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It was the home of Barrett Boulware – a fisherman, suspected drug smuggler and Alex Murdaugh’s longtime friend and business partner who died in 2018. Before the Murdaughs called Moselle home, the property was tied to another controversial family. They also saw a place where another mysterious death took place just three years before the 2021 murders.
Former Murdaugh home near site of murders under $1M contract for new use. Here’s what is planned
Murdaugh got the money but kept it for himself, financially ruining his friend. In court in an orange prison jumpsuit, Murdaugh listened as victims recounted how he had duped them with his commanding presence and seductive Southern charm. His attorneys filed the motion asking that a trial judge hold an evidentiary hearing on their allegations of jury tampering by the Colleton County Clerk of Court Rebecca "Becky" Hill. Murdaugh’s defense team has called experts who said investigators didn’t dust for fingerprints, collect or test blood, or photograph evidence with the angles or clarity needed to study it properly later.
Inside the 1,700-acre Murdaugh family murder farm now on sale for $3.9M
Creighton Waters, the lead prosecutor, noted that Mr. Murdaugh admitted on the witness stand that he had told many lies over the years to cover up his financial misdealings and addiction to painkillers. Mr. Waters urged the jurors to avoid becoming the next ones to believe his lies. But another of Mr. Murdaugh’s lawyers, Jim Griffin, told jurors on Thursday that the notion that Mr. Murdaugh would try to evade scrutiny of his finances by placing himself in the middle of a murder investigation strained credulity. In addition to the stolen money, he raked in millions of dollars in genuine income in some years as a lawyer for his family’s firm.
Murdaugh Murder Scandal
Roger Slatten had just left for work Friday when his friend called to tell him a tornado was spotted near his home in the Elkhorn area of Omaha. He turned around and called ahead to his brother, Royce Slatten, who was at the house, telling him to find their two dogs and get to the basement. The jurors traveled to the property, which is under contract for $3.9 million, Wednesday morning amid tight security. The judge has warned them that some things have changed on the property since the crime occurred.
Former Murdaugh home near site of murders under $1M contract for new use. Here’s what is planned - The State
Former Murdaugh home near site of murders under $1M contract for new use. Here’s what is planned.
Posted: Fri, 16 Feb 2024 08:00:00 GMT [source]
Alex Murdaugh friend pleads guilty to helping steal from dead maid’s family
During a bond hearing in December 2021, Mr. Murdaugh agreed to pay $4.3 million to Ms. Satterfield’s family. He also noted that the police had for months wrongly believed that blood spatter had been found on Mr. Murdaugh’s shirt, when, in fact, more rigorous tests taken later showed no blood. The verdict came more than 20 months after the June 2021 fatal shootings. On the stand, the prominent South Carolina lawyer admitted to lying and stealing but tearfully denied the murders.
Two months after the shootings, Mr. Murdaugh was arrested after attempting to stage his own murder. He said that Murdaugh’s brother called law enforcement to remove trespassers from Moselle as he noticed people taking selfies in front of the feed room where the brutal murders unfolded. And they might have even seen some of the estate’s wild hogs – whose existence has been an unusually common mention throughout the disgraced attorney’s murder trial.
Murdaugh has been charged with dozens of financial crimes.
He told all of his victims that they were welcome to visit him behind bars. Prosecutors initially charged Murdaugh with 101 financial crimes, including breach of trust, money-laundering and tax evasion, involving 18 victims. Three jurors say Alex Murdaugh didn’t help himself by testifying in his own defense against charges he murdered his wife and son.
Maggie Murdaugh, 52, and her son Paul, 22, were found shot to death near the dog kennels on the property in June 2021. Husband and father Alex Murdaugh was convicted of killing them and is serving two life sentences. Over the past nearly six weeks, the jury has heard from over 60 witnesses called by state prosecutors, who have argued that Alex Murdaugh killed his wife and son to gain sympathy and distract from his financial problems. Alex Murdaugh’s trial for the murder of his wife and son drew intense public attention; the case spawned true crime series.
