ALLENDALE, S.C. (June 20, 2024) – A 49-year-old Hampton man who ambushed his ex-girlfriend as she backed out of her driveway – with the couple’s infant child in the vehicle – has been sent to prison.
An Allendale County General Sessions jury found Cleveland Maxwell of Hampton guilty of first-degree assault and battery, domestic violence of a high and aggravated nature, and discharging a firearm into a dwelling or occupied vehicle. He was sentenced Thursday to 10 years in prison.
“This could easily have been a murder trial,” said Reed Evans of the 14th Circuit Solicitor’s Office, who prosecuted the case. “In the months leading up to this incident, Cleveland Maxwell threatened to put the mother of his child in the grave, and he nearly did exactly that. Fortunately, his aim was off, his victim is alive and his child won’t have to grow up without a mother.
“And Cleveland Maxwell is off to prison, where he belongs.”
Before dawn on Sept. 10, 2022, Maxwell’s ex-girlfriend was backing out of the driveway of her Allendale home to leave for work. The infant child she had in common with Maxwell also was in the car. Maxwell, driving a vehicle registered to his wife, with whom he lived in Hampton, then drove up to the victim and opened fire.
The victim attempted to speed away, but Maxwell pursued her. The chase ended when the victim ran her vehicle into a railroad tie used as a landscaping feature in a neighbor’s yard. Maxwell continued to fire, but the woman fled on foot without injury. The child also was uninjured.
The woman called 9-1-1 and identified Maxwell as her attacker.
Investigators with the Allendale Police Department and the S.C. State Law Enforcement Division detected gunshot residue in the vehicle Maxwell was driving and recovered a 9mm cartridge casing from the front seat.
Maxwell denied being in Allendale after 10 p.m. the night before the incident, but cellphone tower data indicated he was near his ex-girlfriend’s house at the time of the shooting.
Evans called five witnesses during two days of testimony at the Allendale County Courthouse.
Maxwell’s criminal history dates to 1991 and includes convictions in Florida for selling cocaine within 1,000 feet of a school, grand theft firearm, trespassing, resisting arrest and domestic violence.
Circuit Court Judge Carmen T. Mullen handed down the sentence.
