Murdaugh Murders Podcast - Prelude To Murdaugh Murders Trial + ‘Tombstone’ Friends and the Good Ole Boy Enablers (S01E76)

Episode Date: January 18, 2023

Alex Murdaugh’s double-murder trial is set to begin amid new revelations about the “tombstone buddies” who have enabled his behavior throughout the years. Who are these friends and what secrets have they been keeping for the son of one of South Carolina’s most powerful families? Mandy Matney and Liz Farrell are putting together all the pieces and once again have found themselves looking at two distinct systems of justice.  Consider joining our MMP Premium Membership community to help us SHINE THE SUNLIGHT! CLICK HERE to learn more: https://bit.ly/3BdUtOE SUNscribe to our free email list to get alerts on bonus episodes, calls to action, new shows and updates. CLICK HERE to learn more: https://bit.ly/3KBMJcP And a special thank you to our sponsors: Microdose.com, VOURI, and others. Use promo code "MANDY" for a special offer! Find us on social media: Facebook.com/MurdaughPod/ Instagram.com/murdaughmurderspod/ Twitter.com/mandymatney YouTube.com/c/MurdaughMurders Support Our Podcast at: https://murdaughmurderspodcast.com/support-the-show Please consider sharing your support by leaving a review on Apple at the following link: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/murdaugh-murders-podcast/id1573560247 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I don't know what secrets will be revealed in the double homicide trial next week, but we expect to finally get answers to some of the biggest questions we've had throughout this investigation. And we hope that Ellic Murdoch's enablers are exposed for their alleged roles to the point where the system can no longer ignore it. My name is Mandy Matney. I have been investigating the Murdoch family for almost four years now. This is the Murdoch Murders podcast written by Liz Farrell and produced by my husband,

David Moses. So, 575 very long days ago, we published our first episode of the Murdoch Murders podcast. It was 12 minutes long and took us 60 hours to make. I stumbled through every line and I had so much trouble that at times I had to record a lot of sentences word by word. The first episode opened with the basics. I don't know who killed Maggie and Paul.

I don't know who killed Stephen Smith. I don't know if anyone killed Gloria Satterfield, but I think I know who killed Mallory Beach. At the time, even though the Murdoch saga was the craziest true crime story I had ever heard of, I didn't think we had enough content for more than 10 episodes, at best. But we learned that pressure breaks pipes. And the more we dug into this story, the rabbit holes multiplied and the Murdoch saga turned into something we've never seen before, five deaths allegedly tied to one family, millions of stolen dollars missing, and a handful of powerful people attached to this never ending

criminal ring. Since that first podcast, Elik Murdoch has been charged with more than 90 counts for a wide range of crimes, from money laundering to forgery, to assisted suicide for hire, to the biggest one of all, the murders of his wife and son. In the eyes of the public, Elik Murdoch has deteriorated from a rich and powerful man who tragically lost his wife and son into a despicable human being who is capable of any evil, or at least that's how I see him now. While the murder investigations seem to stand still in the eyes of the public for so long

in 2021, we dove into Elik's actions related to the other cases, and piece by piece we showed the world who this man is. In the Boe Crash investigation, we saw Elik's true colors finally start to emerge in a way that we could articulate on the record. Before then, all we got was background comments that alluded to Elik being sketchy or a jerk, but nothing painted a clear picture. Then we got the Boe Crash investigation files, which told us a lot about Elik Murdoch. A Buford Memorial Hospital on the night Mallory died, hospital workers described Elik's

horrific and appalling behavior. They described a man more concerned about covering up for his son's drunken mistakes than he was about the fact that a teenage girl was missing. Don't worry about her. He's gone. Elik was heard saying as he moved from room to room in an apparent effort to not only protect his family name, but all of their secrets too. And then, through the Satterfield investigation, we saw more of Elik's true colors that kept

getting darker. We learned that Elik stole millions of dollars from the family of his dead housekeeper, the woman who raised his children, and he did this after looking her boys in the eye and telling them that he would take care of them. Elik stole every dime of the settlement, even though Gloria's son was being evicted from his home, and Elik knew that. If Elik had given the Satterfields just $500,000 of that settlement, the only part available to the public, I honestly don't think that we would be preparing for a murder trial right

now. I don't know if Elik would have been charged at all. Then, we kept learning more that Elik stole from the family of Hakim Pinkney, a death quadriplegic man, even after his death. And then we learned that he took money from the Plylar Girls account, who were children at the time who lost their mother and brother in a horrific crash. And now here we are, days away from the double homicide trial, where Elik stands accused of arguably one of the most horrific crimes.

