Murdaugh Murders Podcast - ‘The Devil’s In The Details’: Russell Laffitte Indicted On 21 Charges + Bowen Turner Arrested (S01E44)

Episode Date: May 11, 2022

The Good 'Ole Boys had a very bad week in South Carolina.  Last Wednesday, the S.C. Attorney General’s Office announced three superseding indictments against Alex Murdaugh, his best friend Cory Fleming, and his banker buddy Russell Laffitte.  Attorney Justin Bamberg, who represents the Pinckney family, joins us for episode 44 of the Murdaugh Murders Podcast.  And trust us — “The devil is in the details.” And, on Monday (5/9/2022), we found out Bowen Turner was arrested again and this time, he was denied bond Thank you Katie Gambla from Charter One Realty for supporting Hopeful Horizons! And a special thank you to our sponsors: Microdose.com, Priceline, Embark Vet, VOURI, Babbel, Article, and others. Use promo code "MANDY" for a special offer! The Murdaugh Murders Podcast is created by Mandy Matney and produced by Luna Shark Productions. Our Executive Editor is Liz Farrell. Advertising is curated by the talented team at AdLarge Media. Find us on social media: https://www.facebook.com/MurdaughPod/ https://www.instagram.com/murdaughmurderspod/ For current and accurate updates:  Twitter.com/mandymatney 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

Ugh, another pointless video call where nothing gets done. I think you're on mute, David. Uh, sorry, what did I miss? IT just approved Miro for the whole company. Miro? That's the... Online whiteboard. For team collaboration.

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In Russell Lafitte, Corey Fleming, and Alec Murdoch were hit with several charges related to the Hakim Pinkany case. And that is a big deal. My name is Mandy Matney. I have been investigating the Murdoch family for more than 3 years now. This is the Murdoch Murders podcast with David Moses and Liz Farrell. Wow, so we had a busy week since our last podcast. On Monday, we found out Bowen Turner was arrested again and this time he was denied

bond. We will get into that at the end of this episode as it definitely plays into this theme of accountability among the good old boys. So on Wednesday, the same day that our podcast episode named how many people will go down for this aired, the South Carolina Attorney General's office announced 3 superseding indictments against Alec Murdoch, his best friend Corey Fleming, and his banker buddy Russell Lafitte. But before we get into all of that, I want to talk about a tweet by David Haskins that

really stuck out to me in the last few weeks. The tweet said, I hope the Beach family finds comfort in that their pursuit of justice for Mallory has helped lead to justice and restoration for so many other families too. Wow, it isn't every day where a kingdom publicly crumbles like this. To see three very powerful men, two former attorneys and a former bank CEO get indicted for crimes where they allegedly took advantage of people who had less power than them, that is a big deal. And it's something we should stop and think about.

All of these people are going down and all of these investigations are happening right now because of Mallory Beach. Because people loved her so much and said enough is enough. Because her mother was brave enough to file a lawsuit when she felt she wasn't going to get answers or accountability without it, it is horrible that so many people, including Mallory, had to die for these ruthless crimes to be exposed. But I want everyone to know that we will make sure none of their deaths were in vain. So let's talk about these indictments.

First of all, the indictments were handed down on April 14th, but the Attorney General's office didn't make the announcement until May 4th. This is sticky because attorneys in this state will make the point that there's nothing unusual about what happened here. They'll also say we don't know anything about the law and this is why we have an issue with something they see as just the way it works here. Obviously we understand that indictments can be sealed for multiple reasons, especially when we're talking about a criminal conspiracy and seemingly countless related investigations.

Here's the thing, though. We know about the intense negotiating that goes on behind the scenes in terms of high-priced defense attorneys seemingly calling the shots when their client gets arrested. Now if the indictments are unsealed too soon, the public knows about them and then wonders, well gee, why isn't this guy in jail? In Paul Murdoch's 2019 Boat Crash case, he never went to jail before or after his hearing. Dick Harputlian and Jim Griffin went to great lengths and some people seemed to bend over backward to get Paul processed in the courtroom after the hearing.

