Murdaugh Murders Podcast - MMP #55 - What Happened To Hakeem Pinckney? Part Two

Episode Date: August 3, 2022

Today we take a deeper dive into how former Hampton County attorney Alex Murdaugh and former Palmetto State Bank CEO Russell Laffitte allegedly defrauded a deceased quadriplegic man — and then tried to cover their tracks. We show once again that there is no “bottom” in the world of South Carolina’s good ole boys. Also on the episode, Liz Farrel gives you a behind the scenes look at Laffitte’s federal bond hearing and Mandy updates you on Dick Harpootlian’s motion for a gag order in the murder case. Plus spirited analysis from Eric Bland and Justin Bamberg. Learn more about our friend Luge Hardman's book, Life After Loss by clicking this link: https://amzn.to/3zhfCpz Stay Tuned, Stay Pesky and Stay in the Sunlight...☀️ Please consider donating to the ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Justice For Stephen Go Fund Me⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Premium Members ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠also get access to ad-free listening, searchable case files, written articles with documents, case photos, episode videos and exclusive live experiences with our hosts on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠lunasharkmedia.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ all in one place. ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠CLICK HERE⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to learn more: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/3BdUtOE⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Check out our LUNASHARK Merch 👕⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ What We're Buying... ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://amzn.to/4cJ0eVn ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Advertising is curated by the talented team at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠AdLarge Media⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. *** ALERT: If you ever notice audio errors in the pod, email ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠[e-mail]⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and we'll send fun merch to the first listener that finds something that needs to be adjusted! *** For current & accurate updates: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠bsky.app/profile/mandy-matney.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠bsky.app/profile/elizfarrell.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠TrueSunlight.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠instagram.com/mandy_matney⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠facebook.com/TrueSunlightPodcast/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram.com/TrueSunlightPod⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠instagram.com/elizfarrell⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠youtube.com/@LunaSharkMedia⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠tiktok.com/@lunasharkmedia Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I don't know how it is possible that I continue to be surprised by how low Ehrlich Murdoch was apparently willing to go to allegedly steal millions of dollars from his clients. But after Liz dug up more on the Hakeem Pinkney case, I am beyond shocked. Not only by what Ehrlich and Russell Lafitte apparently did in the aftermath of Hakeem's death, but also by Hampton County's probate court. which is supposed to be protecting people's estates from getting plundered. And yet again, we are reminded of the many, many layers of corruption in this case. My name is Mandy Matney.

I have been investigating the Murdoch family for more than three years now. This is the Murdoch Murdoch Murders podcast with David Moses and Liz Pharrell. As usual, we have a lot to cover in this episode. But before we get into any of that, I want to take a moment and commend Liz Farrell for her phenomenal work on this case recently. As some of you might have noticed, I have taken a little bit of a step back covering the day-to-day insanity of this case that just keeps spiderwebbing. Before Liz came on board last year, I found myself in a really bad place mentally due to the stress of trying to stay on top of this case that just kept getting larger instead of smaller. I knew if the podcast was going to continue, I had to take a step back from some of the day-to-day stuff. I'm a hard worker at heart, but I also know that burnout is serious and staying strong mentally is absolutely essential to the work that we do here every week.

When I say Liz is a hero in this case, I really mean it. Liz has been my right or die in this from day one. When she took a break from journalism, she was the one pushing me to expose every single month. monster in this case. She has always been the one screaming, we can't let them get away with this, and helping me find ways to drag so many vampires into the sunlight. And she doesn't get nearly enough credit. It truly takes a village to disrupt the good old boy system, and we all should be cheering Liz on right now. In the last week, Liz has not only published a phenomenal and shocking investigative report on the haunting details in the Hakeen Pinkney case, she also drove to Charleston

and covered the Russell Lafitte federal bond hearing, all of which we will discuss in this podcast. Plus, Liz has been staying on top of the double homicide case and making sure the public officials in this case know that we are watching them, which is so important. Again, this podcast is not here for your entertainment. We are here to expose the truth, give a voice to victims, and get the story straight. We are here to hold people accountable. We know a lot of the powerful men we call out in this podcast are listening. And no one wants to sound bad on a podcast with millions of listeners around the world.

