The Carolinas news

South Carolina

COLUMBIA

Marsh tacky gets state designation

The reliable marsh tacky is finally getting its due.

Gov. Mark Sanford on Wednesday held a ceremonial bill-signing designating tackies as the official state heritage horse. The measure passed the legislature earlier this year.

Ancestors of the tackies were left by colonial Spanish explorers. They survived for centuries on the sea islands, but their numbers dwindled to about 150 several years ago as breeders renewed efforts to save them.

Tackies are suited for toiling in the heat and can take hunters into marshes that can't be reached by foot. They don't flinch easily, and their hind ends slope downward, allowing for tight turns.

COLUMBIA

Greene hires new campaign adviser

Surprise U.S. Senate nominee Alvin Greene has dropped one adviser and hired another to help with his South Carolina campaign.

Donna Warren said Wednesday she no longer represents Greene in his long-shot bid to oust Republican U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint.

Warren lives in Los Angeles and had been working for free for Greene's campaign for several weeks. She says Greene has hired Greenville attorney Suzanne Coe to manage his campaign.

There was no answer at Coe's office. In the 1990s, she represented Shannon Faulkner in her successful effort to gain entry to The Citadel, South Carolina's formerly all-male military college.

CHARLESTON

City to host 2,000 at political conference

About 2,000 politicians and guests from 15 southern states will descend on Charleston this weekend for a conference on governing, bringing with them an estimated $3.5 million economic impact.

House Speaker Bobby Harrell, R-Charleston, announced Wednesday that the state will host the 64th annual Southern Legislative Conference. The conference kicks off Saturday and runs until Wednesday.

No state tax dollars will be used for the conference.

CHARLESTON

Parkway plan on table to finish project

South Carolina transportation planners are proposing a lower-speed parkway to complete the last link of the Mark Clark Expressway around Charleston.

The Transportation Department on Wednesday released a draft environmental impact statement on the project that will complete Interstate 526 from Mount Pleasant to Charleston's James Island connector.

The parkway will complete an 8-mile gap between the existing expressways.

The proposal calls for a four-lane parkway with a median and speeds between 35 and 45 mph. The parkway would cost about $489 million.

Mark Clark was the Allied general who liberated Rome in World War II . He was later president of The Citadel.

FLORENCE

Ex-Latta mayor gets 3-year prison term

The former mayor of a South Carolina town has been sentenced to three years in federal prison for illegally getting Social Security benefits.

U.S. Attorney Bill Nettles says former Latta Mayor Lenneau Berry was sentenced Wednesday in federal court in Florence. Berry also was ordered to pay about $250,000 in restitution.

Berry was convicted in March on 60 federal charges. Prosecutors say Berry collected nearly $250,000 in Social Security benefits by claiming he was disabled.

Defense lawyer Jimmy Rogers argued Berry was innocent because his job as mayor was not gainful employment, but was more like being chairman of a club.

Berry's wife was found not guilty of similar charges.

WALHALLA

Man sentenced in girlfriend's murder

A South Carolina man has been sentenced to 30 years in prison for shooting and killing his pregnant girlfriend at a medical clinic.

Solicitor Chrissy Adams says James Baskerville was sentenced in Walhalla on Wednesday after pleading guilty to voluntary manslaughter and causing the death of 29-year-old Karla Benson's fetus.

Adams says Benson broke off a relationship with Baskerville in June 2009. The two had met at Oconee Memorial Hospital, where they had worked as custodians, and Baskerville thought he was the father of Benson's child.

Authorities say Benson went to the clinic where Baskerville worked to get money from him. An hour later, the owner of the business found Benson bleeding from a gunshot to the head. Baskerville shot himself in the head and shoulder at the clinic.

North Carolina

RALEIGH

Rand tapped for U.S. attorney position

President Obama has nominated a judge and son of a former state senator to serve as U.S. attorney for the middle district of North Carolina.

The White House said in a news release Wednesday that Ripley Rand was nominated to replace Anna Mills Wagoner. Rand was one of several people recommended for the post by U.S. Sen. Kay Hagan.

Rand has served as a superior court judge since 2002. He was an assistant district attorney in Wake County from 1997 to 2002 and in Cumberland County in 1997.

He graduated from the University of North Carolina Law School in 1995 and is the son of former Senate Majority Leader Tony Rand, who resigned Dec. 31 to lead the state parole commission.