Criminal Defense Lawyer in Spartanburg, SC

SPARTANBURG COUNTY, S. C. (Friday, ET) — A shooting at a Spartanburg County motel has escalated from an on-scene response into a broader search effort after authorities issued an AMBER Alert tied to the incident. deputies were sent to the Rodeway Inn on New Cut Road around 11: 36 a. m., where one person was injured. As of the latest official update, no one is in custody, underscoring that the situation remains active as investigators work to develop leads in spartanburg sc.

What officials have confirmed so far in Spartanburg Sc

The Spartanburg County Sheriff’s Office said it is responding to a shooting at a motel on Friday. Deputies said one person was hurt at the Rodeway Inn on New Cut Road around 11: 36 a. m. (ET). Authorities also stated that no one was in custody at the time of the update.

Shortly before 3 p. m. (ET), authorities issued an AMBER Alert connected to the incident. The alert included a vehicle description: they are looking for a white 2010 Mitsubishi Outlander with South Carolina tag 669BMX.

AMBER Alert issuance adds urgency to the investigation

The decision to issue an AMBER Alert several hours after the initial call signals that investigators are treating the incident as more than an isolated shooting scene. While officials have not released additional details in the publicly available update, the alert indicates law enforcement is seeking rapid public awareness around a specific vehicle believed to be relevant.

In practical terms, an AMBER Alert changes the operating tempo of a case: it extends attention beyond the motel property, focuses the public on an actionable identifier, and can widen the search area as tips and sightings are evaluated. At this stage, officials have not announced an arrest, and the lack of a person in custody keeps the outcome uncertain in spartanburg sc.

What remains unknown and what to watch next

Authorities have not publicly provided the condition of the injured person beyond confirming that one individual was hurt. Officials also have not disclosed information on a suspect, a motive, or the circumstances that led to the shooting at the Rodeway Inn. The AMBER Alert announcement did not include additional narrative details in the available statement.

Key developments that would clarify the scope of the event include any official confirmation of who is connected to the white 2010 Mitsubishi Outlander with tag 669BMX, whether investigators have a description of a person of interest, and whether additional safety guidance is issued. For now, the confirmed facts remain limited to the response time, the location, the injury, the absence of custody, and the AMBER Alert vehicle information connected to the case in spartanburg sc.

Jaylin Nicole Simpson was born February 11, 2018 to Jacosha Simpson and Jamarcus Wade. In her 8 years of life, she found many joys in her family, her friends and her faith. Jaylin loved attending church with her grandmother at Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church, her great-grandmother at Greater New Hope, and even would join her grandfather at Greater Target AME Church in Hollyhill, SC.

Aside from her faith, Jaylin enjoyed all things creative, girly and cats. She drew pictures and made dolls out of everything she could find. Her love for music was just as strong. She loved to record videos of her and her friends doing day to day things. She spent the most time with her cousins. She was a very bright student as well and although she didn't like school, she excelled. She loved to travel and see new places, on her list of must sees was New York and Paris.

Jaylin knew how to be the boss and even had a couple of babies of her own: Hailey, Bailey, Kaylie, Aylie and Lolie.

In addition to her parents, left to cherish fond and loving memories are: maternal grandparents, Rita Simpson and James (Renee) McKissick; paternal grandparents, Jamie Fuller and Marcus Wade; great-grandparents, Deloris and Henry James and Lettie Fuller; aunts, Markesha Fuller, Tynesha (Jaylin) Hynes and Klarke McKissick; brothers, Kace and Koree McCreary; cousins, Angela Wallace and Cameron Fuller; godmothers, Briana McCreary and Mariah Chapel; and a host of cousins and extended family members she also loved dearly.

She was preceded in death by: her aunt, Victoria Fuller and her uncle, Jeremiah Gilliam.

Jaylin lived a wonderful 8 years and was loved by everyone she held dear, and she loved us all as well. Please keep Baby Jaylin ,"Sugar Sugar", our sweet girl in your thoughts and prayers.

Funeral Services will be held on Sunday, March 22, 2026 at 2:00 p.m. at Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church, Spartanburg, SC. Burial will be in the Heritage Memorial Gardens, Roebuck, SC.

Public Viewing will be held on Saturday, March 20, 2026 from 5:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m. at The John Stinson Woodward Memorial Chapel.

In Honor of Jaylin's love for tea parties, the family kindly requests tea party attire for her homegoing celebration.

Severe storms are possible Sunday and Monday across the Upstate of South Carolina, western North Carolina, and northeast Georgia, with threats including damaging straight-line winds, isolated tornadoes, large hail, and heavy rain.

Live radar:

Severe threat Monday:

MONDAY: Impact Day due to severe storm potential

Keep up with what's happening around our area by downloading the WYFF News 4 app on the App Store or Google Play.

*** A burst of snow is likely in WNC by the afternoon as the front departs. Light accumulation, mainly on elevated surfaces, is possible. ***

The wind will pick up behind Monday's powerful cold front. A Wind Advisory is in place for the highlighted areas above 3500 feet in western North Carolina. Wind gusts of 50-60 mph are expected.

TUESDAY: Impact Day due to frigid temperatures & wind chills

WEDNESDAY: Impact Day due to another cold morning. Lows in the teens & 20s.

The WYFF News 4 weather team has been independently certified for having the most accurate forecast in the Greenville-Spartanburg-Asheville-Anderson market for the second year in a row.

