COLUMBIA, S.C. (Court TV) — Even as they fight for a new trial for their client, Alex Murdaugh‘s attorneys conceded that they don’t want to repeat the 6-week-long drama that played out in South Carolina’s LowCountry.
Alex Murdaugh cries as he addresses the court during his sentencing for stealing from 18 clients, Nov. 28, 2023, at the Beaufort County Courthouse in Beaufort, S.C. (Andrew J. Whitaker/The Post And Courier via AP, Pool, file)
Alex has maintained his innocence after a jury found him guilty of murdering his wife, Maggie, and their younger son, Paul, at their home in 2021. He was sentenced to life in prison. On Wednesday, his attorneys appeared before South Carolina’s Supreme Court to argue his appeal, filed in Dec. 2024, which contends that improper evidence was admitted at trial and also accuses the court clerk of pressuring jurors to reach a guilty verdict.
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Becky Hill, who worked as the Colleton County Clerk of Court during Alex’s trial, was the primary focus of the first part of the hearing. Hill, who pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice and perjury for showing a reporter sealed court exhibits and then lying about it, has been accused of improperly influencing the jury. Alex’s attorneys say she made comments to the jury to pressure them to vote guilty and was biased against him for a book that she was writing. Hill has denied making any inappropriate comments to the jury.
An evidentiary hearing on the alleged jury tampering was held in 2024, where Retired Chief Justice Jean Toal denied Alex’s first attempt at a new trial. After listening to Hill’s testimony, Toal found she was not a credible witness, but said that she did not believe the comments Hill made had an impact on the jury’s verdict.
Addressing the justices of South Carolina’s Supreme Court on Wednesday morning, Alex’s attorney, Dick Harpootlian, described Hill’s comments as “egregious.” Citing Aaron Burr’s 1807 trial for treason, Harpootlian argued that his client was denied a fair trial by the clerk’s behavior. “We spent months getting ready for this trial, six weeks trying the trial. More months finding jurors to talk to,” Harpootlian said. “Nobody wants to do this again less than we do, but that’s not the issue. It’s not about how much trouble it’s going to be.”
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Approximately half of the 132-page appeal and the second half of Wednesday’s hearing focused on evidence from the trial, arguing that very little physical evidence connected Alex to the murders. Harpootlian took aim at the work of an investigator who said he tossed an iPhone around his office to test how it could be damaged in comparison to Maggie’s cell phone, as well as the testimony from a firearms examiner about what he called “untested” and “unprecedented” technology.
The justices pressed prosecutor Creighton Waters about his use of financial crimes evidence during the trial, suggesting that the testimony of Tony Satterfield, the son of the Murdaughs’ late housekeeper, was extraneous and unnecessary. Satterfield testified that Alex had stolen money from a settlement that was legally his. Waters told the justices, “You can’t understand the boiling point if you don’t understand the slow burn leading up to that,” suggesting that all the financial evidence was necessary to show the pressure that pushed Alex to murder his wife and son.
The justices did not offer any expected time frame for their ruling.
