2nd defendant sentenced 37 years for ‘senseless’ drug deal murder of St. Helena man
22-year-old Seabrook man Xavier Maoshi Polite was sentenced Friday to 37 years in prison, mirroring the sentence of his co-defendant in the 2020 drug deal shooting that killed St. Helena man Steven Glover.
A Beaufort County jury found Polite guilty of murder, attempted murder and possession of a weapon during a violent crime, according to a Friday afternoon press release from the 14th Circuit Solicitor’s Office. Circuit Court Judge Robert J. Bonds handed down the sentence.
Found guilty of the same charges in October 2022, St. Helena’s Channon Talon Preston also earned a 37-year sentence for the attempted armed robbery that quickly turned to murder.
Prosecutors say Preston and Polite planned to rob Glover while buying marijuana from him the afternoon of Nov. 18, 2020. The two parked in the front yard of Corey Singleton, Glover’s cousin, before quickly leaving, claiming they saw police in the area.
But Preston and Polite sped back toward the house moments later, stepping out of the car and firing over 30 times at Glover’s Nissan. Glover was shot seven times and was pronounced dead on the scene, but Singleton took cover behind the car, managing to run to a neighbor’s home and call police, according to Mary Jones of the Solicitor’s Office, who prosecuted both defendants’ cases.
County deputies and SC Law Enforcement Division investigators found ample evidence to prosecute the deadly shooting, Jones said: security camera footage from Singleton’s home, DNA evidence on the Nisaan and handguns in Preston’s home that matched shell casings found at the scene.
“These two defendants ambushed Mr. Glover with an overwhelming hail of gunfire — all for perhaps a couple hundred dollars in cash,” Jones said. “This attack was senseless and brutal. Now, the people responsible for it are going where they belong.”
