Every Town - Alex Murdaugh Is Guilty Of Murder! The Tragic Rise and Fall Of The Murdaugh Family

Episode Date: March 3, 2023

Alex Murdaugh Is Guilty! In the summer of 2021, shocking news rocked the state of South Carolina. Two members of a renowned legal family had been shot and killed on their property. On the surface, while tragic, it may not seem all that crazy. But the details of this case go back decades and has many twists and turns. So let's head down to Hampton South Carolina and learn all about the Murdaugh family.💥 Watch On Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/scarymysteries🎧 Our Other Podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1235579💀 Follow Our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/scarymysteries 💀 Follow Our Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/andrew.fitzg👁 Follow Our TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@andrewfitzgerald💥 Follow Our Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/scarymysteriesofficial🗣 Business Inquiries: [e-mail] Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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grab your favorite mug and pour yourself a dose of creepy true crime every single morning with morning cup of murder. This short daily show is the perfect podcast to incorporate into your morning routine because in less than 15 minutes, you'll hear about a true crime that took place on a day's date in history. Each day's dark history lesson will kickstart your morning with intriguing tales of murder, abduction, serial killers, cults, and everything in between. With over 20 million downloads, Morning Cup of Murder has something for every true crime lover. One listener describes the show as a small package

with a powerful punch of crime. Another writes that the show is an absolute delight in the morning. So for yourself, a piping hot cup of murder, every single morning with Morning Cup of Murder. Find it on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever. you get your podcasts. Every town has a dark side. In the summer of 2021, shocking news rocked the state of South Carolina.

Two members of a renowned legal family have been shot and killed right on their property. On the surface, while tragic, it may not seem all that crazy, but the details of this case go back decades and as many twists and turns. I'm Mane of it's Gerald, welcome to another episode of EveryTen, where today we'll talk about a Saturday night that started out as ordinary for six teenagers, but ended in the death of a 19-year-old named Mallory Beach. And this marked the beginning of the fall of a prominent legal family dynasty. So let's head down to Hampton, South Carolina and learn all about the Murdof family. People who live outside of South Carolina might not know about the Murdof family.

So let's get into their backgrounds so we can set the stage for. for you. It all goes back to 1885 when Josiah Putman Murdoch retired and headed down to Hampton County. As a little side note, it's been said that his wife Annie was a relative of Confederate President Jefferson Davis. Josiah made his money and mining, fertilizer, real estate, and as a Charleston cotton broker. His son Randolph would then go on to establish the Hampton Law Firm, which will go on to become the family's legal dynasty. Randolph operated his one-man law office before being elected in 1920 as the first chief prosecutor for a region of five counties covering 3,200 square miles. And he held that position for 20 years before being killed in a train accident. Then his son, Randolph Jr., also

known as Buster, took over his father's position as solicitor. When Randolph Murdoch Jr. retired after 46 years, his son Randolph III was elected and served until 2006. So a lot of Randolph's working in law over many decades has gotten them to be a well-respected and prominent family down south. Randolph III then had a son named Richard Alexander, who most people just called Alex. And although he didn't run for office as prosecutor, he occasionally helped his father with cases and worked as a volunteer prosecutor. About 30 years ago, Alex met his wife, Maggie, when they were undergraduate students, and they got married in 1993 while Alex was a law student at the University of South Carolina. Alex was the fourth generation of Murdoz to attend the school,

and the fourth Murdo to play football for the Gamecox. Buster, Alex's grandfather, is said to have earned his nickname on the football field because he busted the opponent. Alex and Maggie's first son, Richard, has also been a son. so-known as Buster, and he was born in 1996, and three years later, Paul Murdoch was born. Okay, so now that we've gotten the history of the family, now we can get into the details you came for. And they're interesting, sad, and very strange. According to property records, the Murdoz had a beach house on nearby Adesto Island, and Alex Murdoch, co-owned three wooded tracks along Beaufort County's waterways.

They had a river house that people would call Murdo Island, so naturally they had boats. Five, in fact, in total. At February 23rd, 2019, Paul borrowed his father's boat to attend a house party and oyster roast on one of the nearby islands. The 19-year-old managed to buy some alcohol at a gas station using his older brother Buster's ID before meeting up with his friends that evening. Paul's girlfriend, Morgan Dottie, was there. Anthony Cook and his girlfriend, Mallory Beach, and friends Millie Altman and Connor Cook were also on the boat along for the ride. These kids have been friends all throughout growing up. They had play dates as children, hunting and fish together, and they often went out on boats for fun once they were old enough.

