North Myrtle Beach Times Serving our Community and the Grand Strand for over 50 years
By Ruben Lowman
The leadership core of the Horry County Police Department (HCPD) has been dealt a blow following the sudden retirement of Deputy Chief Lance Winburn.
Winburn’s exit on April 28, after more than 40 years of service, comes as a direct consequence of a newly reopened Internal Affairs (IA) investigation into a 2022 “unarrest” incident that has exposed allegations of political weaponization, civil rights violations and a systemic lack of accountability.
Winburn is now the third high-ranking official to leave the department in just over a year, joining former Chief Joseph Hill and former Deputy Chief Brandon Strickland in a total turnover of the agency’s executive command.
Internal documents and a federal lawsuit reveal a series of highly unusual events that critics claim were a coordinated campaign of political intimidation.
The 2022 incident, which remained buried until forced into the light by recent Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, details a bizarre breach of standard police protocol. While officers were transporting a handcuffed male to jail for “misuse of 911,” Deputy Chief Winburn personally called the patrol car and ordered the officers to turn around.
The arresting officer reportedly told the person, “I have never seen anything like this,” as he was ordered to release him on the side of the road with a ticket that was never filed in any court.
A 2022 internal probe originally found the arresting officers violated policy. However, Winburn himself later overturned those findings to “not sustained,” effectively clearing the officers involved in the very incident he had allegedly intervened on.