The murders of his wife and son. In the worst part of all of this, Elik undoubtedly had help, and he did all of this while emboldened by the badge of the solicitor's office, where his father, grandfather, and great-grandfather reigned at the helm of low-country law enforcement for nearly a century. The other day, I was watching some national news show about the Murdoch case and something stuck out to me. The host, after quickly explaining all of the deaths and missing millions and powerful connections to this case, stared with a blank look on his face and asked one of the talking

heads on the show, something like, but what about this case makes people so interested? As if the spiderwebs of crimes that have unraveled since the 2019 boat crash in the fall of a family dynasty wasn't enough to capture a worldwide audience. I've thought about this question a lot in the last couple weeks, and I think it's something that a lot of mainstream media reporters covering this case fail to understand. It was never a who-done-it mystery. It was more like, what did Elik get involved in that led to so much death and destruction in his own family.

And also, how many powerful people were involved in this. That was the mystery. In the only real who-done-it mystery I think in all of this is the Steven Smith case, because it's very clear the corruption occurred and unfortunately we still don't know who killed Steven or why the Murdoch name came up as many times as it did in the investigation. Or do we know what Sled found during the course of the double homicide investigation that made them reopen Steven's case? But what makes the Murdoch saga so interesting is not the who, but the how.

How did these people get away with so much for so long? How did so many others look away when they knew that Elik Murdoch was up to no good? How many lawyers, judges, and police officers compromise their own integrity to prop up this good ol' boy system that hurts so many people? And now that we know everything that we know, will those in power actually do the right thing told everyone responsible, not just a select few? That is my main concern right now. And my hope for this trial is that so much is exposed as the media shines the brightest

light on South Carolina and make it so officials have no choice but to make big change and hold those who are responsible for this mess accountable. It is my hope that the AG's office one day makes it a point to say that their work on this case is far from over even after the trial and that they show the world that the good ol' boy days are over. I had been living in the low country for three years when Randolph Murdoch III retired from the solicitor's office in 2006, but it wasn't until ten years later that I started to understand what that name actually meant.

Like a lot of people who live in the Hilton Head Island area, I'm not only not from here, I'm not a southerner. I don't have relatives who live in the south and most of my friends here are from somewhere else. There is a tiny bubble within the 14th Circuit where the Murdoch's influence doesn't register and that's where I resided until 2016 when a law enforcement source of mine gave me the low down. When this source started out as a cop in the low country, he was told, don't ever let

a Murdoch do a favor for you and be careful about what favors you do for them. He told me about the envelopes of cash that got left in cop's mailboxes after tickets were dropped. He told me about the Murdoch boys and the fights they'd get into on Hilton Head and in Buford. He told me how Randolph got his boys out of trouble all the time, except for once. One time one of the Murdoch boys had to stay in jail overnight according to my source and Randolph was furious.

Not at his son, but at the magistrate who wouldn't make a special exception for him. This source told me about the rumors of missing bodies during the Buster era, of witnesses who were paid to take the stand to testify against defendants, of fixed juries and illegitimate children and boozy parties with some of the most powerful people in the state. He told me that the Murdochs owned half the land in South Carolina because poor clients used to pay them by transferring their property over to them back in the day. They might be the richest people in the low country, he said, but you'd never know it. They're just the nicest people, but you don't want to get on their bad side.

He told me about the times Randolph interfered with cases causing charges to be dropped, and yet Randolph remained a mentor of his. This is how complicated things can be down here. No one is all bad or all good, and this was true of Randolph. He was a pro law enforcement prosecutor, and to investigators this was important. He treated them with respect and kindness, and that went a long way, at least long enough to forgive him when he let them down. The source hounded me about doing a profile on Randolph.

If Randolph says no to the profile, then I should still go meet with him, he said. Because he was such a captivating storyteller, and boy could he tell me some stories about how it was here back in the day. He thought it would help me in my role as a full-time columnist at the island packet. Through this source, Randolph eventually said yes to meeting with me. I put it on my list of potential writing topics, but never got around to making it happen. I used to regret this, but after considering what kind of jovial and passively apologetic column that might have come out of it at that point in time, I'm so glad there's nothing

out there like that with my name on it. Sometime around 2017 or 2018, the source called me after a dinner party with the Murdochs at a Hilton Head restaurant. This is when I learned about Ellick Murdoch and his two sons. The source told me about how loud and obnoxious Randolph's big-headed son was, and how much worse his grandsons were. They call him Handsome Liz, not Grandpa, but Handsome. It's weird, he said.