On that particular day, they parted until the sun went down and after spending about five hours at the oyster roast, the group ended up stopping in downtown Buford, as Paul insisted on going to a little. local bar for a drink. But just Paul and Connor Cook went to the watering hole while the others hung back. They had a couple of shots there and after the two young men joined their friends back on the dock and boarded the boat to head home. But Paul was in a mood of sorts. He was getting drunker as the night went on and more aggressive. At one point, Paul kicked the boat into neutral just so he could go to the front of the boat and argue with his girlfriend Morgan. Connor took over to steer for a bit before Paul hopped back behind the wheel and sped off because of how fast the boat was going

and of course the drinking. The boat hit the front of a bridge and then a pylon which sent Paul, Anthony Cook, and Mallory Beach overboard. The two boys made it back to the surface, but Mallory didn't. Carter then called 911 in the Beaufort County Sheriff's Department, the Port Royal Police Department, the Paris Island Marshal's Office, Emergency Medical Services, and the South Carolina on the Department of Natural Resources all responded. Conversations between law enforcement and some of the disoriented teenagers were recorded by police dashboard cameras. And in one exchange, Mallory's boyfriend, Anthony, can be heard yelling at Paul after

Anthony said he noticed Paul smiling. On the police dash cam, you can also hear officers talking about Paul's cell phone. The recordings reveal that two cops discovered a cell phone they believe belonged to Paul, but in the official investigation files, there's no evidence that Paul Murdo's cell phone was taken that evening. So does that mean they gave it back to him just like that? Later, a Beaufort County Sheriff's officer testified that he saw the cell phone but didn't take it because he believed the investigation will be turned over to the Department of Natural Resources.

Mallory Beach's parents also showed up on the scene hours after the accident, and her mother Renee said that she kept praying, that they would see her daughter on a sandbar or somewhere. She was hoping that there was a reason she just couldn't get to them, but that she was safe. Anthony refused to leave the scene that night without his girlfriend. The four remaining teenagers were taken to the hospital for treatment. The Department of Natural Resources sent investigators to the hospital to question them about what had happened. While the Department of Natural Resources officer was trying to talk to Paul his father and attorney Alex

and grandfather Randolph III arrived, which abruptly stopped the interviews. Alex went into each teenager's hospital room and ordered them to remain silent when investigators questioned them. Connor Cook testified later that Alex stopped him in a wheelchair on his way to have his fractured jaw examined and told him he didn't need to tell anyone who was driving the boat. When Mallory's mother found out about this, she said, That night, I was concerned about finding my child, and they were concerned about how, they were going to cover up Paul driving. Seven days later, sadly, the body of Mallory was found. Because of this, Paul's case was now a manslaughter charge, and it dragged on for nearly two years

as he awaited trial. The survivors accused Paul of driving recklessly, well intoxicated, and ignoring their repeated request to stop. He was charged with multiple felonies, but then something happened before he could be brought to justice. In June of 2021, around 10 p.m., Alex Murdoch called 911 in a panic, saying that he discovered his wife Maggie and son Paul shot outside their family home. They were each shot with two different weapons. Maggie, with an assault-style rifle and Paul, having been shot with a shotgun. Whatever happened at the hunting lodge was brutal. Both victims were shot numerous times, and it was so bad that even veteran investigators were shocked. Bobby Chaconne, a retired FBI agent, turned criminal

analyst said, based on what's been made public so far, the shooter shot the sun in the back as the son was taking a video of his friend's dog, which he was dog sitting. Once this shot rang out, the wife may have started running, and the shooter then transitioned to the other weapon, either slinging the shotgun or placing it on the ground and picking up the rifle, which he then used to shoot the wife. Then he walks over to her and shoots her again. Alex was named as a person of interest in the case in October of 2021, but his lawyer denied the allegations and said he had no motive for the crimes. But according to NBC News, sources close to the investigation, said authorities discovered cell phone video evidence linking Alex to the crime scene.

The coroner discovered that Paul and Maggie died between 9 p.m. and 9.30 p.m. Roughly 30 minutes before Alex would find them. So who out there in the middle of nowhere, if not Alex could have committed the crime. Well, the strange thing is that as investigators started to look into the deaths of Paul and Maggie, they found other unsolved crimes that were connected to the Murdof family. The state reopened an investigation from 2015, a case involving a boy named Stephen Smith, who had been found dead by the side of the road. Smith was 19 years old when he died in 2015.

