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“Tonight on DayBlime, Mr. Murdoch, are you a family and eyeliner?”
A family and eyeliner?
You mean I did a shoot my wife and my son?
No. A bombshell in the notorious case of Alec Murdoch, his guilty verdict overturned. This decision is nothing short of shock. This never ever happens. Inside this stunning new ruling, jurors told you they felt coerced.
Something really a mess went on in the jury room. I mean my world stopped. Revealing new interviews, the attorney general. We intend to retry this case. Two people were murdered and they deserve justice.
The defense team, who was Alec's response? When you told him, he said, I didn't believe it's going to happen. The jurors. I feel like he didn't get a fair trial. He was like, what? Why?
They aren't dead on day-to-day. Yes sir, that's what it looks like. He didn't kill Maggie and Paul.
“Do you have new evidence to back that out?”
Problem investigators shall they're investigating? If they have the evidence, we'd love to see it. The eyes of the world were on this trial. We have a job to do and we are going to do it. I'm Lester Holt.
And this is date line. Here's Craig Melvin with "In the Matter of Alec Burtock." Just three short years ago, it was proclaimed the trial of the decade. Did you take this gun or any gun like it? And shoot your son Paul?
No, I did not. I didn't shoot my life or my son any time. Twenty-eight days, more than seventy witnesses, some giving dramatic testimony. It was hard because I know she wasn't going to be coming back.
No mother, father, and her uncle, should ever have to see and do what I did that day. Listen to that gathering storm that all came to a head on June 7th, 2021. The day the evidence will show he killed Maggie and Paul.
We got up this morning at 2 o'clock. We were here at 3 o'clock in line. It really has been worldwide. It ended with one of South Carolina's most prominent attorneys from one of its most famous families convicted of murder.
Guilty verdict. Or did it? They overturned his murder conviction. This is huge true crime news today. I just can't believe this is going to trial again.
Social media blew up this week. When the state's highest court ordered a duel in the case of South Carolina versus Alec Murdoch.
“How does the state of South Carolina convict the guy?”
And then have it all undone. How does that happen? Look, while I am disappointed, I don't put blame on anyone but one person. Tonight, how the verdict against Alec Murdoch came undone.
I did not pressure the jury. She was definitely manipulating this jury. What happened was so egregious, so disgraceful in the words of the court they had no choice but to overturn this conviction. You know, here from insiders who fought over the case once
and seemed destined to do so again. You'd dust yourself off, you get back up, you take a fresh look at it, and then you go to your job. We didn't give up. That's the secret to the business we're in.
You don't give up.
But first, we'll take you back to the beginning
and the man at the center of it all.
It was June 7th, 2021, a dark night in South Carolina's
Lou Country. Now we're going to get our emergency.
“At 10.07pm, a call came into the Colton County Sheriff's Department.”
There was an emergency at a remote home outside of town.
Sergeant Daniel Green was the first to arrive.
Such a sudden one sudden scene is secured. At a whisky fox, whisky Mike, both the gunshot wounds to the head. His body camera rolled. I want you to let you know because of the scene. I did go get a gun and bring it down here.
Here's in your vehicle. Do you have any guns on you? No, no, sir. So lean it up against the side of my car. You're fine, man, you're fine.
Green came face to face with the collar. Alec Murdoch. Right away, there were a row of dog kennels. It was bad to take the bullseye. Yes, sir.
“There, by the kennels, Maggie Murdoch, 52, and Paul Murdoch,”
22, each had been shot multiple times, including to their heads. This is the firearm you brought from inside the house. Yes, sir. I want to get, this is a long story.
My son was in a boat wreck. Oh, up, deep the months back. And while Alec said he didn't know who committed the murders, he suggested the motive. Retribution for a crash that killed a 19-year-old woman on a boat,
Paul Murdoch, was said to be driving. He's been getting threats. Most of it's been benign stuff. We didn't take serious. You know, he's been getting, like, punched.
Notice, somebody, I noticed what it is. Murdoch also told the sergeant, he had gone to visit his mother that night. When did you get home?
Right, right when you called, or did you go to the house first?
Where is the house? I came to the house first. My mom has late stages Alzheimer's and my dad is in the hospital. Okay. I left.
I don't know what time. I can go back on my phone until you did exactly. As he told Green about the moment he found his wife and son, his emotions spilled over. Did you check them?
“They, we got medical guys that are, that's, that's what they're going to do, okay?”
What are they doing? Can they hurry? They are. Yes, sir. Once the EMTs arrived, Green confirmed Alec's worst fears. They are dead on their control.
Yes, sir, that's what it looks like. Alec frantically called his friends and family. And they started arriving too. Meanwhile, Green learned the central fact about the man who made that 911 call.
What's your first answer?
My name is Alex Richard Alexander Murdock. Murdock. That was a name known to nearly everyone in the low country. A name that meant power and influence for generations. As more deputies arrived, they realized the gravity of what had happened here.
And to whom it happened. The Elfamader with the family is, uh, I wasn't until he told me that he was a name. Last year he went with Murdock. Then investigators from sled, the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division arrived.
They were crime scene specialists who soon had a lot of questions for Alec Murdock. How is your relationship with Maggie? Very good. That's good as it could possibly be. I mean, you know, we had our issues.
The tragic events on that warm, humid night would launch a southern Gothic tale of epic proportions with a final chapter yet to be written. There's nothing that happened that day. They would say to him, "I better go kill Maggie and Paul." Seems like we're getting a good little preview here at the Retro.
We're ready. Even before the sun rose on June 8th, 2021, residents of Tiny Hampton, South Carolina were playing a game of telephone. Keep in mind that Hampton County is a small town, small place. You can't meet your gossip travels faster than you do.
Just a few hours earlier, one of the towns, most prominent figures, Attorney Alec Murdock said he had come home to find his 50-year-old wife, Maggie, and 22-year-old son, Paul, shot to death on the family's sprawling property, known as Moezelle.
Yes, sir, that's what it looks like.
Reporter Michael Duit was born and raised in Hampton.
“That night, and early in the morning, the people in the Murdock circle,”
found out they're getting phone calls, they're getting text. Maggie and Paul have been shot and killed. As the new spread, Colton County shares deputies and agents from the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division or sled continue to gather evidence at the scene. A few things were clear right away.
Maggie and Paul had been shot at close range, each with a different gun. It was clear at the scene that Paul had been shot twice with the shotgun, and she had been shot multiple times with this high-powered rifle. That shotgun and rifle were nowhere to be found.
“But there were guns, a lot of them on the property, which was often used for hunting.”
