Dillon County, South Carolina – The warning now hanging over Dillon County is not vague. It is direct, public and federal: at least nine shootings since March are believed to be tied to an ongoing gang feud, and the FBI is offering up to $10,000 for information that helps bring charges, arrests and convictions in the case. The bureau says the violence has already killed five people and left numerous others critically injured.
For a rural county of roughly 27,600 people, the numbers land with extra weight. This is not the kind of violence that disappears into a large-city crime log. In Dillon County, every shooting travels fast through families, churches, schools, stores and streets where people know the names before the headlines arrive.
The FBI’s Columbia Field Office, through its Florence Resident Agency, is assisting the Dillon County Sheriff’s Office and Dillon Police Department.
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Investigators have not publicly named the gangs involved, listed every connected case, or released a full timeline of suspects. What they have said is enough to signal the seriousness of the moment: “SUSPECTS SHOULD BE CONSIDERED ARMED AND DANGEROUS.”
The first sharp public sign of the pattern came on March 23. Dillon police responded around 5 p.m. to South 9th Avenue, where a male victim had been shot. While officers were still working that scene, a second call came in around 5:20 p.m. for another shooting on South 1st Avenue. Multiple people were found wounded. Two young men, 22-year-old Tyrese Smith and 18-year-old Ja’Quese Alford, both of Dillon, died from their injuries.
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Those March shootings are now viewed as part of a wider and more dangerous picture. The FBI said law enforcement has identified at least nine shootings in Dillon County believed to be part of the feud since March 2026. Local coverage has tracked several of the shootings, though the FBI has not publicly specified which incidents are included in the official count.
The reward is aimed at people who may know something but have stayed silent, a vehicle seen leaving a street, a name heard in an argument, a social media exchange, a weapon, a warning, a rumor that suddenly makes sense. Authorities are asking residents to report even small details, because in a chain of retaliation, one overlooked piece of information can be the break that stops the next shooting.
Tips can be shared with the Dillon County Sheriff’s Office at (843) 774-1432 or (843) 841-3707. People may also contact the FBI at 1-800-CALL-FBI, reach out through a local FBI office, or submit information through the FBI’s online tip system. The FBI’s public poster on the Dillon shootings is also available through its wanted and seeking information page.
The renewed fear comes after a brief period when Dillon County appeared to be moving in the right direction. SLED data showed Dillon County had the highest violent crime rate in South Carolina in 2022, at 168 violent crimes per 10,000 residents. In 2023, violent crime in the county dropped by about 29%, and the sheriff’s office reported two homicides, described as a five-year low.
That progress is now being tested by a wave of gunfire that has stretched across months. The FBI reward does not mean the case is solved. It means investigators are widening the circle and asking the public to help break it. In Dillon County, the next useful tip may not come from a dramatic confession. It may come from someone who saw one thing, heard one thing, or finally decided that silence had become too costly.