And this counted as his quote-unquote arrest. This is what we're taking an issue with. Sure, it's normal that someone like Russell Lafitte, who has the means to hire the best, can hold off on going to jail until just hours before his hearing. They're saying it shouldn't be normal. So our issue isn't with the length of time it took to unseal the indictments in this case. It's with what we believe to be one of the possible reasons, and that's to minimize

the time between when the public finds out about the indictment and when an arrest is made. Remember, Fitz News had been hearing since January that Russell Lafitte's indictment was imminent. According to our sources, Russell had been making preparations for this eventuality for a while. On April 11th, literally three days before he was indicted, Russell put his house on the market, the one that was described as having a quote, secret children's playroom,

which is a really weird thing to say a house has. On April 28th, it seemed like Russell was even able to sneak in what could actually end up being his final turkey hunt. But this is a problem. Two weeks earlier, he was indicted for allegedly stealing $1.8 million from very vulnerable people in very tragic situations. But he's still able to be out having a good ol' time for himself? Photos of him after the hunt were posted on Facebook and featured him grinning away as

if nothing was wrong. Again, everyone has the right to be considered innocent until proven guilty. Our question isn't about his guilt or innocence, though. It's about the deals that we know get made outside the public process that result in good ol' boys like Ellick, Russell, and Corey getting treated much better than 99% of people accused of committing crimes. As of today, Corey hasn't even been arrested on his new charges in his second and third indictments, meaning Corey is now accused of defrauding three people.

This is important because Corey's main defense, and Russell's too, is that they were tricked by Ellick, and this does not appear to be a fool me once situation. When Ellick was arrested in October of last year, it was a surprise to everyone. Sled was not messing around. They went down to Florida and they extradited him back to South Carolina. This meant he didn't have the chance to flee if leaving the country was on his mind, and he didn't have the chance to commit any more alleged crimes. When the receivership was appointed in November, it meant Ellick and his family were stopped

from potentially hiding or degrading his assets. Based on Russell's and Corey's indictments, it looks like they too might have had a lot of reasons to hide information or even to flee. So those turkey hunting photos aren't just showing a man having fun, they're showing a man who is free and easy to do whatever it is he might need to do to improve his future. All three of the indictments handed down in mid-April were superseding indictments. This means that all three of the indictments that were previously handed down were updated adding Russell to all three and Corey to two of them, as well as adding new charges for

Ellick and Corey. Russell Lucius Lafitte now faces 21 charges of conspiring with Ellick Murdoch to steal nearly $2 million, including hundreds of thousands of dollars in settlement money from the family of Hakim Pinkney. Here is attorney Justin Bamberg, who is representing the Pinkney family. When we first heard of the indictments, it was bitter sweet, it was a mix of emotion. I think there was excitement because we had been waiting. We knew that there were certain things in the file that didn't look right.

There were questionable checks and transactions. There were certain people's signature on certain documents and we were just patiently waiting like, what is going to happen? Is all we going to see justice come in the form of accountability in the criminal justice system? And it happened. You know, I was more excited for Ms. Pinkney because there's a degree of, thank God, the system is finally working for me, which sounds really crazy because they were involved in

those underlying accidents and all the pain and all the trauma and everyone is familiar with that. But the system was supposed to work for them over a decade ago and it didn't. Now here you are with all these old wounds reopened and now you see the system working for you. And I was very happy for Ms. Pinkney. As you know, Hakim was a deaf man who became quadriplegic in a 2009 car crash. He died mysteriously in 2011 after his respirator became unplugged.

Hakim died four days after Elik settled his car crash case. Another attorney from PMPD who specializes in medical malpractice cases handled a wrongful death case for Hakim's estate. But using his position of trust and as a representative of the bank, Russell Lafitte first served as Hakim's conservator and then after Hakim died mysteriously, he served as a personal representative of Hakim's estate. He obviously was impressed with the work he did for Hakim because he paid himself handsomely from Hakim's settlement money.

Also in more trouble were Elik, who was indicted on four additional charges in Hakim's case as well as the case of Arthur Badger and Corey Fleming, who like we said is now accused of bilking a second victim, Hakim and a third victim, Hakim's cousin Natasha Thomas for which he faces an additional five charges. Two of the three indictments focus on the Pinkney car crash. We did a deep dive into the Hakim Pinkney story in episode 28 on January 19th. If you haven't listened to it already, we recommend you to go back and listen. It was one of the hardest and the most emotional episodes we've ever done.