A lot of people hunt the fact that the Murdock family had at least 27 guns in their family gun room is not surprising. Chris Wilson, a friend of the Murdock family, was a regular at Mozão.
Just a very social place, they always welcome people into their home.
His friendship with Alec dates back decades. Growing up in towns that were close to each other, you know, 30 miles or so apart, played some ball against each other, and then a little bit of ball with each other. The friends grew closer in law school, and by that time, Alec had met Maggie. Chris was in their wedding party.
They had a very close relationship. I mean, Alec did what he needed to do to take care of the things that Maggie needed. And Maggie did what she needed to do to take care of the things that Alec and the boys needed. The boys, Sun's Buster and Paul, became Maggie's world according to Chris' wife, Dana. When she had boys, she embraced that role and would fish with them and hunt with them.
And she probably even threw ball in the yard with them, but she was just such a great boy, Mom. Mozão was one of three properties the family owned, and it's where Alec taught his wife and kids to love the lifestyle of the new country. What did Maggie ever see about her life at Mozão? She loved being out there. It was a way from everybody, and it was just such a beautiful place and so quiet.
Quiet and remote. It was a special place for Paul too.
He was always outdoors and so good at it.
So good at tending the land and hunting and just being outside. It was a great place. 17 hundred or so acres, hogs, turkey deer, dove, quail, a huge house that would sleep and welcome a number of people. But now the property was the scene of a bloody whore. Sled special agent David Owen was leading the investigation.
He claimed into a car with Alec to ask him some questions. And you go about Alec? Yes sir, just start the top take your time. Alec told Owen he had been visiting his mother that night. He described what happened when he got home. Maggie and Paul were not at the house, so he said he went looking for them at the dog kennels on the property. I mean, I pulled up and I could see him and you know, a new
song was bad around out. I knew it was really bad. Come on, my boy over there, I could see. Owen asked if the family had had any issues of late and Alec repeated the theory. He had given to Sergeant Green earlier. Have y'all been having any problems out here? Trust passers,
“none of them breaking in. None did I know of the only thing that what comes to my mind is my”
son Paul was in a boat wreck a couple years ago. And there's been a, you know, he was charged with being arrested for being a driver. There's been a lot of negative publicity about that and there's been a lot of people online, just really bow stuff. That 2019 boat wreck had upended the lives of
Paul and for his friends.
on three counts of building under the influence causing death and great bodily injury. He faced
“a maximum of 55 years in prison and pleaded not guilty and awaited trial. But now, he laid dead”
alongside his mother on the family's beloved property. He's been getting threats. Was Alec right? Was this the act of ultimate retribution? It hasn't received any direct threats related to the boat accident. Oh, yes. Hey, guys, Willie guys here reminding you to check out the Sunday Sitdown podcast. On this week's episode, I get together with Grammy winning star Michael Boobley to talk about their remarkable career ranging from pop hits to Christmas classics. You can get our
conversation now for free wherever you download your podcasts. Let's kickstart your wellness journey with the Dark Today app. Workouts, meal plans, it's your fast track to help you, you. And now, during the expenity member celebration, members can get an exclusive 50% off an annual subscription and to expenity.com/membership to learn more. Expenity, imagine that. Subscription automatically reduces each year at 6599 plus taxes in fees until canceled. Offer ends May 20th, 2026, prices subject
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You know, every day on up first NPR's Golden Globe nominated morning news podcast,
“we bring you three essential stories. At the heart of each story, our questions. What really happened?”
What really mattered? What happens next? At NPR, we stand for your right to be curious and to follow the facts. Follow a first wherever you get your podcasts and start your day knowing what matters and why. From almost the very moment investigators arrived at his country home, Alec Murdoch had been telling them the murders of his wife and son had to be connected to a 2019 boat crash. This is a long story. My son was in a boat rake. That boat crash had turned the
lives of Alec's family and several other families upside down. It happened in the middle of a
February 9th at 238 AM. 16 acres including Paul Murdoch were in the Murdoch's motorboat in a local creek when the boat sped up and slammed into a bridge piling. One of the passengers Connor Cook made the call. There's six of us and one is missing. Please send someone. I don't know. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Connor and several other passengers were rushed to the hospital,
“Marty and Christine Cook, our Connor's parents. How did you find out what had happened?”
Connor called me. He said, "Daddy, we've been in the accident and I just creep and we can't find Mallorne." 19-year-old Mallory Beach was still missing in the dark water. Paul Murdoch was rushed to the hospital too. His father and grandfather met him there and Alec reached out to the cooks who were still on their way. Alec called me. Going on and on about being an accident and the girl was missing and then Connor was driving the boat. He told you Connor
was driving the boat. Yes, he did. Sometimes he called. To check on you, to check on, now hell no, to try to get this game going. To tell us about how he can get it. To convince us that our son was driving the boat. That didn't make sense to the cooks. Paul usually drove his family's boat. The cooks also say Paul was a known troublemaker and thought Alec was wielding his considerable influence that night at the hospital to keep him out of trouble. It would be
easier for him to get Connor out of trouble than his son. That was his exact word. I can look out Connor better than I can't fall. Meanwhile, on Archer's Creek, the search for Mallory Beach went on for a week. Crews are continuing to search for a former U.S. student who went missing over the weekend near Paris Island. It ended tragically when two volunteers recovered Mallory's body. You know, there were so many opportunities for this not to have happened.
Attorney Mark Tinsley filed a wrongful dev suit on the beach families behalf in March 2019. They wanted to hold all those people responsible for her death accountable, but more than that
They wanted to make sure that it didn't happen to someone else's child.
the boat, belonged with several others in why name Alec Murdoch and that. When you promote a certain
“kind of behavior, when you can don't, the sorts of things that Paul did for the length of time”
without any consequences. And he bears responsibility for what happened. Tinsley requested Alec's financial records as part of the suit. What was their response? Just an objection, a refusal. In fact, Tinsley said Alec told him he was broke. Tinsley didn't believe it.
He was making millions of dollars a year, a million dollars a year, least, every year.
Why would he have no money? He comes from money. The impasse dragged on for more than two years. Finally, in June 2021, both parties were scheduled to appear at a hearing where Alec would likely be compelled to turn over his financial records. Then, June 7th, just a few days before that hearing, the unthinkable happened. I'd get a call about 1130 that Monday night with all the Maggie Ben Merger.
