Sheriff Barry Faile said that, given the crowd, someone likely saw the shooter and what led up to the shooting itself. He’s urging them to come forward.
LANCASTER COUNTY, S.C. — Authorities in the Upstate are searching for a person they believe shot a man dead near the ticket office of a busy local race track as events were underway.
According to the Lancaster County Sheriff’s Office, the incident happened during the last race of the night at Lancaster Motor Speedway just before 11 p.m. on Saturday. In a statement, the sheriff said that deputies were working at the track during the event and responded to an area just inside the front gate where they found a 53-year-old man, later identified as Rodney Cunningham of Heath Springs, with apparent gunshot wounds.
And while deputies attempted to help the man until emergency medical services took him for treatment, the man later died of his wounds at Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) Lancaster Medical Center.
The sheriff’s office statement said a large crowd was on-hand for the races but deputies were able to quickly secure the scene and begin interviewing witnesses. Given the crowd, Sheriff Barry Faile said he believes several people likely saw the shooter and “all of the events leading up to and including the shooting.”
“We have identified some of them but encourage others who we have not talked with to call the sheriff’s office and tell us what they know,” the sheriff said in the department’s statement.
The sheriff’s office has since had crime scene investigators at the scene who collected evidence. No one else was injured in the shooting.
Anyone with details regarding the shooting is urged to contact the Lancaster County Sheriff’s Office at 803-283-3388 or Crime Stoppers at 1-888-CRIME-SC.