The story behind this is that Randolph was asked what he'd like his grandchildren to call him, and he said, well, no one's ever called me Handsome before, so how about that? I was told that Ellick was a volunteer solicitor with Duffy Stone's office because Ellick was the threat Randolph held over Duffy's head. If Duffy proved not to be right for the job, then they could always run Ellick against him in the next election. The next time Ellick's name came up was shortly after this dinner. This same source called me, and he was deeply upset.

He'd just heard from a friend in Hampton County that Randolph's grandsons had been involved in the murder of a gay kid in Hampton a few years earlier. They left the kid in the road, and it's not right, he said. Nothing's going to happen because no one in law enforcement will go against the family in Hampton County. By the time the boat crash happened, Mandy and I knew immediately that we had to push hard against the Murdoch Tide if we wanted justice to be served. We had to keep the story in the headlines.

We had to call them out in the most fearless of ways. The boat crash was the beginning of the end for the Murdochs. Mandy and I were talking about this the other day. Paul Murdoch was very drunk the night of the boat crash. His BAC was about three times the legal limit. His alcoholic neuropathy was on full display as he morphed into his drunken alter ego Timmy. Even in the chaos, even in this drunken haze, he instinctively knew two things.

One, immediately blame someone else for the bad thing he did. And two, call Randolph. Paul brazenly blamed the crash on Connor Cook, who was sitting right next to him in the ambulance. And Connor Cook couldn't fight back because of Paul's last name. That's just how it was here. After Maggie and Paul were murdered, I had asked a friend of Randolph's whether the family had told him about the murders. It seemed to me to be the kind of horrid knowledge you might want to spare a family member on

his deathbed, but no, they had told him. My first thought on that was how selfish it was of them. Of course they had told him. They needed his help. Never mind that he was dying and needed peace. My second reaction was perverse satisfaction. I was glad to hear that Randolph Murdock had died, with the knowledge that his family's legacy was going down in flames and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

Everything his family had reaped for generations was about to be sowed. And here we are today. Like Mandy said, this murder trial is about so much more than a rich man who might have killed his own wife and son. It's about accountability in the purest sense of the word. Not just for Alec, but for every single person who has played a role in the care and feeding of the Murdock legacy. It's like Hannah Arendt's banality of evil.

Evil acts are not always perpetrated by specifically evil people. Instead they arise out of a collection of smaller decisions that, in and of themselves, might not be so evil per se. Like looking the other way, just this once, like not speaking up. Saying yes to seemingly harmless favors. Everything everyone has ever done to protect a Murdock will be on trial next week. Because without that complicity, Maggie and Paul might still be alive. Without that complicity, dozens of hurting people might not have had millions stolen

from them. For the past year and a half, Mandy and I have learned that putting together the Murdock puzzle has meant that we constantly have to start over. Like we've said before, each new fact we learn, or new understanding we have, means we have to return to the first stone in the path and re-walk that new route. And that's what we're going to do today. We're going to re-walk the route with our latest understanding of things. Starting with what we know happened before the murders.

On June 7th, 2021, Alec Murdock wanted the world to believe that his family had been targeted because of a boat crash that occurred over two years earlier. According to a filing from the State Attorney General's Office this past fall, within 30 seconds of the police arriving at Moselle, Alec was talking about the murders as vengeance for the crash. This after a 911 call that recorded a quiet Alec Murdock until the operator picked up and he launched into hysterics. In other words, it sounded like he changed his tone when he thought he was being recorded.

From the very beginning, we suspected Alec might be responsible for Maggie and Paul's death, either directly or indirectly. Why? Because nothing else made sense. No one in these parts would kill a Murdock and think that they could get away with it. That is, except for a Murdock. A Murdock could get away with it. At the time, we knew Alec was facing pressure from Mark Tinsley.

We knew that Alec had told Mark that he was broke. We knew that Mark didn't believe that for a second. Why? Because Mark knew Alec. He knew how many cases Alec had brought in. He knew that if Alec was bringing in that many cases, then he was bringing in a lot of money. And if Alec didn't have that money, then where did it go?