There are so many victims in this case and so many storylines and the details can sometimes get lost in the crowd. But the details are especially important in this case because it's now much more clear that Elik's alleged criminal business model for the Gloria Satterfield scheme was built long before her death in 2018. In the Hakim Pinkney episode, we mentioned that the Pinkney family's attorney Justin Bamberg was looking into whether or not money was stolen from Hakim, his mother and his cousin.

The state grand jury was also looking into this and obviously two days after our episode in January, Elik was indicted for allegedly helping himself to some of their money. This is a complex situation though and Justin is continuing to investigate the potential damage. Here is what he's found so far. You know, after Tom, we of course had documents associated with the underlying red case that led to Hakim becoming a quadriplegic and after a while we did obtain a copy of his file for the nursing home death case and there were a couple of red flags that jumped out at us

almost immediately and one of them is pretty disturbing and we are still investigating trying to get down to the bottom of it but we obtained a copy of the medical billing statement for Hakim for treatment tied to his death and this indicated that providers had billed X amount. Medicaid obviously never pays all the bills, they pay a portion and then they assert a lien right and that's why if you look at his wrong for death settlement approval petition it references $50,000 being withheld to account for a lien, these are public documents. The problem is the numbers don't match up because the disbursement of the money don't

indicate $50,000 being withheld or paid to a lien holder. The disbursement indicates that $183,000 in change is what went to Medicaid but Medicaid had only spent $46,000 according to the documents that we've seen. So we're investigating to find out exactly how much did Medicaid get, what exactly went on and did Alec Murdoch make off with more money or not and hopefully we'll find out the answer soon. Every time you look at anything tied to that man, tied to Alec Murdoch, you've got to use a microscope because it never really is in the details and that's one of the difficulties

of getting answers for these victims is sometimes things are not what they seem. When you just look on paper you've got to look through the paper and yeah, all I can say about that. This should all sound very familiar. We saw a lot of these same things in the Gloria Satterfield case. However, it appears that Palmetto State Bank, specifically the son of its CEO at the time, Russell Lafitte, was a lot more involved in the Pinkney case than they were in the Satterfield case.

In fact, as you remember, Russell seems to have passed on the opportunity to serve as personal representative in the Satterfield case and gave it to his Vice President Chad Wessendorf who put the I don't know in fiduciary. Here is a breakdown of what investigators say Russell, Corey and Alec stole from the Pinkney family. The three allegedly worked together to take more than $350,000 from Natasha Thomas's trust. That's Hakim's cousin.

Russell and Alec are accused of stealing nearly $310,000 from Hakim Pinkney's estate. And by the way, they did this on December 21, 2011, which is two months after Hakim died and four days before the very first Christmas the Pinkney family would spend without their loved one. Alec and Corey allegedly conspired to take almost $90,000 from Pamela Pinkney's accounts and guess what Corey is accused of doing with about $8,000 of Ms. Pamela's money. He appears to have treated himself, Alec, and another attorney and we're trying to figure out who that was with a luxurious trip to Omaha, Nebraska on a private airplane

to attend the 2012 College World Series. It is sickening to picture Alec, Corey, and whoever this mysterious guest is living the high life on the backs of people who just lost so much. So the same moves that were pulled on Hakim, and again remember, this is one of the most disturbing things about this entire situation is when the case settled, Hakim was alive and he was deaf and he was bargacolic in his nursing home. Ms. P was looking forward to doing what she had to do to bring him home. That's why she authorized the settlement in the first place.

I need to bring my boy home. Before these checks get cut, Hakim is already dead. You see what I'm saying? Hakim, unfortunately had already passed away, none of these checks should have been cut in the first place. There's a process by which, and I have unfortunately been in this situation myself with clients before I had a client and we got his case done and the money's on the way and unfortunately the client dies.

