The Alex Murdaugh case keeps getting crazier ...
A once powerful lawyer now standing trial for the double murder of his wife and his son, multiple charges of financial fraud, and hiring a hitman... on himself.
Here's everything you need to know.
A once powerful lawyer now standing trial for the double murder of his wife and his son, multiple charges of financial fraud, and hiring a hitman... on himself.
Here's everything you need to know.
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NewsTranscript
00:00My wife and child just got married.
00:03They're not anyone else's children.
00:05This is Alec Murdoch.
00:07Once the son of a powerful South Carolina legal dynasty,
00:11he now stands accused of killing his wife Maggie
00:14and one of their sons, Paul.
00:16I tried to take their pulse on both of them.
00:19Behind his fall from grace lay a series of suspicious deaths,
00:23a hitman scheme, allegations of multimillion dollar fraud over decades,
00:27and a painkiller addiction.
00:29There have been new charges filed every couple months.
00:32It's now like 85 charges that he's facing, mostly financial.
00:38Over two years before the killings,
00:41police say one of Murdoch's sons, then 19-year-old Paul Murdoch,
00:45crashed a family boat, killing his 19-year-old friend Mallory Beach.
00:49I got a call from my mom to ask me if Mallory was home with me,
00:53and I told her no,
00:55and she just said that there had been a boat accident.
00:58Paul Murdoch was accused of driving the boat while drunk
01:01during the February 2019 incident.
01:04Speculation arose that due to the family's long-time connections
01:07with local law enforcement,
01:09Paul Murdoch hadn't been given a sobriety test,
01:12nor was he ever handcuffed and taken to jail
01:14for questioning or booking after the incident.
01:17The Beaufort County Sheriff's Office tells me
01:19it's recused itself from the investigation
01:21because of its, quote, long-time relationship with Randolph Murdoch III,
01:25the grandfather of Paul Murdoch, one of the teens on the boat.
01:28Beach's family filed a wrongful death civil lawsuit
01:31accusing Alec Murdoch of allowing his sons underage drinking.
01:35As a result of the suit,
01:37Beach family lawyers could likely comb through Murdoch family finances,
01:41something Alec Murdoch fought at every turn.
01:44Paul was eventually charged with three felonies,
01:46but was never brought to justice
01:48because he was killed before ever making it to trial,
01:51just three days before his father's first court date
01:53in the wrongful death suit.
01:55On June 7, 2021, Alec Murdoch called 911
01:59saying he had found his wife and son Paul
02:02killed at their South Carolina home.
02:11In the immediate aftermath, no one was charged in the killings,
02:14and previous inquiries into Murdoch's finances
02:17were put on hold as the community rallied to mourn with him.
02:21Mr. Murdoch was confronted the very morning of the murder
02:24by his own law firm seeking missing fees.
02:27That's the temporal connection of those two events.
02:30But by September 2021, three months after the double murder,
02:34Murdoch was forced to resign from his family law firm
02:37after an internal investigation
02:39revealed he had been stealing client funds.
02:42Just a few days later, the case took another strange turn.
02:46He says he's changing a tire at the side of the road due to a leak
02:49and some man pulls up with a pickup truck,
02:52talks to him briefly, and then shoots him in the head.
02:56Ten days later, Murdoch confessed to orchestrating the hit on himself
03:00with his former client and drug dealer, Curtis Edward Smith.
03:04He had asked Smith to kill him,
03:06hoping that his death would ensure a $10 million life insurance payout
03:10for his surviving son, Buster.
03:12Both Murdoch and Smith were charged for the shooting,
03:15along with other felony charges.
03:17Murdoch's lawyers later stated that their client was depressed
03:20and addicted to painkillers when he thought of the scheme
03:23and was checking himself into rehab.
03:25One month later, in yet another twist,
03:28Murdoch was once again under arrest.
03:31This time because of missing settlement funds
03:33in the wrongful death lawsuit of his former housekeeper,
03:36Gloria Satterfield.
03:38Gloria's sons allege Murdoch kept millions of dollars
03:41in an insurance settlement.
03:43His former housekeeper had died three years prior
03:45after reportedly falling down the stairs of the family's property.
03:49Satterfield's sons claim Murdoch pocketed the money for himself
03:52after pushing them to make an insurance claim
03:55while being represented by his longtime friend.
03:58From November 2021 to June 2022,
04:01Murdoch received more than 80 charges,
04:03accusing him of stealing more than $8 million
04:06from more than a dozen people.
04:08Alec Murdoch's luck had truly run out,
04:10and in July 2022,
04:12he was indicted in the killings of his wife and son.
04:15Are you guilty or not guilty of the felonies
04:17wherein you stand indicted?
04:19Not guilty.
04:21Murdoch's trial for the double murder began in January 2023.
04:25If convicted, he faces life without parole.
04:28The jury has to understand that he had been stealing
04:32for over a decade, 99 counts to date,
04:36and facing essentially life without parole
04:39on these particular financial accounts,
04:42and that's the significance of what he was trying to prevent
04:44from being exposed.