He graduated from Wade Hampton High School in Hampton County the previous year, was a straight-A student and was classmates with Alex's oldest son, Buster. Smith attended Orangeburg Calhoun Technical College after graduating high school, and according to the police reports, Smith's car ran out of gas while he was driving home from night classes, and so he decided to walk the rest of the way on the last day of his life. The initial investigation into Smith's death was led by the South Carolina Highway Patrol, and they investigated it as a hit and run, but later determined there was no evidence he was actually

hit by a vehicle at all. In fact, while officially said to be a hit and run, the young man actually had a gunshot wound above his right eye. The rest of his injuries didn't match what would have been caused by a car accident. The circumstances surrounding Smith's death are still unknown to this day, and he was never given justice. All Stephen's mother had was a tip left by an anonymous college, who said it was connected to the Murdoz somehow. Normally, random tip like that wouldn't hold too much weight, but the fact that Smith was shot in the face and it was called a hit and run means that someone with a lot of power was able to call that case however they wanted.

And there aren't a lot of people who can pull that off, but the Murdof family, with their deep roots down there, would probably be able to. Plus, on top of that, investigators began looking into another Murdof family case. that of Gloria Satterfield, the family's housekeeper who died in 2018 after Maggie called 911 claiming Satterfield had fallen down the stairs. Satterfield, I've been the family's caretaker for a long time and according to sources. She told several people that Paul would kill small animals and disobey authority, meaning the boy had issues. After her funeral, Mr. Murdaugh introduced her two adult sons to a lawyer who he said would take care of them, but the son's

said in a recent lawsuit that they did not know the lawyer, Corey Fleming, was a close friend of Mr. Murdoz. Mr. Fleming reached a $4.3 million settlement with Mr. Murdoch, and he was supposed to send about $2.8 million to Miss Sutterfield's sons. But they have stated that they've never received any money as of yet. Based on the Murdof family's accounts, Satterfield's family had long assumed she had tripped over their dogs and fallen down their front steps, but, the local coroner was never notified of her death and no autopsy was ever performed.

Her death is also listed on her death certificate as natural, which doesn't correspond with an accidental fall. So, just like Stephen, her real cause of death is still unknown. As the mysterious death surrounding the Murdaws was being revealed, a sense of intrigue grew around the murders of Paul and Maggie. But very few details were ever released about the attack, and no arrests were made for more than a year. During that time period, however, Alex himself almost lost his life. Alex's financial crimes were exposed, including his theft of millions of dollars from clients

and his family law firm. His partners forced him out in September of 2021, just three months after the double murder, and Alex was banned from practicing law together in South Carolina, and his name removed from the firm, formerly known as the Murdaugh, firm. And then check this out. The day after Alex was forced out of the firm, he was shot in the head while changing a tire on the side of the road. The shot only caused minor damage and he was able to call for help, and then he entered rehab for opioid addiction just days after that. And it was there that

the truth was revealed when he admitted to lawyers that he had actually hired someone to kill him. Ms. Summelan was Curtis Smith, his distant cousin, client, and alleged drug dealer. He said he did this so he could leave Buster his son the proceeds from his $10 million insurance policy. He then turned himself in to Hampton County Law Enforcement on September 16, 2021, in connection with the suicide for hire scam. And then, finally, on July 14, 2022, Alex was charged with two counts of murder. The prosecution claims he was the only one who could have fatally shot his wife and son in rural South Carolina over the specific details about how he did it whenever made public.

At a bond hearing on July 20th, Mr. Murdoch entered a not guilty plea. According to his attorneys, he wanted to start the trial process right away, and they said, Alex wants his family friends and everyone to know that he did not have anything to do with the murders of Maggie and Paul. He loved them more than anything in the world. But Alex was ordered to remain in jail, where he has been since October of 2021, on other charges as he awaits trial. The current list of charges against Alex includes forgery, money laundering, and breach of trust. And these charges against Alex have not yet received a plea from him.

He's being held in custody on a $7 million bond. For now, the beaches say they are still searching for justice for their late daughter, Mallory, because although Paul has already gone, they say justice and justice in a corrupt world. As for the murders of Paul and Maggie may still remain a mystery. Who could have killed them? Was it really Alex? And if it was, what was his motive? Well, only time will tell. So that's going to do it, guys, for this week's episode of Everytown.

Hope you enjoyed it. Please check out some other episodes if you haven't already. Let us know in the comments. have any stories you want us to cover. And remember, tune in next week for another episode filled with scary, strange, and mysterious stories. Because you never know. Maybe your town will be next.