You don't just get to go and cut checks. Again, that's not how this works. We have laws in this state, there are rules and processes and procedures and at that point money's got to go to his estate. The conservatorship that was previously established dies with Hakim. Literally dies with Hakim. Last week, we gave you a rundown on some of Justin's findings in the Pinkney case and some of the unorthodox ways the two are accused of spending Pinkney's money, including a

check for $100,000 to Russell's father Charlie, a $10,000 check to Maggie Murdoch, more than $300,000 to Elix's father and our former solicitor Randolph Murdoch III. We have not been kidding you when we tell you just how complex the Murdoch investigation is. Finally, the last accusation in the latest indictments says that Russell and Elix conspired to steal nearly $1.2 million from an Allendale man named Arthur Badger, whose case will tell you more about in a future episode. So far, Elix faces 82 charges, 79 from his alleged financial crimes and three from the

shooting incident. He's accused of stealing around $9 million so far. He faces more than 700 years in prison. Corey was first indicted in March on 18 charges related to his alleged role in the Gloria Satterfield case. He stands accused of stealing almost $4 million from two sets of clients. He faces up to 207 years in prison. Again, Russell is accused of stealing almost $2 million.

He faces up to 140 years in prison. Do you guys ever think about the co-conspirators who haven't been publicly identified yet? I definitely do. I imagine them sitting at home, bouncing their legs right now and jumping every time their phone buzzes. Is this it? Have they found out yet? If we've learned anything from this last set of indictments, beyond the fact that some

people seem to be able to schedule their arraignments like their Botox appointments, it's that there has been such a profound lack of accountability in South Carolina for so long that these guys didn't seem to take the time to cover their tracks. And if they did, it wasn't until the writing was on the wall for them. Which means Ellick and Russell are basically the Hansel and Gretel of Hampton County, leaving breadcrumbs that are leading police to all their friends' gingerbread houses which were built with stolen cookies. I mean this with all sincerity.

We hope every single person involved in taking money from people is identified and has to answer publicly for their actions. And I cannot stress this enough. I sure do hope they can shed some light on where all this allegedly stolen money went. Because here's the thing, that handful of lawyers who seem to jump at the chance to tell Mandy and me that we don't understand the law and that's why we're seeing problems in the system. They're usually the same ones who also try to say that white collar crimes are not as

bad as violent crimes. Which is, I don't even know where to start with that. Really stealing money isn't the same as murdering a human being, I had no idea. Thank goodness I asked about that. To us, the question is simple when it comes to white collar crimes. Did you hurt someone in exchange for your personal enrichment? Did you try to create a better life for yourself using money that was not yours? Because taking advantage of someone who might not be aware that you're doing it in order

to steal from them is hurting them. It's kind of like this. When you put money in savings, the bank gives you a percentage of interest, right? It's tiny. In fact, for most of us, it's not even all that noticeable. We're basically lending the bank our money in exchange for the convenience of spending it. But if we borrow the money from the bank, well my god, they sure do make a lot of money

off of that, right? Well, here's the test for anyone in favor of a lighter hand of justice for white collar criminals. Proportionally, someone they trusted and someone they were paying to do a job for them after they or their loved ones were in a catastrophic accident, stole the same amount of their money that Ellic, Russell, and Corey are accused of stealing from the victims. Would they be like, oh jeez, why is everyone getting so up in arms? It's just money.

It's not like it's murder. No. In fact, the proof is in the pudding. Just last week, Ellic's attorneys were in court stomping their hooves on the ground in an effort to regain control over Ellic's assets. Why? Oh my gosh, because it's not fair to Ellic, of course. Ellic deserves his money.

Back to my savings account example. When the lawyers or their friends are taking the money, it's met with a shrug and a get over it. But when it's the lawyer's money or their friend's money, well everyone get ready for a tantrum. So maybe they believe white collar crimes should be treated differently from violent crimes. Over here, we just don't.

Because this is apparently 1% of the bigger picture. And just look at the damage they've done, allegedly. At the very end of the day, every knee shall bow. And what's done in the dark will often come to the light. And it may take time. In this instance, this took 11 years. But it happened. You know, and the only thing I can think of, you know, is, I mean, think about it.

