A 13-year-old boy named Daryl Lowry is dead, and a 17-year-old is facing murder charges after a violent altercation at Strom Thurmond Lake in South Carolina on Monday morning. McCormick County deputies arrived at Modoc Shores around 7 a.m. to find the boy’s body at the dock. According to arrest warrants, Landen Austin Moore held Lowry underwater during a physical confrontation involving multiple teenagers. The victim also sustained knife lacerations during the incident, suggesting the conflict escalated quickly and dangerously. Moore was booked into McCormick County Detention Center and faces adult murder charges, while a 16-year-old involved in the altercation was transferred to South Carolina’s juvenile justice system.
What makes this case particularly troubling is how fast things spiraled from what may have started as a typical teenage dispute into a fatal tragedy. Investigators are still piecing together exactly what sparked the confrontation and whether there were warning signs or events leading up to Monday morning. The knife wounds and deliberate drowning indicate this wasn’t just kids roughhousing—it was violence that crossed a line into something irreversible. For parents and community members, this raises urgent questions about supervision, peer pressure, and how teenagers handle conflict when they’re together without adults present.
The South Carolina Law Enforcement Division continues investigating the circumstances surrounding the death. This case will likely reignite conversations about teen violence, the juvenile justice system, and where accountability lies when young people commit serious crimes. If you’re a parent or grandparent in our area, it’s worth having an honest conversation with the young people in your life about making safe choices and understanding consequences.