We hope they're all paying attention. So before we talk about the latest in the Hakeem Pinckney case, I want to update you about what's happening with Ehrlich's murder case in the gag order that we've all been eagerly awaiting. On Monday morning, the South Carolina Attorney General's office appears to be negotiating the terms of the gag order with Elex attorneys behind closed doors. This is a big deal.

This is the exact opposite of what we should be seeing right now. But then, on Tuesday afternoon, We learned that Judge Clifton Newman denied the gag order that Ehrlich's attorneys and the prosecution strangely agreed to. In his order, Newman said, quote, the public is entitled to know how justice is being administered. Judge Newman, who is widely respected in all corners of the courtroom, has shown that he is a judge who makes his decisions based on the law and the Constitution. He is not someone who's basing his decisions on whether one of the attorneys standing in front of him is a former frat brother or a state senator or a friend of a friend. He has been a clear champion of transparency and he believes that public hearings should be held in public. While all judges should believe this, the law is clear. It says courts should be public.

This is a good day for justice. And we're going to celebrate that, but we are not naive to think that this is it. We know that ELEC's defense team will continue to poke at the system until the very last minute, but we will be watching every step of the way. Elix murder case is the first big test of whether South Carolina plans to turn over a new leaf and actually conduct the public's business in public. For far too long. Men like Elic Murdoch have gotten to dictate the terms of their own accountability far away from the public eye.

For generations across the state, but particularly in the 14th Circuit, powerful families have been able to operate behind a very thick wall of secrecy when it comes to what goes down in South Carolina's courts. They have been allowed to negotiate terms that are favorable to them and them only. And we're afraid that what we're seeing here is already history repeating itself. So after we published last week's episode on Wednesday morning, Russell Lafitte, the former CEO of Palmetto State Bank and one of Elyke Murdoch's alleged co-conspirators in the theft of around $2 million from a handful of clients

appeared in federal court to be arraigned on five charges of conspiracy and bank fraud. After Murdox Bond hearing on July 20th, the U.S. Attorney's Office announced that Russell Lafitte had been indicted for allegedly using his role at the bank to help further Elyx alleged scheme to steal millions. Liz went to the hearing, so she's going to give you a quick rundown about what happened. The hearing was held at the federal courthouse in Charleston, which is about 90 minutes north of where we live in the low country. I got to the courthouse early, as did Russell Lafitte. I almost literally ran into him as I rounded the corner to the courtroom five waiting room. This was a bit awkward given that I had published a huge investigative piece on him the night before. But he was friendly, I will say that.

I gave him a pan of hello and immediately backed away because he was alone in the waiting room and talking to one of his attorneys. I went and sat by the bathrooms and spent the next 40 minutes watching his family walk by. He had a lot of family with him, by the way. That stands in stark contrast to the hearings that have been held for his red-headed pal, the quote-unquote bank customer. That's how the federal indictment refers to Ehrlich. He's the bank customer. Now, the hearing was short and very orderly, which is good,

because we were not allowed to take our recorders or any electronics into the courtroom. It makes it a whole lot easier to take notes when the judge speaks clearly and with the objective of being understood, which is not always a goal of state judges in South Carolina. During the hearing, Russell's attorney, Matt Austin, told the court that while Russell admits to doing the things he's accused of, he never thought he was committing a crime in doing so. Meaning, Russell's defense seems to be that he wasn't doing this to steal money from people.

Eric Bland and his partners were at the hearing. They represent two sisters for whom Russell served as conservator back in the day. Russell is accused of using one of the sisters' conservator accounts, as a personal piggy bank in which he gave himself eight below-market interest rate loans, and gave ELEC 14 below-market interest rate and unsecured loans, according to the federal indictment. They allegedly pay back that money using money stolen from other clients of Ehrlich, including that of Hakeem Pinckney and his cousin.