What's worse, doing some stupid stuff and getting caught right after you do it or doing it and thinking that your life has moved on and it's 10 years later and you, whether you're still doing what you, the failures you previously had or not, it come back to bite you. That's probably harder than getting caught right when it happens. You know, you think about them people who, you know, and you read about them, you know, you read about that person who like that all of a sudden, there's this solved murder from 40 years ago and the person who gets charged for it, like literally has a whole

new life and just figured that it never come up. And all of a sudden, 40 years later, off the prison you go, buddy, you've been caught. Right? I mean, you never know. That's why you got to keep your nose clean, do things the right way. And it ain't hard. Like, that's the most, the dumbest thing about this entire ordeal is it's not hard to be a decent person.

And we'll be right back. So that leads us to the bond hearing. On Thursday morning, Russell Lafitte appeared before Judd Allison Lee for his bond hearing. That hearing was virtual. Russell was cuffed in wearing a green jumpsuit for the bond hearing. He apparently turned himself in Friday morning at the Kershaw County Detention Center. Kershaw County is about 30 minutes from the Richland County Courthouse. It is not clear why Russell turned himself in there, but it's likely because of staffing

issues at the Alvin S. Glenn Detention Center where ELEC is. Or because of the current jail population there. That jail apparently has a lot of trouble beyond ELEC Murdoch. Lafitte hired a powerful legal team, including former U.S. Attorney Bart Daniel and Matt Austin. Hiring a former U.S. Attorney indicates that Russell might be anticipating federal charges as well. Ostensibly, he likely hired Daniel for his abilities and his influence.

He's highly respected in South Carolina and, by the way, was involved in prosecuting defendants caught up in Operation Jackpot in the 1980s. Go back to Episode 31 to hear more about Jackpot. At times, Russell appeared super casual about the situation. In his hearings, ELEC looked like inmate emeritus, someone completely at ease in his scrubs and his bloody knuckles, but who'd also like to get out of there if that's an option. But if not, no big deal. He has his meat sticks.

Corey looked utterly furious at his bond hearing, which is a good facial expression to have when you want a room full of people to believe that you've been hustled by your best friend and now your running schedule has been interrupted. Russell had a totally different vibe. It was kind of like he was trying to act casual while hiding his frustrations that he had awayed an hour or so before bonding out. Creighton Waters spoke first. He told the court key details of the state's case against Russell Lafitte.

In total, your honor, between the three indictments, we have 15 counts of breach of trust, 10,000 or more, three counts of computer crime, 10,000 or more, and three counts of criminal conspiracy. The total charges are 21. All of these are felonies, your honor. The total amount of exposure is up to 170 years, and the total alleged amount, which I'll describe at the appropriate time, is about $1.8 million in alleged fraud. Attorney Matt Austin was next to speak. Austin argued his client should be released on his own recognizance or a 10% cash bond.

Mr. Lafitte is a good candidate for release. He prevents no danger to the community. There's no threat of violence, implicating any of the charges that he has been charged with. These are all financial crimes. To the extent he has had or would have any ability to carry out similar crimes as alleged, he would require him to still be working at the bank. He no longer works there, so that's not even possible.

He's a lifelong resident of Hampton County. In fact, he's never lived outside of South Carolina at all and has no intention to. Besides going to Newberry College where he graduated in 1997, he's lived in Hampton his entire life, and he has substantial and strong ties to the community. With us today is his wife, Susie, of 21 years. His daughter, who's a college student, is a son at home as well who just actually heard 17 today, so we're hoping he can get back for his birthday. And his sister, Grace, here as well, she also lives in Hampton.

Imagine that. This was happening on the day of his son's 17th birthday. If this was the move, by the way, for Russell to check into jail on his son's birthday, brilliant, because it made Russell look like he got mercilessly plucked from the warm and fuzzy comfort of dad life by the cold-hearted state. It also reminded the room that Russell had family who loved him enough to keep track of him, and if they didn't get that message from the birthday announcement, they had visuals to prove it. Russell's family showed their support from a conference room with his attorneys.