An interesting tidbit about Mark Tinsley. Our immediate thought on him in 2019 was that he was a shill, a Murdock-approved lawyer who would represent the Beach family but not go hard on the Murdocks. From what we understand, this is also how Alec, Murdock, and Buster Murdock regarded Mark. But all of us were very, very wrong. And this is why we think Mark Tinsley is going to be one of the state's most important witnesses against Alec Murdock.

Because once Alec understood that Mark wasn't going to play nice, things got bad for him. One of Mark's clients is Morgan Dowdy, Paul's ex-girlfriend and one of Mallory Beach's best friends. For years, Morgan had a front row seat to what went on behind the scenes with Alec and Maggie and Paul and Buster. Alec knew what Morgan had seen. He knew what she could say about his and Maggie's permissive parenting, about the many times they cleaned up Paul's drunken messes, including those involving driving, both on the road

and in the water. And this, well it's a story for another time, but it's not lost on us, that Morgan and another boat crash survivor and client of Mark Tinsley's Miley Altman were in a strange but serious car accident in January 2021, when they were hit by a pickup while driving to work at a Buford boutique owned by the wife of a PMPED partner. This car crash was also right after their settlement was reached with Randolph Murdoch's estate, which is very odd. At any rate, by early June 2021, Alec had good reason to believe that a federal judge

was about to release his insurance company from the obligation of covering the boat crash, which is exactly what happened a few months later. At this same time, he also knew that a state judge was likely going to order him to give Mark a list of his financial accounts, which Mark would have then subpoenaed. This would have undoubtedly led to the end of Alec's career as an attorney. This was set to happen on June 10th, 2021. In fact, on the day of the murders, Alec was apparently handwriting a list of his accounts in anticipation of this.

We'll be right back. As the AG's office and other sources have said, Alec's financial crimes were immediately apparent when you look at his bank records, meaning Mark Tinsley would have seen what was happening and would have been obligated to report it to law enforcement and the firm. In addition to this, we knew that Mark had warned Alec shortly before the murders that if Alec messed with the jury or tried in any way to interfere with the case, that Mark would later sue Maggie and Paul in Buford County, where Alec had much less influence over the outcomes.

Strange that those same two people ended up being murdered shortly after that warning. From the beginning, Mandy and I knew the boat crash played an important role in the murders, just not the role that Alec wanted everyone to believe. We had been hearing that since the crash, Paul's behavior had gotten much worse. Sometime after the murders we learned that Alec and other members of his family were being investigated by the state grand jury for obstruction of justice in the boat crash case. It wouldn't become clear until 2022 whether Alec was aware of this investigation at the

time of the murders. Turns out the state grand jury had subpoenaed for Alec's financial records at least three times in the spring of 2021, so he likely knew. Also we had been hearing that since the crash, Paul's behavior had gotten much worse. We also learned that the weekend before the murders, the credit card Paul used, meaning his parents' credit card, had for the first time in his life been declined. It has also been reported that Maggie was embarrassed because a check she had written to a charity had bounced.

As we all know, the Murdochs were accustomed to getting their bad checks covered, so it's not clear what happened there. When we later were told by a source close to the investigation that Alec had killed Paul out of anger and Maggie over the finances, we remembered the credit card. It is entirely possible that Paul started mouthing off at his father about the declined credit card on that night at Moselle. We don't know for sure, but we're told by a source close to Paul that this would have been within his character to do so.

In late 2021 and early 2022, we began to learn more about Alec's financial crimes, and we learned from a source that even though the official story was that PMPED had discovered Alec's thefts in September 2021, it was actually much earlier than that, as in May 2021. That was a big deal, obviously, but the bigger deal which we learned about last November at Russell Lafitte's trial was this. Earlier on the day, his wife and son were murdered. Alec had been confronted by PMPED about the missing $792,000 fee from a case he had worked on with Bamberg attorney Chris Wilson, his close friend from law school, and not just

confronted, he was given an ultimatum. They told him they wanted proof that the money was where he said it was. Recently we learned from a filing from the state that this wasn't the first time PMPED suspected Alec of misappropriating fees. Sometime in spring 2021, they had asked him about another case. All of these pieces, when put together, create a pretty clear picture that Alec was under serious pressure on June 7th, 2021. Like the AG's office said, the walls were closing in and he was out of options.

