that SLED Agents should be subject matter experts and investigators, not policemen, a very important distinction that every previous Governor had missed. Byrnes recalled every Agent assigned to the various counties around the state, most stationed by request at local Sheriff’s Offices, saying that if a Sheriff wanted another Deputy he should hire his own. Governor Byrnes fired all of Thurmond’s Agents that he considered to be political hacks and gave 21% of his budget back to the General Assembly to make sure they stayed gone. Byrnes said that a SLED Agent’s only worth was specialized knowledge and capabilities that local law enforcement did not possess.

Governor Byrnes ended up with an 18-man team of specialists and seasoned investigators, in essence an expanded Identification Bureau, under the control of the executive branch of government as per the Constitution. (Byrnes had also served as a member of the US Supreme Court.) Brady was directed not to hire men based on political affiliations, but on merit and skill.

Byrnes was widely praised by newspaper editors statewide. When asked if he would still propose the creation of a state police agency, the Governor said that he would “leave that up to the Legislature.” In other words, he had dealt with the issue and was done with it.

Byrnes’ de-facto state bureau of investigation, based on Leo Jenkins’ original unit at the Highway Patrol, was created by one memo from the Governor. What he and Leo Jenkins knew was that law enforcement is best handled on a local level, and the state’s role is to assist with technical expertise and manpower as requested. Leo Jenkins’ fingerprints can be found on virtually every aspect of the structure and function of law enforcement in the Palmetto State to this day. One suspects that he would be simultaneously proud and humbled to be called the Architect of Modern Law Enforcement in South Carolina.

Bibliography

1. Death Certificate, Leo Jenkins, SC Department of Health and Environmental Control

2. Draft Registration Card, Wallace Leo Jenkins.

3. Gaffney Ledger, February 13, 1930.

4. Gaffney Ledger, March 15, 1930.

5. The State, February 3, 1931.

6. Florence Morning News, October 21, 1931.

7. Greenwood Index-Journal, April 4, 1931.

8. The State, April 22, 1932.

9. The State, April 20, 1931.

10. Florence Morning News, August 28, 1932.

11. Florence Morning News, December 17, 1932.

12. The State, October 21, 1933.

13. The State, November 16, 1933.

14. The State, December 12, 1933.

15. Greenwood Index-Journal, January 1, 1934.

16. The State, March 31, 1934.

17. The State, June 12, 1934.

18. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, May 21, 1934.

19. The State, May 26, 1934.

20. Florence Morning News, September 6, 1934.

21. The State, September 14, 1934.

22. The State, September 21, 1934.

23. Florence Morning News, November 3, 1934.

24. The State, September 25, 1934.

25. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, November 26. The State, November 26, 1934.

27. The State, November 7, 1934.

28. The State, November 27, 1934.

29. The State, November 28, 1934.

30. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, December 4, 1934.

31. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, December 7, 1934.

32. The State, January 8, 1935.

33. The State, February 9, 1935.

34. The State, February 12, 1935.

35. The State, March 24, 1935.

36. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, May 5, 1935.

37. Florence Morning News, August 6, 1935.

38. The State, October 21, 1936.

39. The South Carolina Highway Department, 1917-1987, by John Hammond Moore, Univerisity of South Carolina Press, 1987.

40. Gaffney Ledger, January 18, 1936.

41. The State, January 9, 1936.

42. The State, January 12, 1936.

43. The State, January 16, 1936.

44. The State, January 17, 1936.

46. The State, January 21, 1936.

45. The State, March 31, 1936.

47. The State, April 11, 1936.

48. The State, August 4, 1936.

49. The State, August 13, 1936.

50. The State, September 27, 1936.

51. Aiken Standard, October 9, 1936.

52. Greenwood Index-Journal, December 13, 1936.

53. Florence Morning News, April 28, 1936.

54. Florence Morning News, June 2, 1936.

55. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, August 2, 1936.

56. The State, February 17, 1937.

57. The State, February 23, 1937.

58. The State, June 1, 1937.

59. The State, June 3, 1937.

60. The State, June 11, 1937.

61. The State, June 18, 1937,

62. The State, July 5, 1937.

63. Florence Morning News, May 9, 1937.

64. Greenwood Index-Journal, June 15, 1937.

65. Florence Morning News, July 8, 1937.

66. Greenwood Index-Journal, July 9, 1937.

67. Greenwood Index-Journal, July 13, 1937.

68. Greenwood Index-Journal, July 17, 1937.

69. Greenwood Index-Journal, August 17, 1937.

70. Florence Morning News, September 21, 1937.

71. Aiken Standard, November 19, 1937.

72. Florence Morning News, November 25, 1937.

73. Greenwood Index-Journal, December 14, 1937.

75. St. Petersburg Times, July 14, 1937.

76. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, July 17, 1937.

77. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, July 19, 1937.

78. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, July 27, 1937.

79. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, November 4, 1937.

80. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, November 19, 1937.

81. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, December 18, 1937.

82. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, December 19, 1937.

83. The State, November 25, 1937.

84. The State, December 7, 1937.

85. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, December 7, 1937.

86. Greenwood Index-Journal, January 9, 1938.

87. Report of the Joint Committee to Investigate Law Enforcement, South Carolina General Assembly, 1937.

88. The State, May 8, 1938.

89. The State, July 8, 1938.

90. The State, September 29, 1938.

91. Greenwood Index-Journal, February 26, 1938.

92. Greenwood Index-Journal, May 8, 1938.

93. Florence Morning News, May 9, 1938.

94. Aiken Standard, July 6, 1938.

95. Greenwood Index-Journal, October 24, 1938.

96. Gaffney Ledger, November 15, 1938.

97. Greenwood Index-Journal, November 20, 1938.

98. Greenwood Index-Journal, December 22, 1938.

99. The Spokesman-Review, Spokane, Washington, May 8, 1938.

100. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, November 3, 1938.

101. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, November 24, 1938.

102. St. Petersburg (Florida) Times, May 9, 1938.

103. Greenwood Index-Journal, January 4, 1939.

104. Greenwood Index-Journal, January 16, 1937.

105. Gaffney Ledger, March 7, 1939.

106. Greenwood Index-Journal, May 25, 1939.

107. Florence Morning News, July 22, 1939.

108. Greenwood Index-Journal, August 3, 1939.

109. Gaffney Ledger, August 22, 1939.

110. Greenwood Index-Journal, September 25, 1939.

111. The State, July 28, 1939.

112. The State, August 19, 1939.

113. The State, September 1, 1939.

114. The State, September 30, 1939.

115. The State, October 20, 1939.

116. The State, December 10, 1939.

117. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, March 5, 1939.

118. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, January 17, 1939.

119. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, August 19, 1939.

120. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, December 19, 1939.

121. Gaffney Ledger, February 3, 1940.

122. Florence Morning News, May 27, 1940.

123. Greenwood Index-Journal, March 1, 1940.

124. The State, January25, 1940.

125. The State, February 17, 1940.

126. The State, March 7, 1940.

127. The State, October 24, 1940.

128. The State, December 10, 1940.

129. Florence Morning News, January 3, 1940.

130. Florence Morning News, January 24, 1940.

131. Spartanburg Herald-Journal, January 24, 1940.

132. Gaffney Ledger, January 30, 1940.

133. Annual Reports of the South Carolina Highway Patrol, 1930-1941.

134. South Carolina Highway Patrol 75th Anniversary, 1930-2005, by Marsha Trowbridge Ardila, Turner Publishing Company, 2005.

135. The Shaftesbury Papers, South Carolina Historical Society, Home House Press, 2010.