Family revisits crime while Solicitor's Office announces its intent to seek death penalty

GIFFORD — Shantell DeVore Miller used to have strong objections to capital punishment. She even wrote a paper explaining her position while in community college a few years ago.

But looking over the graves of three family members Thursday — a year to the day after they were killed at an apartment complex near Dorchester Road— she wasn't so sure. The 1st Circuit Solicitor's Office said last week that it intends to seek the death penalty against the man charged with the slayings.

"Now that it's hit so close and so personally, I've had to let up on my thought process," Miller said. "If he's truly guilty, I would not be against it."

Diane Grant, 44; her younger son, Jatavious DeVore, 20; and her daughter, DeAnna DeVore, 14, were shot at the Archdale Forest Apartments on July 10, 2007.

Though the crime occurred in unincorporated Dorchester County near North Charleston, the news hit especially hard in rural areas a two-hour drive away.

Grant had grown up in the small Hampton County communities of Scotia and Gifford. She worked at a plastics company in the town of Hampton before moving to the Charleston area. DeAnna and Jatavious DeVore attended public schools in Estill, where a memorial service after the deaths drew hundreds.

Back in Hampton County, Grant had been known to work two or three jobs at once. The mother of three even commuted across Jasper and Beaufort counties to work cleaning jobs on upscale Hilton Head Island. During the long hours of work, extended family often helped look after her children.

Grant had moved about five years ago and took a job at the Robert Bosch plant on Dorchester Road, according to Miller, an Allendale County resident who is the first cousin of DeAnna and Jatavious DeVore' father.

"She worked a lot and she worked very hard," Miller said.

Life in Charleston seemed to be going well for the family. Grant was excited about her grandchildren from her oldest son, Marquis Grant, who lives in Jacksonville.

DeAnna was a popular student at Oakbrook Middle School. She was looking forward to starting high school at the end of the summer.

Jatavious DeVore had been enrolled in a job-training program in Bamberg County that he hoped would put him on a career track. He had come back home to his mom's house to visit for a few days.

Then, the unexpected happened.

Grant and Jatavious DeVore were found slain in the apartment early on a Tuesday morning, after neighbors reported hearing gunshots during the night. Later that morning, DeAnna's body was discovered near another building in the complex.

An explanation for the shootings has never surfaced. Family members are puzzled. Police and prosecutors have only been able to offer tidbits of science that point to a suspect, yet fail to answer the burning question: Why?

Three weeks after the slayings, the Dorchester County Sheriff's Office arrested a man who lived in the next subdivision over from the victims' home in Archdale Forest Apartments. The Sheriff's Office said the gun used in the killings matched two incidents in March 2007, and tied Anthony Sanders to the crimes. One of the previous incidents involved shots fired into the air on North Charleston's Spruill Avenue, the other shots fired into a house on Hunters Ridge Lane, a residential street off Ashley Phosphate Road.

Sanders has past convictions for crack cocaine possession, simple assault and driving under the influence. To date, authorities have not discussed how he might have known the family.

Assistant 1st Circuit Solicitor Blair Jennings said on Friday that prosecutors expected to file paperwork this week with the Clerk of Court in St. George, giving notice of their intent to seek the death penalty against Sanders. Also on Friday, sheriff's Capt. Tom Marshall confirmed that detectives have not pinpointed a motive in the case.

The suspect has been in custody since his arrest. He is currently being held without bail at the Dorchester County jail in St. George on three murder charges.

Grant's most recent job before moving to the Charleston area had been at TO Plastics, a factory that makes machine parts in Hampton.

"She was real serious about her work, but we all liked to cut up a little," said Laura Carter, a 19-year veteran of the company who was there before Grant arrived.

Candy Harmon, who started later, called Grant a go-getter: "Diane would be in 10 places at once."

Charles Hosendove had known Grant long before they worked at TO Plastics, since they were about 13 years old. They were only four months apart in age and had attended school together.

"Nothing much bothered Diane," he said. "If it did, she never let it show."

The co-workers held a going-away party when Grant left. They wouldn't have done it for just anyone. After she moved, she still stopped by to say hello when she was in town, the last time about a month before she was killed.

On Thursday, Miller and another cousin of the slain family members, Nadine Ballard, visited Grant, DeAnna and Jatavious DeVore's graves in the Mount Zion Baptist Church Cemetery near Gifford. They had come to the remote burial site down several miles of dirt road on the first anniversary of the deaths.

The two relatives swept the graves and planted a rose bush along the perimeter. Miller tied three balloons by DeAnna's grave for the Sweet 16 birthday she never got to celebrate. It would have been on Wednesday of this year.