The mother of Todd Kohlhepp, the South Carolina man believed to have killed seven people, has been found dead.
According to CBS News, Regina Ann Tague, 70, was discovered dead by her husband in their home on Sunday morning.
Regina Tague, the mother who told @48hours why her son "killed" 7 ppl in S.C., has died, 6 months after his arrest https://t.co/GTZD0FvzOe pic.twitter.com/MAvxK8zWvc
— David Begnaud (@DavidBegnaud) April 23, 2017
Tague had become somewhat notorious in her son’s serial killer case for seeming to have excessive sympathy for Kohlhepp, who is believed to have killed seven people, including the boyfriend of a woman he kept chained in a dark storage container on his property for two months last year, where she told Dr. Phil she was raped twice a day.
According to CBS News, there is no foul play suspected in Tague’s death, though the cause is unknown. Kohlhepp was a registered sex offender, but his killing spree went undiscovered until this past fall, two months after Kala Brown and her boyfriend Charles Carver went to Kohlhepp’s property in rural South Carolina for what they thought was a cleaning job.
Shortly after the pair arrived, Kohlhepp allegedly shot Carver to death, and then held Kala captive for two months in a pitch-black metal storage container, where she was chained by her ankle and let out occasionally for escorted walks.
Brown and Carver were reported missing, and police searching for the couple traced a cell phone signal to Kohlhepp’s property in early November. When deputies arrived to search the property, they heard Kala screaming from inside the storage container and rescued her. A further search of the property uncovered multiple dead bodies, and Kohlhepp eventually confessed to killing seven people in murders dating back to 2003. It is possible there may be more victims.
In a November interview with 48 Hours, Tague spoke highly of her son’s success and work ethic as a real estate agent, and said he killed some of his victims because they “embarrassed” him. She said she couldn’t understand how her son could have committed murder, and insisted that he was not a serial killer, because there was an extended time lapse between killings.
“The people that understand him and know him now just don’t understand how he could do this, because this is not the man they know,” Tague said.
Photo: Spartenburg County Sheriff
