03/03/2023 By Meghan O’Brien
The jury found former South Carolina lawyer Alex Murdaugh guilty on two counts of murder. After a six-week trial, the judge sentenced him to life without parole on Friday.
With the deliberation lasting less than three hours, most of the jury was convinced that Murdaugh was guilty from the very beginning. According to both the jurors and the prosecutors, the piece of evidence that sealed Murdaugh’s fate was his son’s locked phone containing a video taken minutes before the shooting occurred. With Murdaugh’s presence at the scene confirmed by his voice on video, his alibi was deemed unreliable.
This trial follows an incident occurring in June of 2021, where Murdaugh claimed that he returned home to find his wife Maggie and his 22-year-old son Paul dead in their home in Colleton County, South Carolina. Maggie and Paul were found with multiple gunshot wounds, one shot with a rifle, the other with a shotgun. After 13 months of investigation, authorities found multiple pieces of evidence spanning from DNA on Murdaugh’s shirt and phone records that provided reasonable grounds to charge Murdough with two counts of murder.
Despite being on trial for double homicide, Murdaugh has been incarcerated since October of 2021 and currently faces 100 other criminal charges. According to 75 witnesses who all took to the stands during the trial, Murdough has stolen millions of dollars from his clients, evaded roughly $487,000 in state income taxes, was highly involved with money laundering and drug rings, and attempted to commit insurance fraud by faking his death and passing a $10 million insurance benefit to his son.
The Alex Murdaugh trial has shaken the ground of his hometown and place of work in Colleton County, South Carolina. With the population being slightly over 38,400 residents, the small town has taken to the streets in solidarity as a prolific community member has finally been brought to justice. “Today is not the end. It’s the next step in the long road to justice for every person who has been victimized by Alex Murdaugh,” said South Carolina Law Enforcement Division Chief Mark Keel. The Murdaugh family has left a lasting legacy within both Colleton County and Hampton County, with Alex Murdaugh following in his father’s and grandfather’s footsteps as the head of the century-old firm now known as Parker Law Group, LLP.
A family once seen as philanthropic and kind has now fallen victim to the shadow cast by Alex Murdaugh’s actions. Murdaugh still has yet to face the 99 other criminal charges against him.