During the hearing, Eric and one of his partners, Ronnie Richter, spoke on behalf of the Plyler sisters. One of the sisters, Eleania, attended the hearing with her husband. She's a really cool person, and like with all the victims, she is now having to revisit a painful past because of what Ehrlich and Russell allegedly did. Eric and Ronnie asked the judge for a significant bond to send a message to people serving as conservators and personal representatives in the state that this isn't their money. Ultimately, the judge decided to give Russell a $500,000 bond secured with $25,000 cash. He was also assigned another ankle monitor. Apparently, the state ankle monitor is going to come off at some point if it hasn't already.

I talked to Eric about the hearing over the weekend, and here's what he had to say. And just so you can follow along better, Russell's attorneys are Matt Austin, who was a former state and federal prosecutor, and Bart Daniel, who was a former U.S. attorney for the District of South Carolina. Emily Limehouse is prosecuting the case for the United States. very surprised on a number of fronts. One, I was surprised that Matt Austin basically said that he agreed with the facts for the most part in what we said and what Emily Limehouse said and I guess what we've said all along when we made our public statements about the Plyler sisters but he said it wasn't criminal behavior. I was really taken back by Mark Daniel because he's really a reserved lawyer and I think he was going, you know, a little hard at defending Russ

at that bond hearing. You know, don't forget at the end of the day, if you're going to quibble with, well, he borrowed money from a conservatorship account and he's going to say, well, I had some kind of approval even though there's not a court order to do it. He did know that when Hannah Plyler turned 18 years old, that there wasn't the money in her account and he had to have cooperated with Alex to get that money from Arthur Badger and Hakeem Pickney. So it really is a true Ponzi scheme that was being run. And for Bart Daniel to act like that that's not criminal, even if you're going to get beyond the borrowing of money at 2.5%

and doing it as a conservator without a court order, without an independent loan committee, and then loaning money to Alex when he's an extreme, credit risk and, you know, was obviously in the watch list because he had a number of loans that were non-performing. Even if you get beyond that, just the sole act of taking money from other accounts that pay Hannah Blyler when she turned 18 is a crime in and of itself. So I just don't see where Russ feels like he's going to get anywhere. At the hearing, Bart Daniel asked the judge for not a gag order per se, but some sort of

sort of warning to attorneys not to talk about this case to the media. Though he didn't say to whom he was referring, he likely meant Eric. This isn't the first time attorneys in this case have tried to shut him up. At any rate, the judge didn't go for it. Here's Eric with more about that. You know, Bark Daniel threw down the gauntlet when he tried to, you know, get the judge to admonish lawyers about following the rules of professional conduct. We wake up every day and know what the rules of professional conduct are. And we follow the rules of professional conduct. All lawyers, mostly all lawyers do. And I don't need another lawyer to throw a subliminal message. You know, we're watching you and, you know, we think you're violating the rules of professional

conduct. Now, this is this is bare-knuckle litigation, okay? This is bare-knuckle stuff. And I am going to correct the record every single time I hear a lawyer say, oh, my client didn't do anything wrong. If he didn't do anything wrong, then why'd you steal money for Martha Badger and Hakeen Pickney to pay my clients? Why wasn't the money there when they turned 18 years old? So, no, nobody's going to chill me. You know, you saw the way Bart looked when we were outside the courthouse and he walked by. I mean, I could see his eyes through the sunglasses as he was looking at us when we were talking. And we'll be right back. Even though the federal and state indictments have given us a lot of details about the crimes Russell Lafitte is accused of committing.

