COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP)  A South Carolina man has pleaded guilty to a federal fraud charge in a scheme authorities say includes severed limbs.

Gerald B. Hardin of Cayce admitted in federal court in Columbia on Tuesday that he was part of an insurance fraud scheme. Hardin told Judge Cameron Currie that he used a pole saw to cut off the hand of a mentally disabled man in Sumter County in 2008.