New details revealed at bond hearing for man accused in St. Helena pool party shooting
A Beaufort County judge has set a $350,000 cash bond for a Ridgeland man accused of fatally shooting someone at a St. Helena Island pool party last year.
Tey’Veon Smalls, 23, stood very still Thursday as a judge explained the terms of his bond in the Beaufort County Courthouse. His defense attorney, Courtney Gibbes, put her hand on his shoulder as he walked toward police to be taken back to the jail.
Smalls was charged with murder and possession of a weapon in the commission of a violent crime on June 24, a little more than a year after the shooting that killed 27-year-old Malcolm Moore in May 2020. Several days later, James Stafford, 25, of St. Helena, was charged with murder and possession of a weapon in the commission of a violent crime after turning himself in to law enforcement.
Trasi Campbell, a prosecutor with the 14th Circuit Solicitor’s Office, said in court Thursday that numerous eyewitnesses identified Smalls as standing next to Moore the night he was killed. The witnesses say they saw Smalls and Stafford shooting “up and at Moore,” Campbell said.
Gibbes argued that one of those witnesses made four different statements to police and that it could not be said “for a fact” that Smalls was shooting. Smalls is a “family man,” she said, and cooperated with police for a full year in the investigation before arrests were made.
As of Sunday morning, both Stafford and Smalls were confined at the Beaufort County Detention Center, according to the jail log’s current inmate population.
Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office deputies responded to shots fired around 10 p.m. on May 25, 2020, at a party on Seaside Road, The Island Packet previously reported. There were approximately 100 people there the night of the party, Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Maj. Bob Bromage said after Smalls’ arrest. When deputies arrived, they found Moore on the ground. An off-duty nurse at the party stepped in to help a deputy perform CPR on Moore, who later died on his way to Beaufort Memorial Hospital.