It wasn't until we laid everything that we knew out about the Hakeem Pinkney case that we were able to truly grasp the sinister nature of what these two men are accused of doing. We're going to take you through some of the highlights from the case so you can hear for yourself what allegedly went on. This project took Liz. about two months and involved a ton of reporting. The story pieces together information for more than 2,000 documents, from social media accounts, and from several interviews with key sources that help provide background. The story starts out in 2009 when Hakeem Pinckney, his mother, sister, and cousin were in a catastrophic crash on I-95 in Hampton County. Elyke Merdock, and one of his former

law partners represented Hakeem, a 19-year-old deaf man who was now a quadriplegic because of the crash. In 2010, Russell Lefeet, who did not have any other connection to this family, began serving as a conservator for Hakeem and his cousin, Natasha Thomas, who was around 13 years old when the crash occurred. For around two years, Hakeem lived in a nursing home in Aiken County, which is about two hours from his home in Yemisee. The entire time he lived there, he was waiting for his case to settle so that his family could afford to hire the at-home care he would need to live at home again. In October 2011, though, Hakeem's ventilator reportedly became unplugged and he ended up dying as a result. He died four days after the case settled for millions of dollars. The timing of this has always

struck us as very unusual, especially when you look at the number of mysterious deaths attached to the Murdoch family. We are not sure whether there is more to the how of Hakim's death because his medical files are private and no police reports were ever filed. As it relates to the litigation, though, here's what we think happened. ELEC and PMPED refused to settle the case at mediation because they knew this case was very, very valuable. But something happened a few months after their mediation. Around October 7, 2011, that seems to have changed their minds. Now, the timeline of when Hakeem's ventilator became unplugged

and when he was taken to the hospital and how long they stayed there is not known. A wrongful death suit that was later filed on behalf of PMPED never went into any details, which again is very odd. So it's important to first note that as far as lawsuits go, Hakeems was worth a lot of money. He was going to require intensive care around the clock for the rest of his life, and he was very young when this happened, so he had a lot of living to do. This is all to say,

Ehrlich knew he would be making a lot of money personally from this case. Here is the tough part. While Hakeem's life was worth a lot of money, his death, unfortunately, was not. The insurance company payout would be a lot less if the settlement occurred after Hakeem's death. In other words, his death would have meant a lot less money coming Alex's way. So around October 7, 2011, there appears to be some sort of rush to settle this case which they have been holding out on. Like I said, we don't know the timeline of Hakeem's death, meaning when he was admitted to the hospital, we don't know if he was on life support leading up to his death. But Facebook posts from Hakeem's friends starting around October 9th, 2011, seemed to indicate that he was indeed on life support and his death was imminent. He died at 1 p.m. October 11, 2011.

During the lead-up to Hakeem's and his family's case settling, Russell had, quote, managed Hakeem and Natasha's estates, which were worth about $0.0.0. The really unsettling thing here is that he took about $75,000 in fees, $75,000 from Hakeem and Natasha's settlements to compensate himself for that work, the work of managing no dollars in. no sense for them. In the hours after Hakeem died, Russell appears to have purchased a multi-million

dollar annuity on Hakeem's behalf, and it appears that he represented to the insurance company that Hakeem was still alive at this point. Russell also decided to name Hakeem's mother as the sole beneficiary of this annuity, even though state law dictates that both Hakeem's mother and father were supposed to be his beneficiaries. is important. While it's refreshing that neither Russell nor Ehrlich is accused of stealing the money that paid for this annuity, Hakeem's death meant that Russell had no authority to do that, nor did he have the authority to decide who Hakeem's beneficiaries would be. This, of course, resulted in a huge mess. Around the time the wrongful death case settled about three years

after Hakeem's death, Hakeem's father, Melvrick Edwards, entered the picture. Now we don't know whether another lawyer at P&BED with whom Ehrlich was working the case, one who specializes in nursing home deaths and generally has a good reputation for working hard, had contacted Melvrick. Because he knew that Melvrick would be entitled to half of the settlement, he had just won for Hakeem's estate. But this really doesn't seem likely. And this presented a big problem for Ehrlich and Russell because now they had to cover their alleged and very sloppy tracks.