Now, investigators had to find out if the boat crash had anything to do with those murders, even as they seemed to be losing control of a crime scene, that was being overrun by Alec's friends and lawyers. Moselle, the Murdoch family retreat that was known for parties in recreation, had become a place where people came to grieve and offer support to Alec Murdoch and his remaining son, 25-year-old
“buster, Alec's friend Chris Wilson, was one of them. And you got there, what did you find?”
When I got there, pulled into the main gate, I was kind of headed up the driveway towards the main house. I saw a lot of lights and people, you could tell there was a lot of commotion going on down at the kennels, which turned out to be law enforcement and other people. Alec was there. I walked over and hugged his neck and we cried. He didn't say anything. He was whimpering and crying and seemed destroyed. We hugged. It was just there. I was trying to be there
for a friend that didn't know what to do for him, didn't know what to say, just wanted to be there. Some questioned why the house wasn't cordoned off as a crime scene. Like the kennels were. It was clear the Murdoch family held a certain status with law enforcement.
It basically allowed the family and all these attorneys from the law firm to just
move over there and set up and console the grieving allies, console the family. While some investigators searched the home and property, others were looking into Alec's theory about the 2019 book crash. They wanted to know where the surviving passengers and their families were on the night of the murders. That meant Connor Cook and his parents, Marty and Christine, when you heard what you think. My first thought was thank God Connor was home with me.
Did they question him? Of course. They questioned me. The question you.
I was his witness that he, you know, got home from work and that he never left the house.
They questioned every passenger in that boat. But despite Alec's theory, it appeared no one involved in the boat crash was near Mosel on the night Maggie and Paul were gunned down.
“They did, you know, got an alibi from everyone and I think they quickly quickly eliminated the”
boat crash passengers as as possible suspects. Still, the boat crash and the beach family civil suit against him were never far from Alec's mind. In another interview with Slat Agent David Owen three days after the murders, Owen asked Alec to take him through how he spent that faithful day. Alec mentioned the upcoming hearing where he was likely to be forced to turn over financial records. I'm a defendant in a civil case involving my son I told you about the boat
wreck and there were some motions coming up in that on Thursday and I was mostly just getting ready for those names and then other jump. Alec also gave Owen more details about his whereabouts that night.
After work, he said he came home and rode around the property with Paul.
on this video from that evening as the two watched a tree bed. Then they went home to eat.
“Maggie had gotten home and you know we sat down we ate supper and we usually supper together.”
After dinner, Alec said Maggie went to check on the kennels and Paul was outside too. I stayed in the house and I was watching TV looking at my phone and I actually fell asleep on the couch. Alec told Owen he left to visit his mom after he woke up a little after nine p.m. She lived about 20 minutes away and Alec said he stayed there for a while before he returned home.
A little after 10 p.m. Paul and Maggie weren't there he said so he drove around the property.
He found them lifeless at the kennels and doubt nine one one. Once again he got emotional
“not the moment. He discovered his wife and son. I know it's hard.”
And that sent me talking to me as his talk. It was just so bad he did it so bad. That's a good boy. After that second interview with special agent Owen ended, Alec got more bad news this time about his father Randolph who had been sick. Valerie Borline is a
reporter for the Wall Street Journal. On June the 10 there's all this incredible activity going on
in the background trying to figure out what happened to Maggie and Paul and his father Randolph the third comes over to kind of huddle up with the lawyers and the family and then goes back home and dies just a couple hours after that interview. That weekend the family buried Maggie, Paul and Randolph a community gathering to remember a mother and son killed in the low country. On June 25th two and a half weeks after the murders Alec and Buster put out a statement they asked for help to bring
justice to Maggie and Paul and offered a $100,000 reward. By all appearances Alec seemed to be a grieving father and a husband but that summer was about to unravel Alec's world and make so many questions if they ever really knew him. He asked me to write the checks to pay the fees
“on the case it would have been payable to his firm directly to him. Had you written him checks like that before?”
The summer of 2021 was a time of grief and confusion for the Murdock family. Chris Wilson did his best to be there for Alec, his friend of more than three decades. I mean the guy seemed destroyed to me, not eating. I didn't seem to be sleeping, didn't go back to Mosell to spend another night that I know of. It was quite a contrast from their last happy time together. Alec had celebrated his birthday just one week before the murders. That's Chris giving him a
bear hug. Everybody was having a good time that night it was Maggie, Paul, Buster, my wife, my family, a number of their friends and we had had a good time together. Alec and Chris were lawyers in neighboring counties and sometimes took on cases together to better serve their clients. But Chris would soon discover his apparently wealthy friend was hiding some secrets. In the spring of 2021 Alec was facing mounting pressure to turn over his financial records
to Mark Tinsley for the 2019 boat crash lawsuit. Around that time Chris says Alec asked him to do something unusual. Alec asked me to write the checks for the fees directly to him instead of to his firm, which I did at March of 2021. He told me he had authority and approval from his firm. Then you had no reason not to believe him. I didn't have any reason not to trust the guy. I mean, we had been dealing with each other business and professional for 30 years with no problems whatsoever.
But a few months later Alec changed his mind. He contacted me and said the fees can't be paid
To me this way.
same amount of money that I'd paid him. Chris said Alec only sent back $600,000. I had to put
“$192,000 of my own money into my account to have that money available to pay the way that it should”
have been paid had it been done the right way. What Chris did not know was that he wasn't the only one getting suspicious of Alec. Murdoch's law firm had quietly started an internal investigation and found several missing payments related to his cases. On June 7th, the CFO confronted Alec about it, that night, Maggie, Paul, were killed. After that, no one was asking questions about missing fees. They were doing their best to surround Alec with support. Even Mark Tinsley had
paused his civil case in the wake of Maggie and Paul's murders. He thought maybe for good. If Alec is the victim of some vigilante, the boat crash probably as it relates to him would have been over. But then Tinsley noticed another lawsuit related to Alec had settled. It was the case of his long-time housekeeper Gloria Souterfield, who died after a fall at Mozell in 2018. The settlement seemed suspiciously small. The fact that she died, her age, how long she lived,
“case was worth a lot more than $505,000, which was the only thing reported in terms of the settlement.”
He was right. Gloria's family should have gotten over $4 million. Alec and two co-conspirators
didn't tell the family that and kept most of the money for themselves. And once that case became public, other allegations surfaced about Alec stealing money from clients. For years, the allegations were a bombshell for the large group of people who'd circle their wagons around Alec all summer. In September, Chris Wilson heard about those allegations, and he was shocked. I told him that I needed to speak to him and I wanted to be face-to-face.
