Ruling for ex-lawyer Alex Murdaugh retrial expected next week
A South Carolina judge will rule next week on whether she will dismiss the murder grand jury indictments against Alex Murdaugh, a disbarred South Carolina lawyer convicted in 2021 of killing his wife and son.
South Carolina Judge Debra R. McCaslin made her statement following a Friday hearing, where the defense argued that investigators knowingly presented false evidence to the grand jury in 2022. The South Carolina Supreme Court threw out Murdaugh’s convictions in May after finding that the court clerk improperly influenced jurors.
The Friday hearing, which can be viewed here, included arguments over guns and DNA evidence. Regarding guns, the defense argued that there was improper testimony on how guns found at the family’s home, where the killings took place, were loaded and whether the bullets matched with those that killed Maggie and Paul Murdaugh.
Guns like the ones used to kill Maggie Murdaugh “were all over the place,” Creighton Waters, a South Carolina prosecutor, told the court.
He admitted that the investigator could have mistaken that some of the guns found were loaded to kill turkeys, when they were actually loaded to kill birds.
“But it could be used to kill turkeys,” he said.
Additionally, the defense argued that it was reckless to tell the grand jury that blood spatter with DNA from Maggie, Paul and Alex Murdaugh was found on Alex Murdaugh’s shirt, when that was not true.
Waters told the court that according to experts who examined the shirt, because Maggie, Paul and Alex Murdaugh were related, they couldn’t exclude Paul Murdaugh’s DNA from the shirt.
The State has additional coverage.
See also:
Ex-lawyer Alex Murdaugh’s murder conviction overturned; prosecutors vow retrial
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