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Donald Gaskins

Also known as: Pee Wee Gaskins, Donald Henry Gaskins

Active

1970–1982

Region

Florence County, South Carolina, USA

State

SC

Kind

Serial

Status

Executed

Victims

13

Donald "Pee Wee" Gaskins killed at least a dozen people in eastern South Carolina in the 1970s, many of them relatives, acquaintances and associates, burying several near his home in Prospect, Florence County. He was arrested in November 1975, and searchers found the graves that December. He was convicted of one murder and pleaded guilty to eight more. In 1982, already serving life, he killed a death-row inmate with a bomb in a killing for hire, and was executed for it in 1991. He later claimed to have killed more than 100 people, a claim investigators largely discredited.

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Victims

We remember the people whose lives were taken.

• Janice Kirby, 15 · November 1970

  Gaskins's niece.

• Patricia Ann Alsbrook, 17 · November 1970
• Doreen Hope Dempsey, 22 · June 1973
• Robin Michelle Dempsey, 2 · June 1973

  Doreen Dempsey's daughter.

• Johnny Sellers, 36 · June 1974
• Jessie Ruth Judy, 22 · June 1974
• Silas Barnwell Yates, 45 · February 1975
• Dianne Bellamy Neeley, 25 · April 10, 1975
• Avery Leroy Howard, 34 · April 10, 1975
• Kim Gehlken, 13 · 1975
• Dennis Bellamy, 28 · October 10, 1975
• John Henry Knight, 15 · October 10, 1975
• Rudolph Tyner, 23 · September 1982

  A death-row inmate.

Timeline of locations

1. June 1973
   Gaskins's home, Prospect (Killer's residence, approximate area)

   Gaskins kept a home in Prospect, his home community. Doreen Dempsey and her daughter were killed at a home with a fish pond there.

2. December 4, 1975
   Graves near Prospect, Florence County (Recovery site, approximate area)

   Searchers began digging in a wooded grove near Gaskins's home in Prospect on December 4, 1975, and over six days found several graves, including those of Dennis Bellamy and John Henry Knight, who had been killed in the woods there. Gaskins later led investigators to his niece's grave nearby.

3. May 1976
   Florence County trial (Court / trial, approximate area)

   A Florence County jury convicted Gaskins of Dennis Bellamy's murder and sentenced him to death. After the sentence was overturned, he pleaded guilty to that murder and eight others and received life terms.

4. November 4, 1976
   Sumter County (Recovery site, approximate area)

   Patricia Alsbrook's remains were found in Sumter County on November 4, 1976.

5. December 8, 1976
   Williamsburg County (Recovery site, approximate area)

   Kim Gehlken's remains were found in Williamsburg County in November 1976, and Silas Yates's about a mile away on December 8, 1976.

6. September 1982
   Central Correctional Institution, Columbia (Crime scene, approximate area)

   Gaskins, serving life sentences, killed death-row inmate Rudolph Tyner with a bomb hidden in a device he told Tyner would let them talk between cells. He was sentenced to death for it in 1983.

7. September 6, 1991
   Broad River Correctional Institution (Prison)

   Gaskins was executed in the electric chair here on September 6, 1991.

Watch, listen, read

Sources

• Donald Henry Gaskins (Wikipedia)
• Pee Wee Gaskins: Prospect's notorious serial killer (Johnsonville SC History)
• 40 years ago, infamous SC killer 'Pee Wee' Gaskins slayed last victim (The State, via AOL, 2022)

Each location also lists its own sources in the data file.