That conversation was tense. I looked at him and I said, "I need to know what, I'm sure I used to curse word." I said, "I need to know what's going on." And he looked at me,
“started to cry and said, "I can't write this second, walk inside, grab some paper towels,”
came back out, dry his eyes off," and said, "Look, I've been having, I've got a drug addiction,
I'm addicted to pain prescription pills, and it's been going on for 20 years, and I've been stealing from my clients, and I've been stealing from my firm, and I've done you wrong, and I've done a number of people wrong." Wilson left the meeting furious, but also worried about his friend. And he was right to worry, because just a short time later, I'm on my ride back to Columbia, and I got a phone call and told me that Alec had been shot on the side of the road.
Alec Murda, now 911, again. Okay, what's going on? I got a flat tire, and I stopped, and somebody stopped to help me, and when I turned my back, they tried to shoot me. Alec was on the side of this country road when he claimed the shooting happened. Did they actually shoot you? They tried to shoot you. They shot me, and I'm bleeding a lot. When you heard about what had happened on the side of the road there,
what was your initial thought? I thought he tried to kill himself. Alec was airlifted to a Georgia hospital with a fractured skull and the minor brain bleed. But one week later, he confessed that he'd made up the whole thing. It was a failed attempt to get life insurance money for his son Buster. He also admitted publicly to that 20-year opioid addiction and promptly entered rehab.
Alec seemed to be spinning out of control. He was fired by the law firm, and he was facing charges related to both the botched suicide attempt and the insurance fraud of his long-time housekeeper. During that tumultuous summer, Alec and his lawyer also had an ominous meeting with Sled Special Agent David Owen about the status of the murder investigation. Everybody stays in that investigation until we can get them out.
And right now, because of the questions that I have, the need of explanations for, I cannot get Alec out. So, does that mean that I am a suspect? You were still in this with everything that we've talked about, with the family guns, the ammunition.
Nobody else is DNA.
In October 2021, Alec was a reigned for some of his alleged financial crimes.
The Wilson's no longer recognized the man they considered family. We didn't want to believe it. More came out, kept coming out, more still coming out, probably.
“I mean, it's just like, who is this person? I don't know this person. Who was he?”
The world was about to find out. What's the Richard Phillip and Murdoch or the guilty or not guilty of the felis were able to stand and die for? Get the best of NBC news with a subscription. If you were asked deeper access and exclusive content,
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After more than a year of speculation and questions, investigators appear ready to name Alec Murdoch as the killer of his wife Maggie and son Paul. The trial was scheduled surprisingly quickly. On January 23rd, 2023, the Kalatin County Courthouse in tiny Walterboro, South Carolina felt like the center of the universe. An invasion of cameras, tents and trucks on every corner of the courthouse. A nation now hooked on the spectacle was greedy for every torn, every twist to come.
The trial was going to be live streamed, but spectators were out of dawn anyway, lining up for courtroom paths, food trucks, served breakfast and reporters. The place was crawling
“with them. You will find every major TV network. The New York Times is here, the Washington Post,”
the Wall Street Journal. Alec Murdoch arrived in an unmarked van at the Courts back door, straight from the jail cell where he spent more than a year, dressed in business casual, jacket, draped over his handcuffs. Generations of Murdoch's have tried cases here. In fact, a Murdoch family portrait was taken down on the judge's orders before opening arguments began. Listen to that gathering storm that all came to a head on June 7, 2021. The day,
the evidence will show he killed Maggie and Paul. Lead prosecutor, Creighton Waters, a 24-year veteran of the State Attorney General's Office opened with the prosecution's version of how the murders happened. The defendant over there, Ale Murdoch took 12 states shot gun and shot him in the shoulder.
Paul Murdoch was shot first. But after that another shot went up,
understood and did catastrophic damage. Then Waters told the jury, Alec picked up an AR-style rifle and turned it on his wife Maggie. How how? Two shots admin in the lab and took her down. I've got multiple gun sounds out. Two victims shot at close range, the sea, bloody, horrific and the prosecution said, a pile of evidence pointing to Alec Murdoch as the killer. The motive? He was trying to deflect attention from his storm of troubles.
They're going to reach the end of the scapegoat conclusion that Alec murdered Maggie Paul that he was the storm, that the storm was coming for them. That they died as a result. Alec listened at the defense table. Family members behind him including his remaining son Buster. He is our honor to represent Alec Murdoch. Dick Harputlium, the former member of the South Carolina Senate,
with decades of lorrying behind him was the lead defense attorney. I submit to you what you've heard from the attorney general as facts are not. Now stand up. This is Ale Murdoch. And Alec was the loving father of Paul
The loving husband, Maggie.
there was no direct evidence tying Alec to the murderers. He didn't do it. He is presumed,
innocent. Next morning, the prosecution called its first witness.
Sergeant Daniel Green of the Colton County Sheriff's office was the first respond to the murder scene. They are dead on that. The prosecutor used Green's body camp footage and testimony to examine Alec's behavior that night. He was able to answer all the questions that I asked him. Was he panicking in any way? He seemed upset but I wouldn't say panicky. The prosecutor said Alec immediately tried to divert attention to other suspects.
My son was in a boat-ray casting suspicion on how he pointed to Paul's boat crash
“as a possible motive for a revenge killer. Who brought up the buttons?”
This from our dog, Dick. He offered that right out of the games. A possible explanation for what happened here. Is that right? Yes. Prosecutors went on to attack Alec's alibi. Remember, Alec told everyone he had a nap after dinner while Paul and Maggie went down to the kiddos. Alec insisted he did not go with them. I was at the house. I left the house and went to my moms. But prosecutors unveiled an explosive
exhibit that would gut Alec's alibi. A video that had been discovered on Paul's cell phone recorded at the kiddos at 8.44pm when Alec said he was napping at the house and just minutes before
“prosecutors say Paul and Maggie were shot. Get that? Get that? Jewers were told to focus on the voices.”
Not the pictures. Paul is heard calling to this dog named Cash. The Maggie. And a third voice. A man's voice saying come here, Baba, to a dog. Half a dozen witnesses were asked to identify the voices on that video.
The answer was always the same. It was a major blow to Alec's defense. But hardly
the last. The prosecution had more surprises up its sleeve. There were significant number of articles characters to give gunshot primarys to do on the inside of this jacket. Disturbing new details coming to light in the Alec Murdoch murder trial. Alec Murdoch has charged with killing his wife and son. I'm half a century old and there's never been a case like this in my neck at awards. The prosecution had undermined Alec's alibi with that video
“at the kiddos. Now they tried to poke holes in the rest of his story. Remember, Alec said he”
napped after dinner then went to visit his mother. "Now call Miss Michelle Smith at the same." Shelley Smith was Alec's mother's caregiver. She was there when he arrived at his mother's house about 9/20 and unusual hour for him to stop by, she said. "That he was fidgety, you make me "Fidgety." "Yes." "Don't send her." "Did he talk to his mother?" "She was asleep." "She was asleep." She said he left after 15 or 20 minutes. "Did she even know that he was there?"