He'd already spent the $792,000 as well as all the other money, and was running out of people to ask for the money to pay back the missing fee in full. But also, Randolph was about to die. And Alec likely knew he'd be getting a multi-million dollar inheritance. So how does that reconcile? Well for one, the theft of the money from PMPED would have ended his career no matter what inheritance he got from Randolph. Alec needed to find a quick solution to replace that missing money.

And in the meantime, he needed a big distraction. What he needed was time. According to testimony from Ronnie Crosby, the partners left Alec alone to grieve after the murders. They didn't ask about missing money. But also, according to his testimony, the CFO, Jeannie Seconder, did inquire about it. So in the direct aftermath of the murders, and perhaps despite the murders, Alec was forced to patch together a messy solution.

According to testimony from the Lafitte Trial, in July, Alec borrowed $350,000 from Palmetto State Bank to send to Chris Wilson. Chris allegedly put that money into a trust account and then vouched for Alec's with PMPED, meaning he lied to them, according to Ronnie Crosby. So while Alec is supposed to be grieving, he is instead playing shell games to avoid getting caught. In the meantime, he's also giving Eddie Smith, and apparently others, checks to convert into cash for him.

And during that same time, he allegedly went on at least one quick trip to the Bahamas. If Alec killed Maggie and Paul, it's because he chose to save himself. He needed to buy time to make things right with a law firm. With Paul out of the way, the Boat Crash lawsuit was all but over for the Murdochs. With Maggie out of the way, he could keep his inheritance and spend it the way that he wanted to without interference from his wife. Also, let's not forget that $5 million estate of hers. Back to what we said earlier about Paul blaming Connor and calling Randolph, Paul took after

his father on that one. Now, how can someone just blame someone else for something they did and not worry about repercussions after that? They have to have law enforcement on their side on all levels. Several people in the know have remarked to us at various times that Alec in no way expected the Calton County Sheriff's Office to call in Sled. Sled meant that there would be more accountability. Sled meant that Duffy Stone's office, the same office that was occupied by Alec's

father, grandfather, and great-grandfather, and then Alec still worked for, likely wouldn't prosecute the case against him. Sled meant that the elements of the investigation were further from the Murdoch's reach than they were accustomed to. And next week, we'll learn just how far. Going back to those enablers we talked about earlier, here are some of the things we hope to get answers to or that we have concerns about. First, where are the weapons?

We expect this will be a question that gets exploited by Dick and Jim, but there could be a surprise from law enforcement. Remember this past summer when Sled searched a creek near Randolph Murdoch's house? We don't know what, if anything, they found there. We also know that a rumor among law enforcement was that the weapons were buried with Randolph. Did they explore this? Or was this just some gallows humor? Second, what tales will Alec's GPS tell?

We already know his alibi was basically a big can of play-doh, something his attorneys have been able to mold into whatever shape they need as more information has come available to them. In what ways might his phone and car conflict with the story he told law enforcement? In what ways will technology tell on him and perhaps others? Third, we've heard that Alec had gunshot residue on him, but at what point did they bag his hands? Why is this important?

Because again, when we're talking about enablers, we're talking about the people who either treated Alec like he was any other husband who discovered his wife and son were killed or he was treated like Alec Murdoch. And if he was treated like the latter, which we suspect he was, then how much of the evidence has been tainted by bad evidence collection? How many predictable and preventable conflicts are we going to hear about during this trial? Fourth, we ask all this because according to a report from the blood spatter expert, Alec lifted the shirt he was wearing at the time of the murders and wiped his sweaty face with

it. He's on body camera doing this. Would any other suspect be allowed to taint potential evidence this way? Fifth, speaking of the blood spatter expert, where do things stand with that? It doesn't seem like the AG's office is as confident in that evidence as we'd expect them to be at this stage in the game. Where did they land on entering this into evidence? If it doesn't get admitted into evidence, then what does that do to the case?

Sixth, what impact will Duffy Stern's presence in the presence of his goony investigators have on the evidence? Will Duffy and his investigators be called as witnesses? We obviously suspect all of this to be exploited by Duffy's old mentor, Dick Harpoetlian, as well, especially as it relates to the collection of Maggie's phone. Then again, Maggie's phone never needed to be found for investigators to get the information off of it, which is why Duffy's presence might complicate things. Seventh, what story will Maggie's phone tell us about why she was at Moselle that night?

Like we've told you before, several sources have told us that she was lured there. Will the evidence bear that out? Was she the sole target that night? Did Paul get in the way? Eighth, will we hear anything about the Murdoch family's behavior in the aftermath of the murders? John Currier wrote a story about Walterboro the other day and how the upcoming trial is being received by residents there.