Melvrick's involvement now opened them up to the possibility of someone finding out the circumstances of the 2011 settlement, the post-mortem purchase of an annuity policy on Hakeem's behalf, as well as the Liberty Russell Lafitte took with naming Hakeem's beneficiary. Oh yeah, and as we know now, they were secretly borrowing clients' money and had allegedly stolen around $700,000 from Hakim and Natasha. And as we now know, there was a lot on the line here. Eric Blan represents Hakeen Pinkney's father in the case, so he's going to tell you about the situation. I mean, it's just another sad chapter in the Russ and Alex show. And that's the case of picking winners and losers. And they just decided that the winner was going to be Pamela Picnickney,

and the loser was going to be Melvick Edwards. Hakeem Pickney did not have any children and he didn't have a spouse. So his money that was recovered from his lawsuit that was preserved, and then the money that was recovered from the wrongful death lawsuit against the nursing home should have been split equally between his natural parents. Melvick Edwards, who was his father, and Pamela picked me. And I get it. You know, Pamela did not like Melvick.

They weren't married, and in her eyes she didn't view that Melvick was a good father to Hakeem. But Hakeem died without a will. And if you die without a will and you don't have children, don't have spouse in our state, the money is divided equally amongst the parents by statute. And to further compound the problem, Melbert suffers from schizophrenia for the last 30 years of his life, and he was in and out of group homes and in and out of mental hospitals and did in a mental hospital since essentially 2012. Russ, as a conservator, and he was the conservative for Hakeem.

He bought an annuity, a structured annuity from that life. the same day that the coroner announced the death of Hakeem. The problem is, if you're a conservator, you're only a conservator as long as your ward is alive. When your ward takes his last breath, your duty's end. Now, if you're doing something, you have an obligation to finish it up. You know, if it's, you know, if you're going to the bank and you're going to deposit the money, deposit the money. or, you know, but you don't do something completely new because that would be the job of a personal representative.

The problem is that after Hakeem died at 1 o'clock in October of 2011 on October 11, 2011, Russ, at 3.15 p.m. bought this annuity, and he named the beneficiary he picked a winner to be Pam. Again, after Hakeem's death, Russell Liffin. completed an application for a multi-million dollar annuity that was calculated using Haqeem's life expectancy, which he didn't have anymore because he was dead. Hakeem's name appears to have been painted over with Whiteout, and Russell appears to have written his name on top of it, noting that it was for the benefit of Hakeem. what happens is he's trying to cover his tracks there's no place for him to write in the time but he writes next to his name 315 p.m.

And as you astutely point out in your article in not one single other document that Russ signed did he put the time next to his signature except on this. He used the measuring life as Hakeem and Hakeem had already been dead. And then in November, the annuity comes through, and it says the same thing that the conservator is Russ Lafee, the measuring life is Hakeem. And this annuity is purchased. Maybe MetLife would have priced the annuity differently if they knew that Hakeem was dead. I don't know that. I suspect that MetLife is going to ask some questions about this after your article. I do suspect that MetLife is going to raise the specter.

of whether this is, you know, whether they were defrauded. It seems pretty clear that Ehrlich at least knew that he crossed a line here. Because almost three years later, he had to figure out a quick solution for cutting Melvrick Edwards out of millions of dollars. And Alex brings this lawsuit against a nursing home and there's a recovery. Again, he dies in test date. It's got to go through. through the probate court, AMA's the PR, and money's recovered.

Well, all of a sudden, people start to realize, hey, Melvrick is out there. And Melbrick, the father, is entitled to 50% of the intestate estate of Hakeem. And they start to realize, well, you know, if they challenge this annuity, Melvrick is going to be entitled to 50% of those annuity funds if it turns out that Russ was not authorized to purchase it post-death, post-death of Hakeem. And so I don't know the circumstances of how Melvick got to his lawyers, Kirk Morgan and Will Walker.

I know that Tyrone, his brother, was involved. I know that there was a fee agreement that was strangely signed with Tyrone being the client, even though under no circumstances could he ever be the client. I know that if you look at the court record, they were moving to have Tyrone be appointed as a conservator for Melbroke, and that failed, and then he got a power of attorney. But at the end of the day, Melbroke Edwards, I always use this expression, And, you know, he traded his birthright for a bullforge. He, in return for settling for $340,000.

