Somebody hit him on purpose. Is he
breathing? I don't know. I can't tell.
You're coming here to fight him cuz he
was mad at him. Let me ask you this. Can
I get you to step with me over here for
the police? All right.
Try to call him and see if he'll respond
to you. David. David. Come on. Wake up.
David. David. Start roping this off cuz
there's going to be a crime scene. All
right. On May 7th, 2023, a 46-year-old
man's lifeless body is found at the end
of a secluded road, lying in the grass
50 ft away from his wrecked vehicle.
Police and first responders get to a
scene that has all the markings of a
terrible accident. But when
investigators start putting the pieces
of this tragic puzzle together, they
begin to uncover a truth that is far
more sinister. The following report is
based on official police records, and
some of the footage has never been seen
before until now. At 1:34 a.m. on the
morning of May 7th, 2023, a frantic 911
call comes into dispatchers in
Greenwood, South Carolina. Okay. What
happened? Somebody has hit the car and
he's out of the car and he's been beaten
and he's unconscious. Is it a car wreck?
But it's a one person car wreck. He's
unconscious. Yes. It's really bad. He
needs immediate assistance. Okay. Is he
breathing? I don't know. I can't tell.
Okay. Listen to me. Where is he bleeding
from? His nose and his definitely his
nose. You said his nose and what else?
Definitely his nose and I can't tell. Oh
my gosh. Part of his ears really bad.
Okay, listen. Listen to me. Is he flat
on his back?
Yes. Okay. Are you able to turn him on
to his sides?
You Okay, listen. Listen. You said he's
bleeding from his nose and his ears.
Yes.
Okay. Is anybody out there with you?
Yes, I'm with two of other people. He
needs help right now, please. We've got
We've got EMS and law enforcement
coming. Okay.
Okay. Listen to me. Can you tell if he's
breathing? Is his chest moving up and
down? It doesn't seem like it. Can I
touch
his ears?
Okay. Listen. Do you feel any warm air
coming from his nose or his mouth?
I don't know. You don't feel any warm
air?
Actually, maybe. I can't really tell.
I'm sorry. I'm scared. I'm sorry. Okay,
I I understand. What is your name? I
feel it. I feel it. I feel it. I feel
it. I feel it. The dispatcher works to
help the caller. A teenager named Megan
provide as much assistance as possible
until first responders arrive. Okay,
listen to me. Can you tell if he's still
breathing? Can you try to talk to him?
See if you can wake him up. I can touch
him. Is that okay? Okay. Yes, ma'am. Try
to call him and see if he'll respond to
you. Davis. Davis. Come on. Wake up.
Davis. Davis. Davis. Davis. Come on,
Davis. Wake up. Can you tell if he's
breathing? I think he's breathing. Yeah.
You think he's breathing? Okay. Is he
moving around at all when you call him
or
Okay. What's his name? His name's Davis
McClendon.
This is only the first of many personal
details that will emerge on this
horrific night. But as police and EMTs
descend on the scene, the first order of
business is to save Davis McClendon's
life.
Okay. Oh, they're giving him
CPR. He's still on the line. He might
not be freezing.
Hard to tell anything.
[Music]
As the first deputies and medics arrive
on the scene, it becomes quickly clear
that the 911 caller's use of the phrase
oneperson car wreck was misleading. It's
true that only Davis McClendon is here
at the scene, but a deputy notes that
his injuries are consistent with being
struck by a vehicle. His damaged BMW is
sitting some distance away. And the
vehicle that seemingly hit both Davis
and his car spilled oil all over the
road. In fact, the oil isn't just
splattered here at the scene. It leaves
a trail heading away from the Hunter
Creek subdivision. Two Greenwood
deputies decide to follow that trail.
And from what Megan and her friends have
said, they have a pretty good idea where
it will lead them. Myself and 316 are
going to head over there. See if the
vehicles there. The house that he's
supposed to be at with the kids is Are
you heading there now? I'm going head
with you. No, stay here. Yates and I are
going to go over there. We're going to
see if the car is there. What vehicle he
was in?
