As they help remove dogs from Beaufort Co. home, deputies stumble upon stolen gun
Beaufort County deputies said they caught a woman who allegedly possessed a stolen shotgun while helping Animal Control officers remove several dogs from her home.
Lindsay Marie Flynn, 45, of Burton, was charged Tuesday afternoon with possessing a sawed-off shotgun and a violation of the county’s open burning ordinance, according to inmate records. The latter charge came from an outstanding warrant.
Police were called for assistance at Flynn’s home around 11 a.m. Tuesday when animal control had a court order to remove “several dogs” from the property on Burlington Circle. While there, deputies learned Flynn had two outstanding warrants, one of which was a bench warrant, according to a Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office incident report.
Flynn allegedly asked police if she could put on shoes and “have a cigarette” before she was taken to jail, the report says, so deputies escorted her into the house. Inside the bedroom, deputies noted “various kinds of drug paraphernalia” and a sawed-off shotgun near her bed.
Deputies used a national database to confirm Flynn was federally prohibited from possessing firearms. Flynn allegedly told deputies the gun belonged to a man she knew who had been in jail since December, according to the incident report.
The shotgun, with a barrel length of 11 inches, was found to have been stolen out of Hamilton County, Ohio, police determined. Deputies removed a single shell from inside the chamber and another from the magazine port before swabbing the weapon for DNA.
State and federal law prohibit the ownership of shotguns with barrels under 18 inches long, which have typically been illegally modified for increased portability and use in close-combat scenarios. In South Carolina, owning the modified firearm is a felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison and a $10,000 maximum fine.
Flynn’s outstanding warrant for violating the county’s open burning ordinance stems from Dec. 21, when fire crews received a call about her allegedly burning furniture outside her house, according to BCSO spokesperson Daniel Allen. Her bench warrant was related to a habitual offender status for driving under suspension, he added.
This story was originally published January 23, 2026 at 5:00 AM.
