Oconeean stands trial charged by the State DNR

At 2 o’clock this afternoon, the defense gets to present its case, and Oconee General Sessions Court finds out if defendant Tyson McWhorter will elect to take the stand.  In 2014 McWhorter was arrested on Ebenezer Road, in the vicinity of his home, and charged by the South Carolina DNR with possession of methamphetamine and night hunting for deer.  The prosecution’s witnesses included DNR officers and a laboratory employee who analyzed suspected methamphetamine—material that one DNR officer said he found in McWhorter’s right front pocket.  Defense attorney McDaniel tried to convince Judge Scott Sprouse to issue a directed verdict of acquittal, saying the state had failed to prove the elements of the night hunting for deer law.  But Sprouse denied the motion, ruling that enough evidence had been presented for the jury to decide the case.