‘Disrespect to authority has always been cool.’ How will a curfew curb youth violence?

After a third shooting along Ocean Boulevard in downtown Myrtle Beach, the city is implementing a curfew for minors, but some feel that a curfew is only one step in the right direction to deter violent crime downtown.

The deadly shooting at Peaches Corner brings the total to 15 people injured from gunshots since the April 26 officer-involved shooting that killed one and injured 11.

All three shootings which occurred on April 26, June 12 and June 28 involved suspects aged 17 to 18 years old.

Myrtle Beach Mayor Brenda Bethune, 61, said she met July 2 with downtown business owners, Charleston and Panama City Beach, Florida, police chiefs and local youth leaders, including those at the Boys and Girls Club, to discuss how to change the “perception and atmosphere” of Myrtle Beach.

Some, including Former Myrtle Beach Public Information Officer Mark Kruea, 67, said teenagers need more fun things to do downtown to stay out of trouble and prevent more casualties from violent crime.

“We are not lacking in amusements or activities or entertainment for our youth. I can read you a list of places they could go right now if that’s what they chose to do. The problem is more of a societal problem, and we heard that from the two visiting police chiefs today,” Bethune said. “We are not lacking things for kids to do. It’s just getting the right kids that want to come here to do these positive activities.”

Kruea, who is running for mayor in 2025 against Bethune, said the curfew is a start, but urged the city to “bring back the fun” in a Facebook post after the most recent shooting. There are fewer things to do downtown than there used to be, Kruea said.

“We need to consider that teenage audience and provide activities and entertainment for them along the boulevard,” Kruea said in an interview. “Certainly the beach is there, but, something for young people to do downtown other than walk the street and people watch would be a good thing.”

Myrtle Beach area youth leaders, including Ryan Grace, the executive director for the Boys and Girls Club Grand Strand, and members of Newspring Church student ministry, FUSE, were unavailable for comment or declined to go on the record to talk about concerns about the youth downtown.

Directors at the Ground Zero ministry in Downtown Myrtle Beach were not available for comment after multiple calls, voicemails and emails.

The societal issue

Bethune said incidents such as the most recent shooting at the popular Myrtle Beach restaurant show a societal shift that police experts echoed.

“These youths have no fear, and no respect for authority or for the police,” Bethune said. “The young man who worked in Peaches Corner saw the police outside of their windows every single night, so he knew they were feet away, so I think it’s just a different mindset.”

Nate Jenkins, 26, a basketball for Next Gen Elites and mixed martial arts coach for Carolina Fight Club in Aynor, said he works with kids who are less respectful of authority described by Bethune, but the main issue in his opinion, is that no one cares about the “at-risk” kids he coaches.

Carolina Fight Club boasted the motto “guns down, gloves up,” and promoted young people, specifically young men, to stay away from gang activity and violence. Jenkins works to extend his reach to more kids with his basketball team, but often struggles to find somewhere for his team to practice — there’s nothing to do in Aynor, he said.

“You can give them a curfew, but that’s where I feel like that’s where the rebelliousness comes in,” Jenkins said. “They feel like they’re getting so much stuff put on them — rules and stuff — and there’s nothing for them to do to even stay out of trouble, even if they want to stay out late and go to the gym and play basketball until one o’clock in the morning so they get tired, instead of hanging out on the block, getting in shootouts.”

Jenkins said that disrespect to authority has always been cool, and it’s only gotten worse with social media and a lack of mentorship from older people in Horry County. The kids he works with look to social media for guidance on things that are cool like owning or flashing a gun, and at times, using it.

There aren’t any mentors that help him coach or reach out to young people compared to when he was young, he said.

“We had people that would come by from church and try and talk to us and take us out fishing and stuff like that,” Jenkins said. “Today, it’s literally nobody. I can’t even get nobody to do it with me. It’s tough. ‘Those kids (are) bad, man. I ain’t dealing with the kids in this generation.’ That’s all I ever hear.”

Kruea said that some of the culture today has turned young people to carry out grudges to get more attention or eyes on them. He used to visit downtown as a young adult, but never brought a gun with him, Kruea said.