Smith saw Alec again the next week. She testified they had an upsetting conversation where he appeared to be coaching her to tell investigators if they asked that he was at his mother's home longer than Smith said he was. "This phrase was, I was here or you know I was?" "I was here 30 to 40 minutes." "These later Smith testified, Alec was back at his mother's place. This time, early in the morning, with something bold up in his hands at the little time at the
time. "Blue." "Blue." "Okay." "Was it vital?" "It's like a toy that could put on a coin and kick your car coming up." "What did he do when you all did?" "When upstairs." Investigators later searched the house and discovered a blue raincoat similar to a tarp, balled up in a closet.
Agent Megan Fletcher, a trace evidence analyst, examined it for GSR, gunshot ...
were a significant number of particles characters to give gunshot primary residue on the
“inside of this jacket." "Yes." "You're fine and speak consistent with that item”
containing a recently fired fire." "All right, it is possible, yes." Other people in Alec circle also found his behavior after the murders. Strange. Prosecutors called Maggie Sister, Marion Proctor to the stand. "I'm Marion Proctor, PR-O-C-T-O-R." "She told that you're in her family was terrified the killer would target Alec and Buster next, but Alec didn't appear worried at all." "I was scared for Alec and Buster.
I think everybody was afraid." "And..."
"I didn't think it'd be afraid." Marion told the jury Maggie was only Atmosal that night
“because Alec had asked her to be there. He told her his father was gravely ill. The sister's”
talked on the phone is Maggie drove. Marion still haunted by that last call. "And I said, "Well, Maggie, I said, you know, Alec and his dad are super close and that's probably what each should do. Go be with him if he needs you." "Do you encourage her to go to Mesa?" "I do." "Is that the last time you talked to her?" "Yes." "What a period of weakness in the prosecution's case was the lack of blood evidence. They tried to turn this to their advantage by playing one of Alec's
statements to police record it just hours after the murder." "I tried to turn Paul over first."
"You know, I tried to turn him over." "Thank you, touch Maggie at all." "I did." "I touched him,
“Bo." "Okay." "I tried to take." "I mean, I tried to do it is limited as possible, but I tried to”
take their paltz on both of them." "So, why wasn't he covered in blood? The implication was that he'd washed up after the murders." "Call it and county lead detective Laura Rutland, who's on the scene that night." "How would you describe the defendant's hands when you saw when you were interviewing? How would you describe a sentence?" "They were clean." "How would you describe his t-shirt?" "Clean." "How would you describe his shoes?" "Clean." "Did he look like somebody who just
changed his clothes?" "Yes." Alec said something else prosecutors seized on in another statement to police three days after the murders. "We're sitting there talking to me as his toe." "This is so bad. He did it so bad." The prosecutor asked senior Special Agent Jeff Croft to repeat the words. "What did he say?" "It's just so bad. I'm dating so bad." "I dating so bad." "Yes, sir." "Was it a slip of the tongue and inadvertent confession?" "On cross examination, Alec's defense attorney Jim Griffin
played the tape out of slower speed." "The question." "Did Alec say I?" "Or they?" "It's so bad." "Did you hear they then?" "No sir, I did not." "Do you have a great jury to decide what he said on that tape?" "That's the best out of us." "I'd agree that they get to hear the tape and make their own mine up as to what he said. Yes, sir." "But no matter how much testimony prosecutors elicited about Alec Murdoch's inconsistencies and lies, they still had to answer the most basic
question of all. What could motivate a man to brutally murder the wife and son he seemed to adore. They would throw a hail Mary to try to make that case. "They've got a whole lot more evidence about financial misconduct than they have in evidence of guilt and the murder case." "Let's kickstart your wellness journey with the Darktidaya. Workouts, meal plans, it's your fast track to a healthier you. And now during the Expedity Member Celebration,
members can get an exclusive 50% off an annual subscription, and to expinity.com/membership to learn more. Exfinity, and imagine that. Subscription automatically reduces each year at 6599 plus taxes and fees until canceled. Offerance may 20th, 2026, prices subject to change. Visit today.com/exfinity for full offer terms and details." Hey guys, Willie Geist here reminding you to check out the
Sunday Sit Down podcast.
Boobley to talk about their remarkable career ranging from pop hits to Christmas classics.
You can get our conversation now for free wherever you download your podcasts. Good morning. Prosecutors had punched holes in Alec Murdoch's alibi and cast out over many of his statements, but the biggest question of all lingered. Why? Why would Alec Murdoch kill his wife and son, especially since they seem to be a close-knit family? Journalist Valerie Borla.
“And I think that is a high bar for the prosecution to have to get over. To explain,”
yes, these things do hold together. Prosecutors had an explanation. Alec Murdoch was a compulsive thief they alleged, a spinner of scams who stole money from everyone. And because those financial crimes were about to be exposed, they argued, he murdered his wife and son to win sympathy and time. He was eager to keep concealed. This long-running financial fraud that would ruin his family and his family name. This issue is before me on the motion of the state. Normally,
jurors are not allowed to hear about a defendant's past bad acts, but in this case, prosecutors
believe they were crucial to explain motive. They asked the judge for permission to present testimony
about Alec's alleged financial crimes. I always like to respond. The defense protested loudly. They got a whole lot more evidence about financial misconduct than they have about a murder and evidence of guilt in the murder case. But in a pivotal decision, Judge Clifton Newman decided for the prosecution. The find that it is so intimately connected with an explanatory
“of the crime charge that proof of it is essential to complete the story.”
Prosecutors ex-hailed and called Genie Secondger to the stand. Secondger told the jurors the Murdoch family law firm PMPED operated on trust like a brotherhood. She said Alec Murdoch was a successful lawyer largely because of his gift of the gap.
He did it to the articles basically. In May of 2021, Secondger learned of Chris Wilson's missing
check. She discovered other financial irregularities involving Alec too. She confronted him about it for the first time that month and then again on June 7th. He looked at me with a pretty dirty look when I had not seen before and said what do you need now. The conversation was interrupted. He took a phone call and the call was saying that his father was in the hospital and he was terminal. So at that point it turned into a personal conversation. Prosecutors argued that was the dead.
