CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Police arrested the ex-boyfriend of a Gastonia woman whose body was found Thursday in Fairfield County, South Carolina, which is just north of Columbia.
The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department said LaPorscha Baldwin was last seen on Oct. 10. Her ex-boyfriend, Charles William Combs, was reportedly the person she was headed to see when she disappeared.
This weekend, authorities arrested Charles Combs in Myrtle Beach. He is charged with Baldwin’s murder.
He was extradited back to Mecklenburg County on Tuesday.
Information obtained by WCNC Charlotte reveals that Combs was previously convicted in the murder of his former girlfriend, Marsheida Dorsey, in 2004. Records show he spent 12 years in prison before being released in 2016.
“I wrote letters to the parole board, to the DA,” Dorsey’s father, Michael Carn, Sr. said. “And I told them that he was going to do the same thing to somebody else because he does not care anything about life.”
Carn said his daughter was shot five times for trying to leave an abusive relationship. He believes that Combs should not have been released from prison.
“All my condolence and prayer go to the [Baldwin] family because now they’ll have to endure the same thing that we endured for the last 17 years,” Carn said.
Since his daughter’s death, Carn and his wife, Purposed Carn, have become advocates for victims of domestic violence. Every year, they release balloons in memory of Marsheida.
“I cried as if I had just got the news that that was my child,” Purposed Carn, Marsheida’s stepmom, said. “So it's like, I got to feel what it felt like to lose a child in some ways because the feeling was so familiar because I have lost loved ones previously.”
Purposed Carn started an organization to help women who are victims of domestic violence. She’s also a survivor herself and hopes that sharing Marsheida’s story will save other women.
Michael Carn said he remembers his daughter as someone who was full of joy and infectiously happy.
“She was a loving person to where everybody who met her or came around her was full of joy,” Carn said. “I pray every day [for] justice.”
CMPD said Combs was arrested by SLED agents Saturday in Myrtle Beach and was taken to the Horry County Jail.
He'll face a murder charge in Mecklenburg County.