“In the Instagram and TikTok world, making a visual impression is what you do, and in many cases you have to have something if not outrageous, then, you know, that something that stands out,” Kruea said. “I think that probably carries over to daily life.”

Bethune also discussed hanging around downtown Myrtle Beach when she was a teenager.

“That was the place to be,” Bethune said. “We cruised the boulevard, but I also had respect and feared the police, so I knew not to do anything wrong. That doesn’t mean that people didn’t do things that were wrong, but it was different back then.”

What experts are recommending

Panama City Beach Police Chief Eusebio Talamantez said Panama City Beach had to deal with seasonal crime in its main tourist district when college students come down each year for Spring Break.

Talamantez recommended a similar curfew for Myrtle Beach that Panama City Beach enforces, including other ordinances such as curfews for minors or prohibiting minors from renting hotel rooms and other laws that Talamantez did not specify.

Parents were dropping their kids off to Panama City Beach during spring break and other tourist areas, some renting their own hotel rooms, Talamentez said.

He added that Myrtle Beach Police Chief Amy Prock, his former classmate in the FBI National Academy, is one of the most progressive police chiefs in the country and the public safety issue in the Myrtle Beach area goes beyond law enforcement.

“Public safety is not the sole responsibility of the police department,” Talamentez said. “Everybody needs to come together, and just stop pointing the finger at the police department for crime and look at it as a broader picture.”

The City of Charleston launched a new youth curfew for the summer on June 27. Any minor who is 17-and-under is prohibited from remaining in a public place, motor vehicle or establishment in the Central Business District between 9 p.m. and 6 a.m. seven days a week, the curfew states.

Bethune said police officials are in strong support of implementing a permanent curfew for downtown, and all downtown business owners in the meeting supported changing the curfew to start at 9 p.m instead of 10 p.m.

Other parts of the meeting included possibly advocating for changes to state law, including possible changes to South Carolina’s constitutional carry law.

The city is considering a backpack ordinance, increasing lighting downtown, playing family-friendly music along the boulevard, and extending the curfew. However, there has been no suggestion of adding more entertainment to downtown.

The alleged suspects involved in the first two Ocean Boulevard shootings came from towns hours away from Myrtle Beach in North Carolina and South Carolina.

The most recent shooting at Peaches Corner, however involved two locals, Grayson Myers, 18, of Myrtle Beach, who was shot by Evony McCray, 17, of Conway.

“The majority are coming from other areas, and they’re not coming here to go play putt putt or visit Ripley’s Aquarium or go to an ice cream shop,” Bethune said. “Youth violence is on the rise everywhere. Again, that was reiterated to us today, and there is nothing we can do to stop that. There are things we can do to help prevent it, and that’s what the meetings today were about.”

According to the most recent data from the South Carolina State Law Enforcement Division, juvenile violent crime incidents in Horry County grew by nearly 69% in 2023 when 27 juveniles were arrested for violent crime compared to 16 juvenile arrests the year prior.

SLED reported 245 juveniles were arrested in 2023, which falls in line with a trend starting in the late 2010s when each year around 200 to 300 juveniles in Horry County were arrested each year.

The 200 to 300 arrest trend pales in comparison to the more than 800 juveniles arrested almost every year in Horry County from 2000 to 2008, according to SLED.

Ocean Boulevard boasts arcades, henna tattoo and airbrush T-shirt shops, but nothing to match the rambunctious excitement that could compare to establishments like the Magic Attic or Freaky Tiki, which were located downtown until both closed in the 2000s.

Downtown Myrtle Beach used to have several clubs where the Pavilion once stood for young people to dance the night away.

“I came down after high school graduation to Myrtle Beach because that was the thing to do, but none of us brought guns. None of us got into the serious trouble that we’re seeing today,” Kruea said. “As a grown up, I was familiar with the Magic Attic and the Pavilion, and the boulevard atmosphere. It was fun for people watching, and an enjoyable experience, and we need to be able to bring that sort of atmosphere back.”

This story was originally published July 12, 2025 at 5:00 AM.