June 7th, Murdoch realized his crimes or about to be revealed and that very night, Alec got a reprieve from the firm's investigation. After the murders happened, they didn't see why it used to raise those issues to the defendant. Now we were concerned about the welfare of Alec and we were trying to make sure that he was emotionally okay. Old friend Chris Wilson testified, he also stopped asking questions about that missing check.
After the murders, we all told regularly about keeping an eye on him, about being there for him. If prosecutors thought evidence of Murdoch's financial crimes would provide a motive, they counted on their last witness to prove opportunity. Special agent Peter Verdowski, the prosecution's final witness, sleds special agent Peter Rudowski, unveiled a digital toward the force. Using cell activity from Alec's mages and Paul's phones and GPS data from
Alec's car, he built a timeline of the night of the murders. It showed Alec had time to kill
“and to cover it up. How long you've been working on the stock in the right here?”
Roughly about a year on the stock in it. Rudowski's timeline showed that not long after Nagyon Paul's phones went silent for ever at 849 p.m. about the time prosecutors believed the tour killed Alec's phone, which had been inactive for nearly an hour, suddenly came alive. From 902 to 906 p.m., it counted his steps. How many steps?
Two hundred eighty three steps.
He was a busy guy right then, wasn't he?
“At 907 p.m., Murdoch's suburban left Mosel, heading to his mother's home.”
As it near the location where Maggie's phone was later found, the vehicle was going 42 miles an hour. After passing that location as the defendant's vehicle starts to accelerate, it does. Then the suburban sped up to 74 miles an hour, reaching Murdoch's mother's home at 92 p.m. It departed at 943 p.m. traveling back to Mosel. This time, clocking a maximum of 80 miles an hour.
Would you at night, or did you ever at night? On the roads as they existed at the time of June 7, 2021, running code with your lights on,
run 80 miles an hour, down that road. I would not know.
This suburban arrived at the kennels at 10.05 p.m., Alan called 911, less than 20 seconds later, telling the dispatcher he checked both bodies and night there was breathing with that prosecutor's rested. In the matter of the indictments, the state of South Carolina rests. In all, they called 61 witnesses, elicited hours of damaging testimony.
But, was it enough? The defense had its own courts to play a starting with insinuations of a botched and biased investigation. Whatever if Annie was made to take fingerprints at the scene. [Music]
Allic Murdox attorneys lead the groundwork for his defense,
long before the prosecution rested.
“Is that preservation of the scene that your standards require?”
Not, not exactly no. Not exactly. And their cross-examination of states witnesses, did caught Putin and Jim Griffin criticized the way the murder investigation was handled. Should the police be walking through the scene? No. Do we know what other evidence they may have destroyed?
Have no idea. That's right, you don't. You described this investigative circle, so you draw a circle around potential persons of the veterans and allic tools in that circle. We don't draw a circle around any individual person. We worked with the crime scene, which is what we considered the circle.
There was a circle, and it was only around Alic. He was the only living and breathing person in the circle. Was that correct? That is the only person that we could place in the circle at that time. They accused law enforcement of conducting a sloppy investigation from the very start.
Do you know what any of those showers or towns
“were in any way swapped or checked for blood or tissue or any DNA?”
Anything that would indicate somebody who washed off evidence of a crime? Nothing. The defense also called its own expert witnesses to make the same point. If this had been your crime scene, would you say that she and saved his clothes? Definitely. What effort if any was made to take fingerprints at the scene? None that I observed.
At the end of the day, the defense argued there was no physical evidence tying Alic to the murders of Maggie and Paul. No murder weapon, no blood evidence on him. Sure, Alic had a lot about being at the kennels that night they said, but that wasn't evidence he killed his wife and son. The defense also called people close to Alic in the family to attest to Alic's grief and pain
after the killings. He was devastated. I mean he was crying. He was just just beside himself. He said, "Look at what they did, look at what they did to them." He was pretty distraught. When I got there, he and I saw each other and he gave me a hug and just started crying and told me they were gone. Alic's older son, Buster, had set quietly in court for weeks. When it was his turn on the
witness stand, he relived the whole of losing both his mother and brother. My dad called me. He asked me if I was sitting down and I was like, "Yeah." Then he sounded odd and then he told me that my mom and brother had been shot.
Buster, said his father, "Didn't act like a man who had just slaughtered his ...
As the meaner was destroying his heartbreak and I walked in the door and saw him and
“gave him a hug and just just broken down.”
Can you speak? Not really. He cried. Yes, sir. Alic's brother, John Marvin, also took the stand in his defense. His devastating is that it was for me. It was a thousand times worse for him. So, I knew as a brother, I needed to be there for him. And I was. I would have to create a new word to describe how distraught he was, pausing to wipe away his own tears.
John Marvin told the jury about the morning after the murders. I walked over to the feed room.
It had not been cleaned up. I saw blood. I saw brains. I saw pieces of skull. It was terrible. And for some reason, I thought it was my something that I needed to do for Paul to clean it up. And I promised you, no mother or father or an or uncle should ever have to see and do what I did that day. And he asserted his brother, Alic's innocence by revealing the promise he made to his nephew Paul,
Alex Sun, in that tortured moment at the kennels. I don't know. I just loved him.
“And I promised him that I'd find out who did this to him. Have you found out?”
I have not. But when the story of Alic Murdoch's defenses ultimately written,
it will not dwell on those emotional statements from family and friends or accusations about sloppy crime scenes or even withering cross-examination. It will focus instead on the testimony of one man. The defendant Richard Alexander Mardick, which is to take the same. As day 23 of the Alic Murdoch trial dawned, there was a lot of buzz around the county courthouse. Would he take the stand? The decision was only one man's to make,
and Alic Murdoch gave his answer. I am going to test that. I won't test that. A 20-gim griffin started by cutting to the chase. Did you take this gun or any gun like it? And shoot your son Paul in the chest in the feed room at your property, Alc Mozel Road? No, I did not. Mr. Mardick, did you take this gun or any gun like it? And blow your son brains out on June 7th or any day or anytime.
No, I did not. I didn't shoot my wife or my son anytime. Ever. For three weeks, prosecutors had branded Murdoch a serial liar and believed they caught him perhaps in his biggest lie with that video placing him at the dog kennels that June 9 in 2021. Alic and his attorney confronted that head on. Is that you on the kennel video at 844 PM on June 7th, the night magying power murder? It is. Were you in fact at the kennels at
844 PM on the night magying power murder? I was. Did you lie to sled agent Owen and Deputy
“Laura Rutland on the night of June 7th and told him that you stayed at the house after dinner?”
