On the night of November 20, 1992, near Hardeeville, South Carolina, 31-year-old South Carolina Highway Patrol Trooper Mark Hunter Coates was shot and killed during a traffic stop on Interstate 95. A U.S. Marine Corps veteran, Coates had served with the highway patrol for five years and was assigned to the Aggressive Criminal Enforcement Team, which focused on drug interdiction.

According to reports, Coates stopped a vehicle for weaving. The driver, Richard E. Blackburn, struggled with Coates during the stop and the two fell to the ground. Blackburn fired a .22 caliber handgun; the first shot was stopped by Coates’s protective vest but a second shot entered through his left armpit and into his heart. Coates was able to return fire, hitting Blackburn five times in the chest. Blackburn survived and was taken into custody, charged with murder, and later convicted and sentenced to life without parole. A section of Interstate 95 in Jasper County has been named the Mark H. Coates Highway in his honor.

If anyone remembers Trooper Coates, his patrol work, or the events around that night on I-95, please share what you know.