The reporter spoke to the owner of a flower shop and he told her that he lived on Moselle. He said law enforcement had asked him for his surveillance footage, but his camera had been turned off the night of the murders. He was thankful for that because he told the reporter, I could have been killed otherwise, meaning if he had evidence to give the police, it would have been more than noticed. That's a chilling and serious thing to say. We have heard from several people that the Murdoch brothers went looking for surveillance footage after the murders under the auspices of making sure Sled was doing their job.

We'll leave it at that. And ninth, another thing we expect to hear about is the brain matter that Dick and Jim never seem to mention in any of their filings. It's this pattern of brain spatter that we were told was most telling because there was only one way he could have gotten it on him. How does that figure into the blood spatter drama? For us, it all comes down to this. Would there have been this level of an investigation without pressure from the public and the media?

That is a big fat no. Without the media to ask the questions, force transparency and call people out when they don't appear to be doing their taxpayer funded jobs to the extent that they should. You have a system that is very easy to take advantage of. And that's the system the Murdochs had been accustomed to. When you add people like Dick Harputlian and his public relations ally, Amanda Loveday to the mix, Dick is one of the few attorneys who has direct access to the Sled Chief's office.

He is one of the few attorneys who can wrangle the right headlines out of the media with Amanda's help. Also we have to mention both Amanda and Dick have close connections to President Joe Biden, Amanda, former Chief of Staff for a pro-Biden super PAC, recently posted a photo at the White House Christmas party. Meanwhile, Dick Harputlian is a well-known close friend of Joe Biden. Like have each other's cell phone numbers kind of close. We don't want to politicize this story, but we're pointing out that these people

have power. I mean, the team behind ELEC has direct connections to the White House that cannot be overstated. Dick has power, both federally and locally, and his role as legislator cannot be underplayed. Because all of that is how you get a more than year long investigation without an arrest. That time lapse then allowed Dick to paint the picture of an incompetent investigation that targeted his client out of desperation and pressure. When really that time lapse was because Dick Harputlian was ELEC's attorney, and investigators knew that when they charged ELEC.

They knew Dick's next move would likely be to expedite the trial, leaving little room for additional investigation. Mandy and I go back and look at text messages between each other and with sources from the weeks and months after the murders. It is wild to see the directions that the Murdoch can't try to take us all in with changing alibis and shifting accusations, which brings us to the next big question we have about what might come out during the murder trial. What's the deal with Curtis Eddie Smith?

Let's first talk about this motion filed by his defense attorneys last week. Eddie's attorneys, Jared Buschette and Amy Zarumchuk filed a motion to unseal and identify witnesses referenced in a search warrant that led to drug charges against Eddie. The motion in a nutshell alleges a big problem here in the South Carolina justice system. And perhaps answers the question as to why so many people care about this case. The motion accuses the state of engaging in two systems of justice, two ways of conducting itself. The first way is for people like Eddie Smith, poor and at the mercy of the powerful.

And the second way is for people like the PMPD employee mentioned in the motion. So what happened here? Well, we learned in this motion that Judge Carmen Mullen signed a search warrant on September 7th, 2021 that ultimately resulted in Curtis Smith's arrest. And yes, that Judge Carmen Mullen, the one who recused herself from the boot crash case in 2019 and then behind the scenes just a few weeks after publicly declaring that she had a long standing relationship with the Murdochs. And therefore it would be improper for her to preside over the case.

She signed off on a highly suspicious and secret settlement overlooking many red flags that gave ELEC easy access to steal millions of dollars from the Satterfield family. That Carmen Mullen, the judge who was also involved in the Badger Settlement, where again ELEC was able to steal more than a million dollars from his client. That Carmen Mullen, the one who was caught on a body camera attempting to orchestrate the arrest of a mentally vulnerable man in her neighborhood, even though law enforcement officers told her that they didn't have probable cause. Carmen Mullen, who is still a judge in South Carolina, despite our many pleas to the South