As they were settling the case, in April 2014, though, and this looks really, really bad, Melvick's attorney sent an email to Eleg telling him this. I should mention that time is of the essence on this. Melvork's brother, Tyrone Edwards, has the power of attorney to make financial decisions on behalf of Melvrick at this time. However, Melvrick will be released from the mental health facility in the very near future, which may complicate this settlement considerably if Melvrick decides to revoke the power of attorney upon his release.

While he noted that Melvrick was fine with the terms of the settlement, it also seemed super suspicious for his lawyer to say this. His lawyer's job was to represent him. But honestly, it's not clear whose interest Melvrick's attorney was. was serving in this. We do know this attorney and his law firm work closely with ELEC, PMPED, and Moss Coon, and Fleming over the years. And Melbrick is, you know, he has issues. And so it is difficult communicating with him. Sometimes, you know, he's extremely lucid. He's extremely well-spoken, very sharp, intuitive man.

And then other times, you realize that he is compromised. I think the lawyers wanted to somebody that they could talk to with the claim. And you published that April 2014 memo from Will Walker, which is the most devastating language I have ever heard. It is absolutely selling your client down the bike. When you say, hey, we've got to get this done. Tyrone tells us that Melvrick may be discharged in two weeks, and when he gets out, he may not go along with what we're trying to do.

Well, if you say that, then you know that your client is cognizant enough that he won't like that deal, selling his birthright for a bowl of porridge, and they rushed it through. Even though Melvrick was entitled to half of the personal injury lawsuit from 2011, it looks like they instead gave him around half of the $650,000 wrongful death settlement. And in doing so, they had Melvrick's brother. sign a document that included a promise that Melvrick wouldn't sue Russell Lefeet in the future for anything that occurred while he was conservator. If you're asking how did they come up with such a low figure, Ehrlich allegedly threatened Melvrick's attorney that he'd use his power at the

Hampton County Probate Court to disinherit Melvrick. And no lawyer that I know of, we've talked to a lot of experts, can winked who ran for governor, who is our expert witness in the Melbroke, Kevin Edwards case is a probate court expert. He said that there was virtually zero chance that any probate court would ever have disinherited Melvrick. You know, the threat was that Alex was going to go before the probate court and go before Judge Ode and get a declaration that Melvick was a bad, bad father. And he should be disinherited, quite frankly, and Wingate laughed and said it wouldn't happen. because again, that's taking away what Hakeem may not have wanted. Hakeen may not have wanted Melvrick to be disinherited.

He may have loved his father. He may have understood that his father was schizophrenic and that he wouldn't want him to be disinherited. And it's just highly offensive that people pick winners and losers when we have a state statute that does that by law. And we'll be right back. One of the things I learned in reporting this story was how important and utterly confusing probate court can be. I know we say this about every person and entity allegedly involved in Ehrlich's alleged schemes.

Really, without the ability to use what, and I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt here, the seemingly permissive and trusting Hampton County probate court, Ehrlich would not have been able to have allegedly stolen all this money. The same can obviously be said of Russell Lafitte and Peart. Almeadow State Bank, as well as ELEC's former law firm. Every person along the way who could have put a stop to this had they asked one question or taken one minute to look over the documents. Ehrlich needed them all. There are a few things to know about how it appears ELEC used Hampton County Probate Court. The first is that his paperwork is straight up sloppy and haphazard. The documents

filed for his clients are often incomplete and contain a lot of errors. The second thing is this. In South Carolina, a person's estate, whether the person has died or is under a conservatorship, must be opened in the county where that person lived or lives. In the Plyler case, the girls lived in Lexington County. In Hakeem's case, Hakeem lived in Aiken County. And yet their paperwork was filed in Hampton County. It's not clear what Ehrlich's relationship was with Hampton County Probate Judge Sheila Odom, but it is clear that this court was Ehrlich's home turf and he treated it as such.

Eric is really good at making the complexities of South Carolina law understandable. So I'm going to have him tell you more about probate court and how it's supposed to work. Probate court is a guardrail against heirs and loved ones, fighting and taking advantage of a dead person's bounty. That's the bottom line. You know, when somebody dies, it's supposed to be a stop-in-time snapshot. Nobody goes through the house and rifles and snatches the, you know, the Renwar off the wall or the, you know, the Yadro Vaz and walks out. It's a stop in time.