"Our goal every day, in every forecast is accuracy," said WYFF 4 President and General Manager Blake Bridges. "Our expert weather team is dedicated to giving viewers a forecast they can trust to be right. We are also the only station in the market with our own 24/7 live radar, Live Super Doppler 4. It’s clear that WYFF News 4 is the weather leader in this market."

The certification comes from WeatheRate, an independent research firm that tracks forecasts from every station in multiple markets across the country.

"Everyone knows that forecasting the weather around here is difficult with the Upstate and mountains," said WeatheRate President Bruce Fixman. "The station that gets the forecast right more than anyone else is Chief Meteorologist Chris Justus and the WYFF News 4 weather team."

GREENVILLE, S.C. —

Severe storms are possible on Monday in the Upstate of South Carolina, western North Carolina and northeast Georgia.

Storms may produce damaging, straight-line winds, isolated tornadoes, large hail and heavy rain.

Live radar:

Severe threat Monday:

MONDAY: Impact Day due to severe storm potential

Download the free WYFF News 4 App to receive weather alerts. Be sure your notifications are turned ON.

*** A burst of snow is likely in WNC by the afternoon as the front departs. Light accumulation, mainly on elevated surfaces, is possible. ***

The wind will pick up behind Monday's powerful cold front. A Wind Advisory is in place for the highlighted areas above 3500 feet in western North Carolina. Wind gusts of 50-60 mph are expected.

TUESDAY: Impact Day due to frigid temperatures & wind chills

WEDNESDAY: Impact Day due to another cold morning. Lows in the teens & 20s.

The WYFF News 4 weather team has been independently certified for having the most accurate forecast in the Greenville-Spartanburg-Asheville-Anderson market for the second year in a row.

"Our goal every day, in every forecast is accuracy," said WYFF 4 President and General Manager Blake Bridges. "Our expert weather team is dedicated to giving viewers a forecast they can trust to be right. We are also the only station in the market with our own 24/7 live radar, Live Super Doppler 4. It’s clear that WYFF News 4 is the weather leader in this market."

The certification comes from WeatheRate, an independent research firm that tracks forecasts from every station in multiple markets across the country.

"Everyone knows that forecasting the weather around here is difficult with the Upstate and mountains," said WeatheRate President Bruce Fixman. "The station that gets the forecast right more than anyone else is Chief Meteorologist Chris Justus and the WYFF News 4 weather team."

SPARTANBURG — A jury delivered a $5.1 million verdict against BMW last month after determining the Spartanburg plant discriminated against an American employee on the basis of her nationality, in violation of federal Title VII protections.

Kelly Dawsey of Greenville left her job in 2021 after learning of a reorganization that replaced her German boss with an American one, according to court records.

BMW had a long-standing policy mandating alternate German and domestic positions among senior managers, court records said, where no two consecutive managers in the chain of command could be American.

For Dawsey, getting an American boss meant the company would have to replace her with a German. Indeed, the company had made plans to replace Dawsey with a German and transfer her to a new role, court records said.

She left before being offered any alternative position and filed the suit in October 2022. It went to trial this year, where a jury agreed that BMW discriminated against her because she was American.

The jury awarded her $100,000 in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages. But since the damages in employment discrimination cases are capped at $300,000, that’s likely all she will receive, plus possible economic damages in the form of lost or future wages.

“We were surprised and disappointed by the outcome,” BMW spokesman Steve Wilson said in an email. “While we disagree, we respect the jury’s decision. We are currently evaluating potential post-trial and appellate options.”

Dawsey’s attorney, Brian Murphy, did not respond to requests for comment.

But Jeremy Summerlin, a Greenville employment attorney who followed the case, said the verdict was a rare occurrence for several reasons.

Nationality-based discrimination claims are less common than sex-based, race-based, age-based or disability-based claims, according to U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission statistics. When they do occur, he said, they usually don’t come from Americans. And generally, employment cases are settled before they get to a jury.

“You don’t see a lot of cases like this go to trial,” said Summerlin, who wrote about the case in his own blog. “Something like 97 percent of cases are going to be settled or dismissed at summary judgment before trial.”

Dawsey began working at BMW in 1995 and had worked her way up to department manager for human resources planning and steering, which reports directly to the vice president of human resources.

Before a planned reorganization, the vice president was a German national. When the German left, an American was brought in to fill the role.

Dawsey learned that a reorganization was in the works in the spring of 2021. In early September, before she learned she would be replaced by a German national, she reached out to a recruiter to look for other jobs.

BMW argued in a motion for summary judgment that Dawsey didn’t have a case, in part because she was looking to leave her position before she learned who was replacing her, and that her job transfer would be a lateral move.

In a motion opposing BMW’s request for summary judgment, Dawsey said that she only began looking for other opportunities after communication about the changes became “chaotic” and she wanted “to see if there were alternatives if she was left out.”

Dawsey pointed out that she only accepted employment elsewhere after BMW told her she would be moved to a job that she considered a demotion.

Major questions left up to the jury included whether BMW’s policy of requiring a German in the chain of command violated Title VII and whether moving Dawsey to another role would have been a demotion that could be considered an adverse employment action.

“BMW’s position is that she was being moved laterally, but the testimony, the argument was that position was a lower classification and the plaintiff had worked there for a long, long time,” Summerlin said. “And she was aware that that job was basically a black hole and nobody got promoted out of that position. She knew ‘If they stick me there, that’s basically the end.’ ”

A judge ruled against BMW on its motion for summary judgment, and the case moved forward, eventually ending in a trial.

On Feb. 25, a jury in the Greenville federal courthouse sided with Dawsey.

A hearing on economic damages is scheduled March 13.