Charles Rhines was executed for the murder of a Sioux Falls, South Dakota donut shop employee in 1992. He is the most recent person executed by the Mount Rushmore State and his case was controversial as he believed the jury deliberately had it out for him for being a homosexual man. Rhines was born in McLaughlin on July 11, 1956, one of four children of Richard and Ruth Rhines, and did not finish high school. At age 17 he enlisted in the Army, earned his GED, and was discharged in 1976. Rhines then enrolled at the University of South Dakota in Springfield but was caught stealing from another student's dorm room and charged with third degree burglary and sentenced to three years in prison. Paroled in 1979, Rhines promptly robbed a liquor store at gunpoint and was sentenced to ten years for armed robbery. He served seven and was paroled in 1987.

It is unclear what Rhines was doing during the next four years but in the summer of 1991 he began working at Dig 'Em Donuts in Rapid City as a night baker and the owner of the shop did not know about his criminal history. Rhines did not get along with co-workers and after eight months there was fired for poor job performance. In need of money, he decided to burglarize the donut shop.

On March 8, 1992, Rhines used a copy of the back door key to enter Dig 'Em Donuts. It was a Sunday and the donut shop was closed, so nobody was inside. Rhines began absconding with money from the cash register when he was interrupted by Donnivan Schaeffer, a 22 year old employee who worked as a courier and came there to pick up supplies. Rhines ran at Schaeffer with a knife and stabbed him in the chest. Schaeffer begged to be taken to the hospital and swore he wouldn't tell anyone, but Rhines pushed him into a storage locker, tied him, and stabbed him to death. He stole $3,000 in cash and fled. Schaeffer's body was found the next day and Rhines attended the funeral with his roommate. Shortly afterwards he skipped down and made his way to Washington.

Immediately suspected in the robbery/murder, Rhines was apprehended in Seattle on June 19 but it was more than two months before he was finally extradicted to South Dakota. He readily confessed to everything, but prosecutors would not accept a plea bargain and sought the death penalty which in South Dakota requires a unanimous jury verdict. The jury found him guilty on January 26, 1993 on the grounds that the murder was committed in the commission of another crime, that it was premeditated, and that it was exceptionally heinous or cruel to the victim.

Schaeffer was initially stabbed in both lungs which would cause painful, labored breathing but not be immediately fatal. The fatal wound was a knife thrust to the back of the skull, puncturing the brain stem and essentially like being decapitated. According to Rhines's confession, Schaeffer continued to breathe and move around his arms after this injury, so he tied them behind his back. He reckoned that Schaeffer breathed for about two minutes afterward. The forensic pathologist who examined the body acknowledged that it was possible that his limbs made some involuntary death spasms.

Rhines appealed on the grounds that his sentence was arbitrary and injust. Like most of the Northern Plains states, South Dakota is an infrequent user of capital punishment and he argued that his crime was nothing exceptional and that the state currently had 17 men convicted of first degree murder locked up who merely got life without parole, some during the same time period of his crime. His attorneys believed the jury in this very conservative state had singled him out for being gay--while deliberating, one juror sent a note to the judge asking if Rhines would be able to live an openly gay lifestyle in prison were he sentenced to life. Would he have a cellmate? Would homosexual lovers of his be allowed to have conjugal visits? The judge declined to answer any of these queries.

Some of the jurors seemed well convinced that spending the rest of his life in a prison surrounded by other men was exactly what Rhines wanted, the equivalent of Brer Rabbit and the briar patch, and this could be avoided by putting him on death row where he would spend 23 hours a day in a cell with one hour out each day for showering and exercise. The defense believed he didn't get a fair trial and his 5th Amendment rights were violated, but this argument got them nowhere.

Governor Kristi Noem signed Rhines's death warrant in September 2019 and he was executed November 4 at the state pententiary in Sioux Falls after a last meal consisting of fried chicken, cantalope, lefse, yogurt, licorice, ice cream, root beer, and coffee. Currently, Briley Piper, convicted of involvement in the torture-death of a man in Spearfish in 2000, is the only death row inmate in South Dakota.

>>17853466
>>17853452 (OP)
South Dakota doesn't use capital punishment much but they're notoriously harsh on violent criminals. Also this jury was really dumb. Who cares if he wants to fuck some butts in prison anyway? Not their problem.

Yo wtf

>>17853477
There was a Supreme Court case in the early 80s about how SD wanted to sentence a repeat offender to life without parole although he didn't kill anyone and the Court said that violated the 8th Amendment.

>>17853466
hhhold up there. dddid you say Kristi Noem?

>>17853505
Yes the governor of SD in '19 when this execution happened. What does that have to do with the price of tea in China though?

>>17853477
it was a flyover state in 1992 what did you expect?

This state is a shithole, please don't come.

>>17853466
>Some of the jurors seemed well convinced that spending the rest of his life in a prison surrounded by other men was exactly what Rhines wanted
I can't imagine maximum security prison is a great environment for sex

>>17853466
>lefse
Is that popular in America? Scandinavian parents, maybe?

>>17854416
It's the Dakotas where every other person is of Scandi ancestry.