Carolina Supreme Court to investigate her. At this point, they won't even tell us that they're investigating and to us, it looks like Mullen has learned that judges like herself are above consequence and the South Carolina Supreme Court has all but assured her of that. So of course, Judge Mullen was the one to sign this search warrant on Eddie. And that's not even the most disturbing part. In an avid David, Sled Officer Blake Johnson swears under oath that Sled agents received information from witnesses quote to be named later that Murdoch had been involved in the

use of narcotics and that he may have been receiving them from an individual named Curtis Smith. Further, Johnson claimed that it was an unnamed PMPED employee who identified Smith as a former client of the firm. So this is insane when you really think about the timeline here. On Thursday, September 2nd, a PMPED employee apparently found the check that broke the camels back and finally convinced partners that Elick was stealing millions of dollars. The next day, Elick was allowed to resign from PMPED when really he should have been

walking out in handcuffs. Saturday, September 4th, Chris Wilson finally met Elick in person to talk about the remaining $192,000 that Elick still owed Chris for the $792,000 in misappropriated fees. Elick didn't have the money to fully pay Chris back. Years later, on September 4th, Elick was allegedly shot on the side of Salcahachi Road. According to Smith's motion, between Saturday and Monday, Sled interviewed Elick Murdoch twice. In both times, he claimed that insane story that he was shot in the head by an unknown

assailant who was in a newer model, dark blue Chevy. And then Monday, September 6th, Labor Day, Elick Murdoch released a statement through his PR agency, NP Strategy, saying that he had resigned from PMPED and he was entering rehab for drug addiction. Then PMPED apparently leaked the story to the New York Times saying that Elick had misappropriated millions of dollars. Never before this day had Teen Murdoch ever mentioned anything about Elick being addicted to drugs.

Then on that Tuesday, September 7th, quote, witnesses, who very well could be from Teen Murdoch, apparently told Sled, hey, look over there, Elick is a drug addict and you need to go get his dealer. And then on that day, Carmen Mullen apparently was like, cool, okay, go get him. I'm just kidding. I don't know what she actually said. But still, it is sketchy that she signed off on those search warrants. According to the filings and our reporting, Sled was suspicious of Elick's story from

the get-go. Sled found a knife nearby that appeared to be the one that slashed Elick's tires. And the DNA on the knife matched Elick's. Also, video surveillance from a nearby church did not show the car he described. But what Eddie's attorneys are questioning here is, why was Sled so concerned about finding Elick's drug dealer at that point? It was clear Elick was lying to them and Sled had a shooting and a double homicide to solve. So why did they care about Elick's drug dealer?

Which reminds me, on the week of September 7th, there was a lot of chatter behind the scenes that appeared to be coming from the Murdoch camp claiming that an arrest was going to be made in the shooting. Mandy was covering the story at the time and it felt to her that Team Murdoch wanted reporters to write a story with unnamed sources pushing a narrative that Elick was a victim and someone else was arrested for the shooting. But something happened with that narrative between September 7th and September 13th. Elick was interviewed again with his attorneys and he presented an entirely different narrative

claiming he had staged a suicide for a higher situation with Curtis Eddie Smith, all for an insurance scam to get Buster a $10 million life insurance policy. Meaning, after enough time had passed where Sled would have been able to find the evidence that countered Elick's narrative, Elick changed his story to fit that evidence. The problem. After Elick had lied to Sled several times at that point, Sled appeared to take his word for what happened and Eddie was arrested the next day for the shooting and insurance fraud. Another problem.

Remember Greg Alexander, Elick's BFF, the police chief to whom Elick apparently loaned thousands of dollars right after the murders? Well his sister-in-law, Tanya Alexander, signed the arrest warrants for Eddie because of course she did. Which brings me to the Tombstone Friends. According to the motion from Eddie's lawyers, on October 8th, 2021, Sled agent Kelly interviewed a person employed at PMPD. The person isn't named in the motion, but we will get to that.

The employee was asked about his relationship with Elick, his position at PMPD and other relevant information. During that interview, and remember, this is before Elick was arrested in Orlando, back when Elick still seemed to think his legal troubles were temporary. The employee said that Elick was, quote, big on loyalty and had several friends he called Tombstone Buddies. He said Tombstone Buddies are friends who take your secrets to the grave. Let's pause for a second here.

