January 25, 2023 Alex Murdaugh trial opening statements

Opening statements have concluded in the trial of Alex Murdaugh, who is accused of killing his wife and son.

State prosecutor Creighton Waters laid out the case against the disgraced South Carolina attorney while defense attorney Dick Harpootlian spoke on behalf of Murdaugh.

Court is in recess until 9:30 a.m. ET on Thursday.

Dick Harpootlian, defense attorney for Alex Murdaugh, speaks during the trial on Tuesday.

Dick Harpootlian, defense attorney for Alex Murdaugh, asked the jury members to forget what they heard from the prosecution during its opening statement, reiterating that his client is not guilty. Murdaugh is accused of killing his wife and son.

Harpootlian stressed that the burden is on the prosecution to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt — something he urged the jury to keep in mind throughout the trial.

“He is presumed innocent,” he said, pointing at Murdaugh.

The defense attorney pointed out that there was no forensic evidence such as fingerprints or blood, tying Murdaugh to the murder.

“Your mental framework is, he didn’t do it, they have to prove it to me beyond a reasonable doubt,” he said.

The evidence will show that law enforcement did not find any blood on the clothing of defendant Alex Murdaugh on the night of the murders, defense attorney Dick Harpootlian said during his opening statement Wednesday.

Investigators tested “12 different places” on Murdaugh’s shirt and pants and found no blood, he said.

Harpootlian said prosecution witnesses will describe the catastrophic injuries suffered by the defendant’s son, Paul Murdaugh, that his head “literally exploded” from the gunshot wound – and that whoever shot him was “probably no more than three feet away.”

Because of the close range, whoever shot him “would be covered in blood, from head to foot in blood,” he told the jury. 

Law enforcement seized Alex Murdaugh’s clothing and they didn’t find any blood on his clothes, he said.

“No human blood detected, period,” Harpootlian said.

Lead prosecutor Creighton Waters spent just over 30 minutes laying out a timeline of events and key evidence from the night that Maggie and Paul Murdaugh were killed. 

Alex Murdaugh attorney Dick Harpootlian is now presenting his opening statement. 

Murdaugh has denied involvement in the deaths, saying he had been visiting his mother at the time. He has pleaded not guilty to two counts of murder and two counts of possession of a weapon.

Alex Murdaugh called his wife Maggie Murdaugh twice after she had been killed while he was about a third of a mile away, state prosecutor Creighton Waters said.

During his opening statement, Waters walked through the timeline of what happened after the murders. He said Maggie’s phone locked for the last time at around 8:49 p.m.

Alex Murdaugh’s phone did not register much activity from about 8:09 p.m. to 9:02 p.m., but at 9:02 p.m., he called his wife.

She “doesn’t answer, of course,” Waters said. “He calls Maggie again at 9:06. Remember he’s just a third of a mile away, you can see it,” he added.

At 9:06 p.m., he then turned on his car and texted his wife that he was going to check on his mom, before driving to Almeda, South Carolina, where his mother and her caretaker were, according to the prosecutor.

Prosecutor Creighton Waters said that while the defendant – Alex Murdaugh – says he was never at the family’s kennels near where the alleged murders took place, video evidence will prove that he was there that night.

Waters said that on the night of his death, at 8:44:55 p.m., Paul Murdaugh recorded a video from the kennels on his cell phone.

The prosecutor said that the state’s evidence will show that on that video the jury will be able to hear defendant Alex Murdaugh’s voice, along with his son and wife’s voices.

Waters added that “just over 3 minutes later” after Paul Murdaugh recorded the video his cell phone “locks forever.”

Defendant Alex Murdaugh during his murder trial on Tuesday.

Creighton Waters, the lead prosecutor for the state, said evidence presented at the trial of Alex Murdaugh will show that the gun that killed Maggie Murdaugh was a “family weapon.”

Around Christmas 2016, Alex Murdaugh bought two 300 blackout AR-style rifles, Waters said, but not long after that, the prosecutor said the evidence will show that one of those rifles went missing from his son Paul Murdaugh’s truck.

In April 2018, Murdaugh bought another rifle to replace the one that was lost, Waters said.

He said Paul and his friends shot the replacement gun several times just weeks prior to the murders — sometimes around the side of the house, firing it down into a field and other times at a range across the street. The empty shells were found in the flower bed and at the range, the prosecutor said.

When law enforcement arrived at the property following the murders, Alex Murdaugh could only account for one of the three rifles, according to Waters.

“That replacement gun is nowhere to be found,” Waters said.

Creighton Waters, the state’s lead prosecutor, said during his opening statement that about a week after the murders, the defendant showed up early in the morning at his parents’ home in Hampton, South Carolina.

