‘It’s sickening’: Report shows SC 18-year-old was stabbed more than 30 times

UNION COUNTY, N.C. — Grisly new details are coming to light in an investigation into the brutal killing of a South Carolina 18-year-old.

Deputies said Jacob Williamson was killed in Union County, North Carolina, last summer. His body was left just across the state line on the side of a South Carolina road. It was located on July 4, 2023.

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The details of this case are extremely disturbing, but the family friend Jacob was last living with said it is important the community knows the nature of this case.

“I can never get over seeing that,” Promise Edwards told Channel 9′s Hannah Goetz.

Edwards was taking care of the 18-year-old in the months leading up to his death.

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In June of last year, Williamson left Edwards’ home in Laurens, South Carolina, and never came home. He was going to meet Joshua Newton, who he had been talking to online for weeks.

Williamson’s body was found a few days later on a roadside, a few miles from the home where Newton lived in Monroe with his girlfriend, Victoria Smith. Both were charged with murder in Williamson’s death and for hiding the body.

“Even the worst people in the world don’t deserve that,” Edwards said.

Many of the details that led to Williamson’s death are too graphic to share. The autopsy reveals his cause of death was multiple sharp force injuries. Throughout the report, investigators shared details of more than 30 stab wounds, cuts and mutilations.

“It makes me sick to my stomach to think about how easy it was for them to just snuff his life away and continue on with theirs,” Edwards said. “It’s sickening.”

Back in August, Channel 9 received videos of Newton and Smith live streaming on the social media app LiveMe. Joshua Newton said three words -- “It was fun” -- as he danced during the stream.

The Union County Sheriff’s Office confirmed the video was taken just hours after the killing. Smith and Newton explain to their followers that he had to get stitches on his hand that morning.

Edwards said Williamson would have turned 19 next week. She told Goetz it would have been his first birthday as his true self since coming out as transgender.

“For anybody to have to die that way, especially for a teenager who was only able to be himself for 28 days, makes it even harder,” she said. “Because I know what I did to try to protect him.”

(WATCH BELOW: Murder suspects livestreamed before, after allegedly killing Union County teen)