Negative. We're going to go see if we
can find a vehicle there. Start roping
this off cuz there's going to be a crime
scene. All right. Although the 911
caller didn't see the incident, she
definitely has strong suspicions about
what happened before she arrived. Who
assaulted him? Bring his blood out. He
just was coming here to fight him cuz he
was mad at him and then we came to check
up on him and then he found him like
this. Okay. So the person that assaulted
him you said his name Bud Acriman. Yes.
Does he live in Hunter Creek?
[Music]
No. Separated and he had him moving on
his and like right outside of Hunter
Creek. It's like 2 minutes away. It's
like old Abbyville Highway. Okay. Did he
assault him? Did he have a weapon or do
you know did anybody see him assault
him? Did anybody see it happen? No, I
don't think that we got here nobody was
here. We just were going to leave until
I saw his body and a couple feet being
away in the in on the side of the
church. Megan, who is still back at the
scene, is not alone. She's with a woman
named Meredith Haney, who is Bud Aki's
estranged wife. Megan is in fact a
frequent babysitter for their children,
the three of whom are staying with Bud
for the weekend, Meredith tells police.
And as the deputies make contact with
Bud at his parents' residence, those
kids and their safety are their first
priority.
Double. I see it.
[Applause]
All right. Garage is open.
[Applause]
Garage is open.
Sheriff's office. Yes, sir.
Are there some uh some kids here? Yeah.
Y Okay. Whose kids are they? Mine. Yours
and who? Uh my wife. Okay. Let me ask
you this. Can I get you to step with me
over here for me, please? All right. Do
you have your ID on you? Uh, I do not.
Okay, just step over here for me. Bud
will do very little talking to police
that night, but they've already got the
beginnings of a tangled backstory merely
from what Megan told them in her initial
call. Okay, so how did y'all know he was
out there? Because he's
dating
wife. He was really mad and trying to
find her all night. Okay, so David has
been dating Bud's ex-wife. Yes.
It will later emerge that Meredith and
Bud separated and began divorce
proceedings approximately 1 year
earlier. But while Bud will later admit
that this breakup was against his
wishes, his frustration with the
situation reaches a new level on April
29th, 2023, about a week before the
incident. That's when he learned from a
mutual friend that Meredith had begun
dating a man named Davis McClendon.
Investigators will later find a text
message Bud sent to a friend expressing
his outrage at the news. Bud texts,
"What the hell is Davis thinking, man? I
mean, what the hell, Danny?" Danny
replies back, "I have no clue what
you're talking about. What did he do?"
Bud writes, "He's been Meredith." He
goes on to say, "I had my suspicions,
but it was confirmed by her. I can't
believe he'd do that to me. I mean,
damn, I've known him my whole life." And
when Dany simply writes, I don't know
what to tell you, bud. Bud replies,
"Damn, I don't know either. It's justed
up." Exactly one week after the text
exchange, on the evening of Saturday,
May 6th, Meredith and Davis go out to
dinner at a restaurant called Break on
the Lake, where security cameras pick up
their arrival. It's only 4 and 1/2 hours
before the tragedy on Avid Road. Davis
goes inside while Meredith stays behind
in the car. She's facetiming with their
kids who are at Bud's house and using
their dad's phone to chat with her. What
she doesn't know is that Bud is
observing the screen as well, and he
recognizes the scenery in the
background. He doesn't know for certain
that she's with Davis, but he has his
suspicions. It's 8:48 p.m. and a bad
night is only just beginning. Many hours
later, deputies at Bud's house take
careful note of the fresh, oily
footprints that decorate the floor. So,
footprints. Yeah.
Footprints. Footprints.
[Music]
Footprint.
Footprint. That's the door. I came
in still. Oily
footprints. Oily footprints. The
investigators follow the footprint trail
back to a bedroom where they appear to
come to an end at the foot of the bed.
Is this parents room? Yes. Okay.
Twist there. One here. This bunch. Yeah.