Waters said Alex Murdaugh brought with him a blue raincoat that he took upstairs.

The prosecutor said that when law enforcement searched the home they found the raincoat “wadded up” and it was “coated with gunshot residue on the inside.”

Waters added that the evidence would show that there was gunshot residue in a sink and on the seatbelt of the car Murdaugh drove.

Creighton Waters, the state's lead prosecutor in the trial of Alex Murdaugh, delivers his opening statement on January 25.

Creighton Waters, the state’s lead prosecutor in the trial of Alex Murdaugh, said during his opening statement that the prosecution’s evidence is going to show that neither Murdaugh’s son nor his wife had any “defensive wounds.” 

“Neither one of them had any defensive wounds, as if they didn’t see a threat coming from their attacker,” Waters said.

He continued saying that the evidence would show that the victims, Maggie and Paul Murdaugh, were shot at close range and “stippling” was found on their bodies due to the close proximity of the firearm that killed them.

“The evidence is going to show — it’s called stippling. It’s almost like a tattoo, that it leaves marks that the forensic pathologist can see,” Waters said. 

Waters said during his opening statement that after the killings, Murdaugh told “anyone who would listen” that he was not at the scene of the alleged crimes.

Waters then held up a cell phone, saying “the evidence is also going to show from these things that every one of us — most of us — carry around in our pocket, that he was there, and he was there just minutes before with Maggie and Paul.”

Opening statements are underway in the trial of Alex Murdaugh. 

Murdaugh is charge with two counts of murder and two counts of possession of a weapon during the commission of a violent crime in the deaths of his wife, Maggie, and son Paul.  

The lead prosecutor for the state, Creighton Waters, is presenting his opening statement.

"Keep Out" signs marked one entrance to the Murdaugh family property in Islandton, where a double homicide occurred.

For 87 years, the Murdaugh family name came to represent a legal dynasty in coastal South Carolina, where three successive generations controlled the local prosecutor’s office.

But that has all fallen apart in recent years. Now, among other legal and financial problems, Alex Murdaugh is on trial after being accused of killing is wife and son.

Here’s a look at the timeline:

June 2021

September 2021

July 2022

In addition to facing murder charges in the death of his wife and son, in January 2022 Murdaugh is charged with 23 more crimes in four new indictments returned by a grand jury, the state attorney general said, claiming that he stole more than $2.2 million mean for four clients.. That’s on top of the seven indictments with 21 criminal charges are filed by December 2021 related to an alleged wide-ranging scheme that sought to defraud victims of more than $6 million, according to South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson.

You can read the full timeline — with everything we know about Murdaugh’s other legal and financial challenges — here.

Opening statements are expected to begin in Walterboro, South Carolina, in the trial of Alex Murdaugh, who has been charged with the 2021 murders of his wife and youngest son —the most serious and the grisliest of allegations faced by the once prominent, but now disbarred, attorney.

Murdaugh has pleaded not guilty to two counts of murder and two counts of possession of a weapon during the commission of a violent crime in the killings on June 7, 2021. South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson, whose office is prosecuting the case, announced last month prosecutors would not seek the death penalty but life in prison without parole if Murdaugh is convicted.

Prosecutors accuse Murdaugh of committing the murders to distract attention from a series of alleged illicit schemes he was running to stave off “personal legal and financial ruin,” according to court filings. Evidence will show, the state claims, that Murdaugh’s alleged financial crimes were “about to come to light” when his wife, Margaret, and 22-year-old son, Paul, were killed.

Murdaugh, who has denied involvement in their deaths, called 911 the night of the killings to report he’d found his wife and son shot dead on the family’s hunting estate. Murdaugh’s attorneys blasted prosecutors for the charges, issuing a statement addressed to family and friends saying he loved his wife and son “more than anything in the world.”

Other legal trouble: Separate from the murder charges, Murdaugh faces 99 charges stemming from 19 grand jury indictments for various crimes, according to the state attorney general’s office, including allegedly defrauding his clients and former law firm of nearly $9 million. Just last month, the AG’s office announced Murdaugh had been indicted for tax evasion for failing to report almost $7 million of income earned through illegal acts, for which he allegedly owes the state almost $500,000.

Alex Murdaugh sits with his legal team as jury selection continues before his trial at the Colleton County Courthouse in Walterboro, South Carolina, on January 24.

Alex Murdaugh is a member of one of the most powerful family dynasties in coastal South Carolina.

Three generations before him served as 14th Circuit Solicitors — leading prosecutions for Allendale, Beaufort, Colleton, Hampton and Jasper counties in the state.

