Court documents filed on Thursday alleged that a bank often allowed South Carolina attorney Alex Murdaugh to overdraw his account, sometimes in the six-figure range.
FITS News reported that Palmetto State Bank apparently allowed Murdaugh to keep his accounts in the negative for the past several years. Despite this, the bank allegedly gave Murdaugh large loans which he was said to have not paid back on time.
Authorities claimed Murdaugh’s banking behavior should have appeared on anti-fraud reports but that never occurred. According to FITS News, in July 2021, Palmetto State Bank gave Murdaugh a $750,000 line of credit — even though his account was in the negative $162,014.03.
Murdaugh’s relationship with Russell Laffitte, Palmetto State Bank’s former CEO, has come under scrutiny. Laffitte resigned in January before he was criminally charged with 21 counts for allegedly conspiring with the attorney to steal $2 million.
Murdaugh, who remains jailed, was arrested in October for allegedly stealing $4.3 million from the estate of his former housekeeper, Gloria Satterfield, who suffered a fatal fall on his property in February 2018. In that case, he is accused of stealing insurance payouts that were intended for Satterfield’s family.
At the time of his arrest in October, Murdaugh was out on bail and undergoing treatment at a rehabilitation center in Florida. Murdaugh went to Florida after he survived an alleged suicide-for-hire plot that entailed a client shooting him in the head so his surviving son would receive a $10 million life insurance payout. The September 3 incident resulted in him being charged with insurance fraud.
A day before the shooting, Alex was forced out of his family law firm amid allegations he misappropriated funds. He announced he was entering rehabilitation for drugs two days after the shooting.
Since then, Murdaugh was charged with 74 counts, as he has been accused of stealing money from a slew of clients and his former law firm. He has not been charged in connection with his wife and son’s murder. He remains jailed on a $7 million bond.
No suspects have been arrested in connection with the June 7 shooting deaths of Maggie’s wife and son Maggie and Paul, who were killed at the family’s 1,770-acre lodge in Colleton County.
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[Featured image: Alex Murdaugh/Hampton County Sheriff’s Office]