But could Elick be more juvenile? Grown men calling each other Tombstone Buddies? You know who doesn't have a Tombstone Buddy? People who haven't done anything wrong. It's sick to me that these guys take pride in holding on to Elick's secrets. God, I hope they have had some sleepless nights because of it. Also, and this is the funniest thing I've ever said in all of this. Elick's Tombstone Buddy, the guy who takes secrets to the grave, is the tattletale who

lets Sled know about Tombstone Buddies. I cannot wait to hear this guy's testimony, by the way. Anyway, much like Elick, this employee, the one who I deed Eddie for Sled and marked on himself and his Tombstone brothers, changed his story later, likely when evidence began emerging that something was up with him. According to the motion, in February 2022, this employee was again interviewed by Sled and admitted that he had, wait for it, not been fully truthful with them before. He, as it turns out, was also cashing checks for Elick and returning the money in envelopes

the same way Eddie had been, and he had served as a personal representative for a case handled by PMPED. Quote, the employee acknowledges that this about face, quote, didn't make him look good. Then, Mr. Tombstone McGrathface gave investigators the identity of two other Tombstone Buddies of Elick's, a local police chief and a county fire chief. Who are these people? It's unclear. However, could the local police chief be Greg Alexander?

Could the county fire chief be Greg Cook? The friend Elick had bustered you that three-way call with from jail. And could the PMPED employee be Ricky Dixon? At the time of the Sled interview, Ricky, who is a former South Carolina highway patrol officer who led one of the agency's accident reconstruction teams, would have been an investigator at PMPED. In 2017, he served as a personal representative for the estate of a man named Rodell Singleton, which was being sued by a man who was represented by Randy Murdock.

You know, Ricky's co-worker at PMPED. This is very strange indeed. Whoever the employee is, who is referred to in the search warrant, there is an inherent injustice happening there. This person admitted to lying to Sled. How is that not obstruction of justice? He admitted to cashing checks for Elick and giving him back cash just like Eddie did. How is that not money laundering?

It is so hard to trust the system when you see things like this. Anyway, the point of the motion was that Eddie Smith's attorneys want to know exactly what led to the search warrant getting signed September 7th, 2021. It is a fair question. Because what reason would Sled have to go after Eddie at that point in time? It wasn't until almost a week later that Elick told Sled about the alleged suicide plot that Eddie allegedly was involved in. So why would the Murdock team want Sled to know about Eddie Smith?

Well let's fast forward to October 2022 when Dick and Jim basically accused Eddie of murdering Maggie and Paul. And now let's rewind to September 18th, 2021 when a story was published in the New York Post about Eddie Smith and in the story he apparently denied killing Maggie and Paul, which he wasn't being accused of. So why was that coming up? Here is how the story ended. I never had a reason not to like him before, Curtis said.

I understand he's in fight or flight mode and he wanted me to be the heavyweight in the water so he could fly. However, Curtis said Murdock should not mess with him further. I wouldn't advise him to try to set me up, Smith said. I'd strongly advise him against that. Was the Murdock camp trying to set Eddie up for the murders of Maggie and Paul on September 7th, 2021? We have to ask that question at this point.

In two interviews with Sled, Elick maintained that he was shot by a random shooter. That's what he wanted us all to believe. That he, like his wife and son, was being targeted by a murderous stranger. By September 4th, 2021, Elick was in deep trouble. Was this him setting up Eddie to take the fall for the murders? We hope the court will unseal the warrants because when it comes to this case, transparency is the only answer. It is our only hope of ending this VIP system of justice in which those who are deemed worthy

by the good ol' boys get to benefit. And that is it for this week. Unless there is some last minute super crazy drama, the next time we will talk to you guys on MMP will be after the trial has started. Tune in on Monday for our latest pre-trial coverage with Eric Bland and Cup of Justice. And please subscribe to MMP Premium at MMP.Supercast.com. We will be doing a live pre-trial Discord chat where fans can ask Eric, Liz, and I questions on Friday, January 20th.

And speaking of fans, I have some really devastating news to share. As we were finishing up the podcast tonight, I learned that one of our biggest fans, Kim Mitchell, suddenly died this week. It feels weird to be sad about the death of someone you never met in person. But I really liked Kim. After every podcast she would post these fun recaps that I always enjoyed reading. She was so enthusiastic and kind and curious and was one of those fans who kept momentum going when I didn't have much to give.

Anyways, I just wanted to dedicate this episode in honor of Kim Mitchell. I never got to tell her how much I appreciated her. I hope that she rests easy and I hope her spirit inspires others to be kind and caring and curious. The world needs more Kim Mitchell's out there. That is for sure. And on that note, stay tuned and stay in the sunlight. We'll see you next week.

The Murdoch Murders podcast is created and hosted by me, Manny Matney, produced by my husband, David Moses, and Liz Farrell is our executive editor. From Luna Shark Productions.