On Friday, prosecutors questioned a South Carolina investigator about inconsistencies with Alex Murdaugh’s comments during a police interrogation conducted shortly after his wife and son’s 2021 murders.
Colleton County detective Laura Rutland testified that she found it odd that Alex claimed he was visiting his mother, who has Alzheimer’s, on the night of the slayings as people with dementia are in a diminished state at night. Rutland noted that there were no footprints located in the blood near Paul even though Alex claimed he turned him over twice and checked his pulse
Rutland also testified that she saw no blood on Alex — including on his shoes and hands. During cross-examination, Rutland would not say if, to her, Alex appeared to be the person who had just killed his son on their family’s property.
Alex is believed to have acted alone in the slayings, allegedly shooting his wife, Maggie, with a rifle and killing Paul with a shotgun. He was reportedly filmed driving away from the lodge an hour before he called 911 to report their deaths. He allegedly carried out the double slaying after visiting his mother.
Prosecutors said cell phone data and forensic evidence tie Alex to the slayings. Meanwhile, Alex’s attorney, Dick Harpootlian, said the cell phone records were incomplete and asserted that Alex would be covered in blood if he killed his wife and son at close range. Harpootlian said no blood was found on Alex’s clothing,
In September 2021, months after Paul and Maggie’s slayings, Alex suffered superficial head wounds when he allegedly had former client Curtis Smith, 61, shoot him in the head so his surviving son, Buster, would receive a $10 million insurance payout.
A day before the shooting, Alex was forced out of his family law firm amid allegations he misappropriated funds.
Two days after the apparent botched suicide, Alex announced he was entering rehabilitation for drugs. Shortly thereafter, he was charged with insurance fraud in connection with the September 2021 suicide-for-hire plot and released on bail.
However, in October 2021, Alex was rearrested upon leaving a rehabilitation center in Florida 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 was accused of stealing insurance payouts that were intended for Satterfield’s family. Authorities plan to exhume her body amid an ongoing investigation regarding her death.
In addition to the murder charges, Alex faces more than 100 criminal counts related to fraud.
In June 2022, Alex and Smith were indicted for allegedly purchasing and distributing oxycodone in multiple counties. In December 2022, Alex was indicted for tax evasion for allegedly failing to claim the $6 million he allegedly earned through illegal acts between 2011 and 2019.
Alex was charged with Maggie and Paul’s murders days after he was formally disbarred by the South Carolina Supreme Court.
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[Featured image: Alex Murdaugh cries as the murder of his wife and son is described by Colleton County Sheriff’s Department Sgt. Daniel Greene during testimony in Murdaugh’s double murder trial at the Colleton County Courthouse in Walterboro, S.C, Thursday, Jan. 26, 2023. (Joshua Boucher/The State via AP)]