I did lie to them. Did you lie to Agent Owen? Nage and Crawf on the follow-up interview on June 10th. That the last time you saw magying power was that dinner? I did lie to them. So why did he lie? He said his addiction to painkillers was the reason. Up to 60 pills a day. As my addiction evolved over time, I would get any situations and circumstances where I would get paranoid thinking. It could be anything that triggered it, it might be a look somebody gave me,
it might be a reaction somebody had to something I did. It might be a policeman following me in a car. He said he distrusted sled intensely and his drug induced paranoia coupled with the shock from the murders. Fogged up his mind. On June 7th, I wasn't thinking clearly.
I don't think I was capable of reason.
And I'm so sorry that I did. Did you continue lying after that night? Did you not?
“But once I lied, I continued to lie here, sir. Wow. You know, or what a tangled web we weave.”
Murdock went on to give a new account of that afternoon and evening, constantly using the nicknames,
mags and Paul Paul for his wife and son. And offering details, he had never mentioned in his
interviews with law enforcement. He described driving around Los Al with Paul on his son's last afternoon. You could not be around Paul Paul. You could not be around him and not have a good death. I love doing anything with Paul Paul. He was an absolute delight. After dinner that evening, he said, magi asked him to go out to the kittles where she and Paul were checking on the dogs. And this was his new story. He said he drove a golf cart out there.
I'm talking to Maggie for just a short time before Bubba catches a chicken.
“Oh, like, said he tried to pull it away from it. Did you get the chicken out of Bubba's mouth?”
I did. I took the chicken from Bubba and I put it on top of that. What looks to me like a portable dog crate. What did you do after you got the chicken out of Bubba's mouth? I got out of there. I left. I went back to the house. So he went back to the house. He laid down on the couch and then what happened next. I'm not, I'm not positive. I dosed off for a minute or didn't dosed off for a minute. But I got up off of the couch and I was, I made up my mind. I was going to
visit my mom. He described that trip over to his mother's house. All routine he claimed. When he got back to the house about an hour later, he said he didn't see his wife for son anywhere inside. So he started searching. And now I'm going to drop down to the
“kennels in your suburban. I did. What'd you see? So shall I see him pick you up?”
So bad. What did you do when you went up to Paul at some point in time? Paul was so bad. At some point, I mean I know I tried to check him for a pulse. I know I tried to turn him over. When you say you've tried to turn him over, why are you trying to turn him over? I don't know. I don't know why I tried to turn him over. Me and my boys laid a step down. He's done the ways done. It was the ways. It was. I could see his brain laying on the sidewalk.
I didn't know what to do. He said in the weeks after the murders, he was ready and willing
to give the police anything they needed, whether it exonerated him or not. But the bottom line for
the defense was this. Murdoch had no motive to kill his wife or son. I would never hurt Maggie. And I would never hurt Paul. Ever. Under any circumstances. But Alec wasn't finished on the stand. Now it was the prosecution's turn to question him. You've been able to lock quickly and easily and convincingly if you think it'll save your skin for well over a decade. It doesn't that true. Alec Murdoch had lied to police for a year and a half. He told them he was not at the
dog kennels before his wife and son's murders. Now he said he was.
All this time later, this is the first time you've ever said that. Yes sir.
Prosecutor Cretan Waters wanted to underscore that point. This defendant was a liar and not just
About the murders.
other to rip them off. You would agree with me that for years you were stealing money from clients.
“Yes sir, I agree with that. And that you were stealing from your law firm.”
Yes sir, I agree with that. And that had been going on since at least 2010. I'm not sure the exact date but it's been going on a long time. I would agree with that. This defendant said Waters stole millions of dollars. Even from people he claimed to care about what was going through your head and how it went down when you sat there and looked them in the eye and condensed them that you were doing them right while you were lying to them and stealing their money.
Yes sir, I had a lot of conversations with a lot of my clients that I cared about. And so I will tell you that I had conversations with them where I misled them and I lied to them and I took their money. The only reason I like stopped lying about stealing money the prosecutor argued was because he got caught. Just as the only reason he stopped lying about being at the kittles
get it was the tape. You're great that the most important part of your testimony here today
is explaining your life for a year and a half that you were never down to those kittles at eight
“44. Would you agree with that? I'd be all in my testimony. Is it important?”
It's important. Would you agree that that's an important part of your testimony? Sure. The prosecutor attacked Murdoch's new version of that night. Which went like this. He was at the kittles at 844 but only four minutes or so to rescue a chicken and distress. Then he went back to the house. So we got you back around 849 and he didn't
hear anything at all. Did you hear anything at all Mr. Murdoch during that time period? No, I did not.
That's possibly because he was napping by then, Alex said. He had missed his wife and son's murders. By mere seconds, missed the sound of multiple gun blasts, likely because he was out cold. According to your new story, how long did you does? If I does, extremely short time.
“Extremely short time. Does you want to agree with me that at 902 you're up and moving?”
According to the data. I agreed at according to that data. My phone's recording steps at whatever time it is 902 something. So what was he doing? Create waters asked. I know what I wasn't doing Mr. Waters and what I wasn't doing is doing anything as I believe you've implied that I was cleaning off or washing off or washing off guns, putting guns in a raincoat and I can promise you that I wasn't doing any of that.
Waters dismissed the latest alibod as the words of a man who routinely lied to escape trouble. And you've been able to lock quickly and easily and convincingly if you think it'll save your skin for well over a decade. Doesn't that true? I have lied well over a decade. And you want this jury to believe a story manufactured to fit the evidence that you brought forth just yesterday. After hearing this trials worth a testimony.
No, that's not correct. The trouble Murdoch was trying to save himself from this time the prosecutor argued was impending financial exposure at his law firm and in the Mallory Beach Civil Case. To avoid that, he seized on a hair-brained scheme, commit a greater crime to block out the lesser woods, kill two loved ones to attract sympathy instead of scrutiny. Mr. Murdoch, are you a family and highlighter?
A family, a highlighter? He may like, did I shoot my wife and my son? Yes. No. Nothing further. As a former attorney Alec Murdoch had a knack for reading juries. But all that mattered now was how these juries were reading him. After 28 days of testimony, the case was theirs to decide and they did it in less than three hours. Then it will rise. Docket number. It fell to the court clerk, Becky Hill to read the verdict.
Guilty verdict.
Outside the courthouse, Attorney General Allen Wilson celebrated the state's victory.
