Hospice Worker and BF Arrested For Stealing From Client

Lexington County Sheriff’s Department detectives arrested a 31-year-old woman who formerly worked as a hospice nurse and her 28-year-old boyfriend on charges that the woman accompanied her boyfriend when he broke into a home on Walter Taylor Road near Gilbert on February 7 and robbed at gunpoint a 74-year-old man who owns the home. The 31-year-old woman had provided care at the home as a hospice nurse for the 74-year-old man’s late mother. Lexington County Sheriff James R. Metts said detectives arrested Tonya Leigh Corder, 31, of 112 Naomi Drive, Gilbert, at 4:05 p.m. on Friday, February 26 on arrest warrants on charges of first-degree burglary, robbery while armed with a deadly weapon and possessing a weapon during the commission of a violent crime. Deputies arrested James Bentham Butler, 28, of 194 Old Duncan Road, Batesburg-Leesville, at 12:45 a.m. on Tuesday, February 23 on arrest warrants on charges of first-degree burglary, robbery while armed with a deadly weapon and possessing a weapon during the commission of a violent crime. Corder and Butler were being held on Saturday, February 27 at the Lexington County Detention Center while awaiting bond hearings, Metts said. Under South Carolina law, a circuit judge would have to conduct bond hearings for Butler and Corder in general sessions court because first-degree burglary carries a punishment of life in prison, Metts said. The 11th Judicial Circuit Solicitor’s Office has not yet scheduled bond hearings for Butler and Corder. Arrest warrants allege that at about 9 p.m. on February 7 Butler broke into the 74-year-old man’s home on Walter Taylor Road by forcing open a door, Metts said. Butler pointed a handgun at the 74-year-old man and demanded that the man provide him with money. Butler removed the 74-year-old man’s wallet, which contained about $1,000 in cash, from a pocket in the man’s pants and fled to a car, where Corder was waiting in the driver’s seat for Butler to exit the home, Metts said. Corder drove the car away from the 74-year-old man’s home. Earlier in the evening on February 7, Butler accompanied Corder when she went to the Walter Taylor Road home in order to borrow $30 from the 74-year-old man, Metts said. Corder noticed that the 74-year-old man had a large amount of cash in his wallet. Corder and Butler then drove away from the 74-year-old man’s home. About 45 minutes later, Butler and Corder drove back to the 74-year-old man’s home in order to rob the man, Metts said.