The Campobello Police Department, in a joint investigation with the Spartanburg County Sheriff’s Office, arrested Bobby Dean Pruitt, 74, for the April 13, 2012 murder of Fred Wayne Ramsey.

A release from the Spartanburg County Sheriff’s Office said Pruitt confessed to investigators that he murdered Ramsey by shooting him.

On the afternoon of April 13, Ramsey’s body was found by a citizen in a wooded area just off Highway 176 in the Town of Campobello. Officers from the Campobello Police Department requested assistance from The Spartanburg County Sheriff’s Office in the investigation of this case.

Sheriff Chuck Wright assigned investigators from the sheriff’s office violent crime unit to assist in the investigation. During the course of the investigation Pruitt had been identified as a person of interest in this case.

In late September 2012, Pruitt was arrested and charged by the Inman Police Department with assault and battery high and aggravated nature and booked into the Spartanburg County Sheriff’s Office Detention Center. Pruitt was also charged with a probation violation by the S.C. Department of Probation and Parole.

A bond was set at $75,000 on these charges. Pruitt has remained in the detention center since his September 2012 arrest.

Pruitt informed detention center personnel on Friday, Dec. 21 that he wished to speak with an investigator. While speaking with an investigator he confessed to Ramsey’s murder. Pruitt will go before a judge for a bond hearing on these new charges of murder and possession of a weapon during a violent crime at a time to be set by the court.

Sheriff Chuck Wright and Campobello Police Chief Chad McNeill said they are pleased the case has been solved and that Ramsey’s family could have a form of closure in this case here at Christmas. This investigation is another example of the cooperation between law enforcement agencies to see that justice is served, said Spartanburg County Sheriff’s Office officials.