A bunch right here. I'm pretty sure it's
going to be the shoes that he's got on
now. Yeah. Investigators will indeed
find oily residue on the shoes Bud is
wearing that night, as well as a small
amount of what appears to be blood on
his hands. Both were presumably clean
earlier that night when he was at a
local bar called the Key West Club,
where surveillance shows him ordering at
least four beers over an hour and a half
time period. But Bud isn't just drinking
and socializing. He's making repeated
attempts to get in contact with
Meredith, who has left break on the lake
and is now with Davis at a friend's
party. At one point, frustrated that
Meredith won't take his calls, Bud texts
her a message. Why do you hate me? I
just don't understand. When a friend who
was at Key West Club that night calls
Meredith to tell her that Bud is gone,
Meredith and Davis head up to the bar
themselves. According to what Meredith
would later tell investigators, Bud
continued calling repeatedly during this
time. She says that when she finally did
take his call, he demanded to know where
she was and why she was refusing to
speak to him. The call logs would later
reveal that between 9:07 p.m. and 12:15
a.m. that night, Bud attempted to call
Meredith a total of 36 times. At his
residence in the hours after the
incident, investigators take a close
look at Bud's Ford F250, which just
happens to look like it's been in a
crash. That's wild. Yeah, that's that's
what I walked up and I was like, "Oh,
yeah."
You see the Yep. Yep. It's a That's a
That's a palm mark. But like that right
there, you got those little specks right
there.
Bud himself refuses to answer any
questions without a lawyer present, but
the circumstantial evidence is piling up
quickly. As for Meredith, she says she
tried reaching out to Bud's friends and
family while at the Key West Club
earlier that night. In the meantime,
Davis sent a text message to a friend
saying, "FYI, apparently Bud is drunk
and out trying to hunt Meredith down.
She's wanting to call the cops. I was
hoping maybe you could get his dad to
rope him in. At almost the same time,
Bud Acriman is on the hunt, scoping out
the parking lot at the now closed break
on the Lake restaurant for any signs of
Meredith and Davis. He makes two circles
through the lot before leaving.
Investigators will later learn, thanks
to the Ford's onboard computer, that he
also drove down the street where
Meredith lived and down the street where
Davis lived in an effort to find the
couple. Back at the Key West Club, Davis
decides enough is enough and tells
Meredith he's going to call Bud and talk
to him about the relentless attempts to
get her on the phone. Meredith watches
her boyfriend walk away, never imagining
it would be for the last time. Bud would
later characterize the call as
aggressive, saying that Davis was
threatening to beat him up. While the
true nature of the conversation cannot
be known, what is known is that Davis
and Bud agree to meet near the
intersection of Avid Road and Sawrass
Place. According to Bud and confirmed by
the call logs, he called Davis back at
10:09 a.m. He says he told Davis at that
time that he wouldn't be meeting him
after all and would instead be going
home. Bud says that Davis cursed at him
and taunted him for backing out, at
which time he drove straight to the
meeting place. At 1:11 a.m., his final
approach is caught on a local resident
surveillance camera.
[Music]
[Applause]
The camera only captures the sound of
the impact, but another resident's
camera records the moment of impact
itself. The first camera not only
captures the sound of the incident, but
also Bud yelling something in the
seconds following the impact.
At 1:13 a.m., Bud's truck can be seen
leaving the area. He would later say
that the collision was an accident
caused by Davis standing in the middle
of the road. Bud says that he only saw
Davis at the last second, at which point
he jerked the steering wheel as hard as
he could to avoid Davis and smash into
his car instead. The onboard computer
system shows that he did not hit the
brakes and was traveling at 25 mph in
his Ford F250. Davis would die that
night at Self Regional Medical Center at
the age of 46. At 6:30 in the morning on
May 7th, roughly 5 hours after the
incident, Bud Acriman is arrested and
transported to the Greenwood County
Detention Center. On trial for murder
the following year, he would insist that
he never meant to harm Davis McClendon
that night and that it was only due to
panic that he failed to call 911. The
jury deliberated for less than 30
minutes before delivering a unanimous
verdict of guilty. In October 2024,
42-year-old William Bud Acriman was
sentenced to 45 years in prison for
murder. He's housed at the Tiger River
Correctional Institution in Spartanberg
County, South Carolina.