“Over the last 13 months, SLED agents and our partners have worked day in and day out to build a case against the person responsible for the murders of Maggie and Paul and to exclude those who were not. From the beginning I have been clear, the priority was to ensure justice was served. Today is one more step in a long process for justice for Maggie and Paul,” said the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division Chief Mark Keel. The jury deliberated for under three hours Thursday before finding Murdaugh guilty of both counts of murder. The defense also called an expert who testified that the killings were likely done by two shooters, as both Paul and Maggie Murdaugh appeared to have been taken by surprise.
His older son, Buster Murdaugh, who had testified about how distraught his father had been after the killings, sat in the courtroom with a hand over his mouth. "It is a heavy place to visit. The property has stood vacant for 20 months," the reporter noted. "Some items seem to be left where they fell, including a deflated football behind the kennels and a tube of sanitizing wipes in the shed." Gloria Satterfield, a longtime housekeeper for the Murdaughs, died in a hospital in February 2018, three weeks after what was described as a "trip and fall accident" at the Murdaugh home, an attorney representing her estate previously said. There's also a cottage on the property, which Buster Murdaugh referred to in his testimony as a "cabin," saying he had stayed there for some time with two friends.
Paul was also charged with three felony counts of boating under the influence. He also is awaiting sentencing on federal financial crime charges and still faces insurance fraud and other local charges after asking a friend to kill him in September 2021 so that his surviving son could get $10 million in life insurance. South Carolina lawyer Alex Murdaugh now says he lied when he maintained that he wasn’t at the family dog kennels with his wife and son before they were killed. Prosecutors took over a year to charge the disgraced lawyer with murder, and decided not to pursue the death penalty. Alex Murdaugh, who is also charged with about 100 counts of financial and other crimes, has adamantly denied any involvement in the killings.
For more than eight decades, three generations of the Murdaugh family served as top prosecutors in South Carolina’s 14th Judicial Circuit, a largely rural region comprising five counties and 3,200 square miles. Mr. Murdaugh’s father, Randolph Murdaugh III, held the post until 2006. Mr. Murdaugh has maintained that he believed that his son was killed by an unknown assailant or assailants because of his involvement in that crash. Investigators have not found the family-owned rifle that they say was used to kill Mrs. Murdaugh, nor have they found the shotgun used to kill Paul Murdaugh. Prosecutors used telephone calls, text messages, videos, car navigation data and even step counts based on cellphone tracking to call into question Mr. Murdaugh’s account of his whereabouts on the night of the killings. The police have not accused the Murdaugh family of wrongdoing in Mr. Smith’s case, and have not said exactly what prompted them to open an investigation into his death.
Mr. Murdaugh was convicted on Thursday of killing his wife and son in June 2021 in the hope of halting the expanding inquiries into his finances and into reported thefts from clients and his law firm. “His theory is that he knew the jig was up, so he went home and butchered — blew the head off his son — and butchered his wife,” Dick Harpootlian, one of Mr. Murdaugh’s lawyers, said in court as he derisively recounted the prosecution’s theory. Mr. Harpootlian said there was a wealth of evidence — texts, pictures, witness testimony and at least one video from the day of the crimes — showing that the Murdaughs were a happy family.
The state attorney general thanks the jurors, who delivered a guilty verdict in less than three hours. “Today’s verdict proves that no one, no one — no matter who you are in society — is above the law,” Attorney General Alan Wilson says. The punishment awaiting Alex Murdaugh, the scion of a South Carolina legal dynasty who was convicted of murdering his wife and son, is set to be decided on Friday.
The feed room -- where a crime scene forensics expert testified Paul was likely standing in when he was shot the first time -- "feels like a haunted place," the reporter noted. Notes from a reporter representing the media who visited the crime scene after the jurors Wednesday help paint a picture about the vast, now-vacant estate. The Beach family's attorney Mark Tinsley also testified and told the jurors, in the wake of the murders, the civil case against Alex Murdaugh would have gone away.