It was all worth it because we got to bring justice and be a voice for Maggie and Paul Murdoch and bring justice for the people of South Carolina. He jubilantly thanked everyone who worked for case. I want to thank the Carlton County Clerk of Court, Becky Hill and her entire team and their staff, including that court clerk, Becky Hill. I call her Becky Booth, that's her nickname, but Madam Clerk wherever you are tonight.
Little did he realize how quickly he'd come to regret that shout out. My name is Becky Hill. A whole new chapter in the Murdoch saga was about to begin. This is stunning. This is a bombshell.
None of those are overstatements. This never ever happens.
It had taken jurors less than three hours to convict Alec Murdoch. They said they
“didn't come to that decision lightly. You have to be very sure in your answer. That's not”
something that I want to live with if it wasn't right. jurors James McDowell, Gwinge and a red, and Amy Williams talked to me just after the verdict. There's no doubt in any of your minds that Alec Murdoch's one who did it. I believe you know that. No question. No question.
Becky Hill, the clerk of court who read the verdict, praised the jury's care and diligence
when she talked to date line after the trial. This jury was definitely a jury. Sempa God. They were very persistent. They were fearful. She also talked about the jurors at length and a memoir she published about the case just four months after the verdict. That book raised a lot of eyebrows in B.C. News legal analyst, Laura Jerry. I could not believe it. Then officer of the court thought that she could cash in on something that she was supposed to
take an oath to uphold her duty. As soon as I saw it, I knew that this was going to be a fight. This is going to come back to haunt this case for a long time. By that point, Alec's lawyers were hearing rumors that Hill had not just observed trial proceedings, but that she'd been an active participant, allegedly trying to sway jurors toward a guilty verdict. We had some indication that
“something really a mess went on in the jury room, and so we, I think, got in a car and went to the”
jurors' homes on a Sunday afternoon. Those who agreed to talk said the clerk had not pressured them, but one of them remembered a specific comment Hill had made about the defense. She said that Miss Hill said, "Don't let them fool you. I mean, my world stopped." I mean, that is so improper and so unheard of that, I mean, you know, this woman had no reason to me. She was very suspicious of us, but once she said that, I mean, it was game-owned at that point. What the lawyers were hearing was a potential
crime, jury tampering. They filed a motion asking for a new trial. Good morning, please be seated. A special judge heard the defense's motion and in a highly unusual move. She even brought back the original jurors to testify. Most of them said Becky's behavior did not influence them. Did you hear Becky Hill, a clerk of court County, that any comment about this case before your verdict? No, ma'am, I wasn't purviewed any of that. But one of them said she had pressured them.
“Was your verdict influenced in any way by the communications of the clerk of court in this case?”
Yes, ma'am. And how was it influenced? To me, I felt like she made it seem like she was already guilty. My name is Becky Hill. That's correct. Then the clerk herself took the stand. She insisted she done nothing wrong. At any time, did you tell the jury not to be fooled by evidence presented by Mr. Murdoch's attorneys? I did not. The judge was less than convinced. But did not find that the clerk's actions warranted a new trial? I simply do not believe that the authority of our
South Carolina Supreme Court requires a new trial in a very lengthy trial suc...
script of some fleeting and foolish comments by publicity influence clerk of court. Good morning,
“everyone. Becky Hill resigned her position and the year later faced a new set of charges on a separate”
issue, leaking sealed crime scene photos to the media. She pleaded guilty to perjury and obstruction of justice. She was sentenced to probation and community service. But Becky's role in Alex Case wasn't over. Late last year, his lawyers raised her behavior with jurors again when they appealed the case all the way to South Carolina Supreme Court. When that court's ruling came out, it hit like a thunder crack. A shocking twist in a double murder case.
Alex Murdoch's murder conviction was thrown out. South Carolina Supreme Court has overturned the double murder convictions of Alex Murdoch. The court called Becky Hill's conduct,
“shocking, and stated that she placed her fingers on the scales of justice and denied”
Alec Murdoch a fair trial. What was Alex response when you told him that he was going to be getting a retrial? He said, Jim, I didn't believe it's going to happen. I'm reading the opinion and I gotta tell you, I still have a hard time believing it. We reached out to Becky Hill for
comment. She did not respond. Mandy Pierce, one of the jurors who first raised the alarm about
Becky talked to NBC News after the decision. I was okay that he got a neutral because I feel like some of the things that happened during his original murder trial, he didn't get a fair trial. Juror Amy Williams disagreed. I was like, what? Why? The evidence was overwhelming. He was guilty. In the middle of all the uproar, Attorney General Allen Wilson vowed to fight on. All I can promise the people of South Carolina is that we're going to continue to see
justice. But some wonder what the point of that would be. Murdoch is already serving 40 and 27-year sentences for his financial crimes. He pleaded guilty to those charges in 2023. Mr. Attorney General, to folks who might say, why retry the case? What would you say to those people? Well, I would ask those people to think about the position they would take if they had members of their family who were brutally murdered and the person who brutally murdered them were
spending time in prison for financial crimes. Would you want us to abandon seeking justice for your murdered loved ones? Legal analysts say a new trial would likely be very different from the
first. For one thing, in their decision, the Supreme Court justices call the trial prosecutors
focus on Alex financial crimes, excessive and prejudicial. The justices have made it clear, do not spin as much time as you did in that first trial, trying to litigate all of this evidence of him praying upon vulnerable victims. The court is saying, you cannot do that the second time the trial would also give the defense opportunity to introduce new evidence. You've maintained from the beginning that it was someone else who killed Paul Nagy. Do you have new evidence to back
that up? We've been given a lot of different leads and information. We got a call from someone who says that he knows where the guns were disposed of. And by him by who? Yeah, and we've been given other information from people with private investigators and they've come with some really solid information. The attorney say they and their client are ready for a new fight. Would you consider a
“plea deal? No. That's a quick no. No. Why not? Could he didn't do it? How about that? Okay?”
The state is ready, too. All options are on the table, but as of right now today at the time of this interview, we intend to go back to trial in this case. The attorney general told us his office may even seek the death penalty this time. So it seems like everyone involved in the murder cases destined to do it all over again. Another week's long trial in the low country with the whole
Nation tuning in.
trying to find justice at last for Maggie and Paul that's all for now. I'm Lester Holt. Thanks for joining us.
“I'm Craig Melford. Cheers. Cheers. I've always been a glass half woke on the guy and now”
I'm talking to some people who look at the world that way too. It's really fascinating folks who share
their defining moments, their trials, challenges, their stories, their funny and my candy. So I hope you'll
“join me each week and who knows. You might just come away with your own glass half full.”
Search glass half full with Craig Melford from today on YouTube and wherever you get your podcasts.