And an inventory of that person's assets have to be done, especially if they died without a will. It's the job of the probate court judge to do an orderly disposition of somebody's estate who dies intestate. And when you have a personal representative or you have a conservator, that person is an officer of the court. And they agree to follow the law and make applications to the probate court. Our Richmond County Probate Court is so good, Liz. I mean, when I am handling a wrongful death claim, I get letters once a quarter from our probate court telling me, tell me what's going on with your lawsuit, what's going on with the estate? is there anything new?

And if you're going to do something, you have to make application to the probate court. And Russ didn't do it. Russ did a lot of it for the Plyler girls. Don't get me wrong. There were a number of applications that he made. And he got orders that said that he could, you know, give them cell phones and buy clothes for them for school and send them the summer camps and buy a car for them when they turned 16. But the real stuff that he didn't get a court approval to was the bigger money stuff.

Loading $1.4 million to himself and the Alex. The job of the judge in the clerk of court is to press that personal representative or the conservator who's handling the money. What is going on? And obviously, that wasn't done in a number of the cases that came out of the Hampton County Probate Court. In South Carolina, probate judges don't have to be lawyers, nor do they need to have a college degree. But they do have to ask questions. They do have to look at the documents. they're signing. They do have to make sure conservatives and personal representatives are filing

regular records of their actions. Let me explain something to you. Everybody, you know, notices Joe McCullough at all these hearings. His wife, Amy McCullough, is a probate court judge in Richland County. Let me tell you what it's like to appear before Amy McCullough. That's a judge that does everything right. You can't just push something under her nose and say, hey, Judge McCullough, this. She wants to know what's being done. Why are you doing this? Why is it necessary? I want to see the invoice to match up to this. Exactly what you said. She holds the hearing on it. Judge McCullough does it right. Now, I'm not saying Judge Boodham did it wrong, but there's some things that happened out of that probate court that should raise concerns. Like automatically taking his gospel,

that Hakeem was a resident of Hampton County. So, you know, Ken Wingate told us there's probate court judges that press you. Well, tell me what you mean. Where do they live in Hampton County? Are they in a hospital or are they in a nursing home? It doesn't seem like any of those questions were asked. Moving forward, Eric said he's hopeful that Melvrick Edwards and the Plyler sisters will see justice and will be made whole by all parties responsible for what had happened to them.

He also said we might be seeing yet another investigation open because of what we found. In fact, I've gotten notice from the Real Forge consulting who bought the annuity. They were the agent who bought the annuity from MetLife, that they said they were duty-bound to have to notify MetLife. of what you and I discovered, which is this post-death purchase of the annuity. That MetLife was unaware of that. He told me that he was going to notify them. I have not heard from them.

I wouldn't be surprised if they, you know, started asking questions and do something similar to what Nautilus did. One of the things that sticks out about how Russell Lafitte handled the Hakeem-Pinkney case is this. In early January 2012, right around when Hakeem and Natasha's settlements came through, Russell ended his conservatorship formally with the Hampton County Probate Court. Now, as we already know, his conservatorship for Hakeem ended the moment Hakeem died. But Natasha was still 15, according to the federal indictment. Russell misrepresented her age as 18 to the court. We're not sure why, but 18 is the natural age that a conservatorship over a minor would end.

So think about this. Before the settlement, Hakeem and Natasha had no money to manage. None. But Russell paid himself $75,000 from their settlement to compensate him for that. And then, at that very moment, when Natasha, a teenager, gets money, a significant, a significant, a significant amount of money. Russell suddenly taps out, his services are no longer needed. That seems really, really bad for Russell. How is he going to be able to explain that? If he was acting as a conservator to Elex clients to quote unquote help them, if that's what he was really doing, then what was the point of being conservator of someone without assets to manage and then ending the arrangement right when they do have money to manage?

