COLUMBIA, S.C. (Court TV) — Prosecutors are fighting back against Alex Murdaugh’s push for a new trial, arguing point-by-point in a 182-page filing why his murder conviction should stand.
Alex Murdaugh, convicted of killing his wife, Maggie, and younger son, Paul, in June 2021, sits during a hearing on a motion for a retrial, Tuesday, Jan. 16, 2024, at the Richland County Judicial Center in Columbia, S.C. (Tracy Glantz/The State via AP, Pool)
Murdaugh was convicted of murdering his wife, Maggie Murdaugh, and his youngest son, Paul Murdaugh, by shooting them on the family’s Moselle property. He was sentenced to two consecutive life sentences in prison without the possibility of parole.
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Much of Murdaugh’s previously filed 132-page appeal focused on comments made by then Colleton County Clerk of Court Becky Hill. Hill, who now faces criminal charges for perjury and misconduct, allegedly made comments to jurors during the course of the trial.
Prosecutors are asking the South Carolina Supreme Court to accept the decision of Justice Jean Toal, who conducted a hearing regarding Hill’s comments and Murdaugh’s motion for a new trial. Toal found that while Hill was “not completely credible” as a witness, she “simply [did] not believe that the authority of our South Carolina Supreme Court requires a new trial in a very lengthy trial such as this on the strength of some fleeting and foolish comments by a publicity-influenced clerk of court.” In the motion, prosecutors make clear, “the State is not arguing that Hill’s comments were appropriate. They were not.” Instead, the State argues that “No rational juror could have received the evidence in this case and concluded Appellant was not guilty.”
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Murdaugh’s attorneys have also argued in their appeal that evidence of his financial crimes should not have been admissible at his murder trial. Prosecutors maintain that Judge Clifton Newman properly admitted the evidence. “Beyond fitting into the motive exception, the financial crime evidence also possessed an unmistakable nexus to the murders that was clearly established by Appellant’s own actions subsequent to the killings. … Appellant — who the defense claimed was supposedly deeply grieving after Maggie and Paul were slain — used the relief from the scrutiny he obtained in the weeks following the killings to, among other things, secure money he previously did not have to cover up his financial crimes.”
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Prosecutors said that the months leading up to the murders saw mounting pressure as Murdaugh faced having to open his books and reveal how much money he had been stealing. “The boiling point cannot fully be understood without understanding the slow burn leading up to it,” prosecutors said.
No hearing on the motion has been scheduled.
