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Alex Murdaugh — a well-known private damage lawyer in South Carolina who comes from one among that area’s wealthiest households — was discovered responsible of homicide on Thursday.
Murdaugh, who had pleaded not responsible to 2 counts of homicide and two counts of possession of a weapon through the fee of a violent crime, was convicted on the conclusion of his trial on all 4 counts.
The jury deliberated for less than three hours following the tip of the trial.
Murdaugh can be sentenced on Friday morning; he faces 30 years to life in jail with out parole.
As for his heinous crime?
On June 7, 2021 the our bodies of Murdaugh’s 52-year previous spouse, Maggie and 22-year previous son, Paul, had been discovered useless on the 1,770-acre property in Islandton, South Carolina the place the household’s searching lodge was situated.
The pair died close to the lodge’s canine kennels on account of a number of gunshot wounds, a State Legislation Enforcement Division press launch mentioned on the time.
Murdaugh was the one who referred to as 9-1-1 and reported the deaths.
For many years till 2006, Murdaugh members of the family served because the main prosecutor in and round Colleton County.
Through the six-week lengthy trial, Murdaugh mentioned he gunned down his spouse and son to distract from his monetary crimes, together with the theft of thousands and thousands of {dollars} from his regulation companions and shoppers … cash used to feed a years-long dependancy to opioids and help a lavish way of life.
Whereas testifying in his personal protection, Murdaugh confessed to mendacity about his whereabouts on the night time of the killings, though he additionally denied taking the lives of his spouse and son.
“I could never intentionally do anything to hurt either one of them,” he mentioned on the stand. “Not ever.”
Alas, a jury of his friends didn’t consider this declare in the long run.
“It doesn’t matter who your family is, it doesn’t matter how much money you have,” Creighton Waters, the lead prosecutor, mentioned after the decision.
“If you do wrong, if you break the law, if you murder, then justice will be done in South Carolina.”
After the decision was learn out loud on Thursday, in the meantime, Murdaugh’s legal professional instantly motioned for a mistrial — which the choose swiftly denied.
“The evidence of guilt is overwhelming,” South Carolina Circuit Courtroom Choose Clifton Newman mentioned in response.
The murders had been the subject of Netflix’s Murdaugh Murders: A Southern Scandal, which premiered on February 22, which supplied additional background into the Murdaugh household’s affect amongst its native South Carolina neighborhood.
Murdaugh’s great-grandfather based the Hampton regulation agency in 1910, whereas a member of this household had occupied the 14th Circuit solicitor’s chair for 3 generations.
The sequence additionally coated how Paul and Maggie’s deaths shed a light-weight on “a century of corruption, power, and cover-ups in the Low Country,” that includes interviews with these closest to the Murdaugh household within the course of.
“Circumstantial evidence, direct evidence — all of the evidence pointed to only one conclusion, and that’s the conclusion that you all reached,” Choose Newman instructed the jurors on Thursday.
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