It makes no sense. We suspect that probate court judge Sheila Odom, who retired before her term ends this year, is going to have some really hard questions to answer. What was going on at Hampton County Probate Court? Why were Ehrlich Murdoch and Russell Lafitte allowed to do the things they did? Why didn't anyone stop them? Why didn't they protect the people who they were supposed to? supposed to be protecting. We have heard nothing about investigations that might be happening

about the judges in the saga, the investigations that need to be happening. But now that murder charges have been filed, we're hoping a lot more attention will get paid to all of the people and all of the good old boys and all of the systems that seem to have helped Elyke Murdoch in one way or another over the years while absolutely failing the rest of us, especially the people they hurt. The system is not fine, and we will not rest until we get answers and accountability and justice for the victims. Stay tuned. Now for some positive news to end the episode on. This week, Attorney Justin Bamberg confirmed that Palmetto State Bank and the Parker Law Group, previously known as PMPED, have reached a settlement with a number of

Ehrlich Murdoch's financial victims who are now being represented by Justin Bamberg, including the Pinkney family. Details of the settlement, including the amount, could not be disclosed due to terms of the agreement. But we did talk to Justin about the settlement this week. I think it's fair to say that on, you know, the Pinkney matter has resolved. You know, we reached a settlement with PMPED and with Palmetto State Bank, which included Russell Lafitte. Okay. And, you know, I can't talk on amounts and stuff like that, but I will say that the resolution was one. It needed to happen.

Everybody realized that. It did happen. I mean, honestly speaking, the firm, the bank, whoever, if they wanted a long, drawn-out, legal fight with the Pinckney family. That is something that they could have chosen to do, and they didn't. And we were able to work it out in a way that worked for everybody. And I think there's something to be said there because they've been through enough. While a settlement was reached with some of the parties, Justin Bamberg was clear. He is not done yet in this case. And Ellick is up next. We're not done in terms of claims.

We are still pursuing Alec Murdoch to get the Pinkney family's respective share of whatever the co-receivers can compile in terms of Alex's assets. I mean, Alex owes so many people. I don't know that anybody will ever get everything they're due from him. But again, when you ask yourself what justice in this case with him, in terms of a settlement, civil side or civil planes, it's really, a half is what's going to. now, you know, the criminal prosecution of him, unrelenting pursuits of him getting prison time for what he did to these people. And then on the civil side, it's not even about how much you get from him. It's about how little is left for himself at the end of this process. You know, like, he should have nothing. I don't care about the amount of money that these victims got in the

settlement. That is their business, not mine. But I do care about how they feel after all of this, especially Miss Pamela Pinkney, who has been a bright light in this very dark story. If you remember, we spoke to Miss Pamela in episode 28, and the interview was heartbreaking. So I asked Justin, how is Miss Pamela doing after the settlement? Does she feel like she's getting some justice? There's a degree of weight that lands on your shoulders when you find out something horrible had taken place and that Alex had stolen money from you, betrayed you, you know, that Russell Lafitte was involved with Alex, you know, and Corey Fleming. And there's a certain weight that that puts on your shoulders because now you're dealing with

not just reliving Akeem's death, reliving your own, you know, bodily distortion that took place because of your injuries. And now you know people are lying to it. So there is a large weight that in part lifted off the shoulders because of being able to put this behind her. You know, because at the end of the day, it's not that any of this was really about money as much as it was about accountability and about, you know, the right thing happening to people, her and others, the right thing happening to people who had been done wrong by Alex and Russell and court, you know, and I mean, it's a little bit relieving. There's a sigh of relief there.

Just like there was a sigh of relief when Russell Lefeet gets indicted by the Fed. You know, it's all these things that went wrong in life. And now, because of the hard work of a lot of people and reporters like you and lawyers like Eric and me and his partner Ronnie Richter and others, you know, for a lot of these people, it's like, you know what, something good is finally happening to me. The Murdoch Murder's podcast is created by me, Maniq. Mattie and my fiance, David Moses. Our executive editor is

Liz Farrell. Produced by Luna Shark Productions.