Murdaugh worked at the law firm Peters, Murdaugh, Parker, Eltzroth & Detrick (PMPED), according to the firm. He was married to Margaret Murdaugh and they had two sons: Buster and Paul.

On June 7, 2021, Murdaugh called 911 to report he had found his wife and son Paul shot dead outside their home in Islandton, a community about an hour away from Hilton Head Island, the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED) said.

Less than three months after the double homicide, he was shot in the head.

In the week following his shooting, his law firm announced Murdaugh resigned after the discovery that he had “misappropriated funds.”

The state then Supreme Court suspended his license to practice law in South Carolina. Murdaugh also announced he planned to begin an unspecified rehabilitation treatment, saying in a statement through his attorney the killings of his wife and son “caused an incredibly difficult time in my life” and exacerbated a “long battle.”

On Sept. 13 — nine days after his shooting — Murdaugh admitted to authorities he had arranged for a former client to kill him as part of a suicidal fraud scheme, according to an affidavit to support charges against the alleged gunman.

In a statement obtained in September 2021, two of his attorneys, Jim Griffin and Dick Harpootlian, said Alex Murdaugh’s life “has been devastated by an opioid addiction” and early that month, “it became clear Alex believed that ending his life was his only option. Today, he knows that’s not true.”

The judge in the Alex Murdaugh murder trial ruled to allow ballistic evidence during an afternoon motions hearing Tuesday. The judge also said state prosecutors would have to wait until the trial is underway to see if allegations of Murdaugh’s past financial crimes could be admitted.

A defense motion asked the court to prevent ballistic evidence and testimony from Paul Greer, a SLED (South Carolina Law Enforcement Division) firearms identification expert. Greer was called to the stand and answered questions from attorneys representing both the prosecution and the defense.

He said he had examined shell casings recovered at the murder scene and the Murdaugh hunting property and had determined they were fired by the same gun, a .300 Blackout rifle the state says, “was purchased by Alex Murdaugh and can no longer be accounted for.” The defense challenged Greer’s methodology and conclusions, citing a lack of academic research on the specific type of firearm used.

In the end, the Judge Clifton Newman ruled against the defense, saying he would allow the ballistics evidence and testimony and it will be up to the jury to decide.

Murdaugh’s finances: Newman said he was not prepared to grant the prosecution’s motion seeking to include evidence of Alex Murdaugh’s purported financial crimes and related offenses into the murder trial. Newman said it should be taken up during the trial if it becomes necessary.

The judge said that needed to be handled during the trial, if it was introduced. Murdaugh is facing charges in a separate criminal case alleging various fraud schemes, some of which he has admitted to. Murdaugh has agreed to repay more than $4 million to the estate of his former housekeeper, Gloria Satterfield, CNN previously report. 

Some context: Typically, prosecutors cannot obtain a conviction by pointing to the defendant’s misconduct in other, unrelated cases, but prosecutors say the financial fraud must be discussed to establish Murdaugh’s motive to commit the murders.  

Newman also declined to issue a ruling on a motion filed by the defense seeking to exclude evidence and testimony from experts who have said there was blood spatter on the t-shirt Alex Murdaugh was wearing the night of the double murder. The judge said it would be taken up at trial if state prosecutors decided to introduce it.

Alex Murdaugh is escorted out of the Colleton County Courthouse in Walterboro, South Carolina, on July 20, 2022, after pleading not guilty on charges of murdering his wife and son.

Disgraced former South Carolina attorney Alex Murdaugh pleaded not guilty to the murders of his wife and son, who were found shot to death on the family’s property in June 2021.

The plea came after Murdaugh was indicted by a Colleton County grand jury in July 2022 on two counts of murder and two counts of possession of a weapon during the commission of a violent crime in connection to the deaths of his wife, Margaret “Maggie” Murdaugh, 52, and their youngest son, Paul Murdaugh, 22.

He has denied involvement in their deaths, saying he was visiting his mother at the time they were killed.

The murder charges are just the latest — though by far the most serious — brought against the now-disbarred attorney, who also faces charges connected to alleged financial crimes.

Though no new details linking Murdaugh to the murders were revealed in court in July during his arraignment, prosecutor Creighton Waters characterized the evidence against Murdaugh as “substantial.”

Attorneys agreed that opening statements will begin at 3 p.m. ET in the trial of Alex Murdaugh.

The decision was made after the trial jury was sworn in this morning. The jury is made up of eight women and four men.

Judge Clifton Newman told the newly seated jury that they would break for lunch and he would give them their preliminary charge when they returned. 

Opening statements will proceed after that.