Frankly, their presentation was not as good as the one Corey's attorney, Debbie Barbier, had created for his remote family support experience. She looked like the captain of a ship that was filled with very concerned passengers. Russell's attorneys somehow managed to make it look like he'd been called into HR and was about to be fired for his browsing history. And Mr. Lafitte is extremely active in the community. Given the nature of his prior job, you know, it's a community bank, and he is very involved in his community. He's a member of the Rotary Club, Hampton.

He was the previous vice chair of the Hampton County Disabilities and Special Needs Board, a previous member of the Hampton County Economic Development Board. He's a member of all Saints Episcopal Church, and he served as treasurer at one point as well. Again, he has no ties anywhere outside of South Carolina that would warrant him being deemed a flight risk, and all of his ties are very firmly in here in the state. And so he has zero criminal record. He has no, there's no danger of him not appearing for a court. He has cooperated with the investigation from the outset,

and actually prior to our being retained in the case, actually, he willfully has been interviewed. He has shown up every time we've asked him to show up. He turned himself in this morning, there's been zero problems. So for all those reasons, judge, we think that he'd be appropriate for release on bail. His attorneys didn't know it yet, but Creighton Waters brought a big bag of their breadcrumbs with him to the hearing. I also want to point out that while this case is related to Alec Murdoch, Mr. Lafitte is a different person than Alec Murdoch. However, what the allegations are here and what we see is there's a long association between Mr. Russell Lafitte and Alec Murdoch.

There's a long association between their families, his very prominent families in Hampton County. And Mr. Lafitte, as he just stated, has served 24 years at Palmetto State Bank, which is a local bank headquartered there. He was the vice president of loans for an extended period of time. He was the CEO and up until his termination, he was the CEO. So a long time in senior leadership in that bank. Your Honor, of course, has also heard of the string of financial allegations against Alec Murdoch. And what we have seen from that is a exhausting sort of velocity of money over many, many years on behalf of Mr. Murdoch. And in addition to anything that he might legitimately earn, he constantly had to beg, borrow, and allegedly steal to stay afloat.

And an important cog in that hamster wheel constantly spinning was his friend at Palmetto State Bank, that being Russell Lafitte. It's important that Creighton-Water said this because this is law enforcement acknowledging that both Russell and Palmetto State Bank played a key role in this heist. Waters then explained the details of the scheme. But ultimately what he also was doing was loaning six-figure figures of money to Alec. And these loans from the children's money kept Alec's afloat. They were off the books from the bank, weren't disclosed to the bank. And of course, Mr. Lafitte has got to make sure that those get paid back because he is conservator is responsible for those. Ultimately, Alec gets Mr. Lafitte appointed in fiduciary responsibility for the victims we have here.

And that would be Ms. Pamela Pinkney, her now deceased son, Hakeem Pinkney, their relative Natasha Thomas, all of whom are represented by Justin Bamberg, as well as Arthur Badger. And he's represented by Mr. Mark Tinsley. Here, Creighton was describing the checks that we told you about in our last episode. Five six-figure payments, quote, used in the manner to give the illusion of regular payments that are used to pay back the loans that Mr. Lafitte had given Alec from the conservatorship, end quote. He said that ultimately, quote, there's about $1.8 million in alleged fraud that comes from this alleged scheme. And we have 21 felonies to date as it relates to this ongoing investigation. Finally, Creighton Waters made an interesting comment about Lafitte's alleged cooperation. Mr. Austin missions cooperation. The most I will say about that is Mr. Lafitte has given statements. And I'll just leave it at that.

Prosecutor Creighton Waters made a point to say this, that Russell hasn't been involved in a two-way conversation with law enforcement, at least not in a way that's been helpful. Providing statements in certain documents, especially after you've been caught in the middle of a scheme such as this one, a scheme that has a clear paper trail, does not, in any way, absolve you from the crime. The prosecution ultimately asked for a surety bond of $25,000 per felony, which is about a $500,000 bond. He also asked that there would be no contact with the victims or bank employees. Attorney Justin Bamberg, representing the Pinkney family, spoke after Waters. He argued that even though this is a nonviolent crime, what happened to the Pinkney family was horrific. There are victims. And to truly understand that, Your Honor, I think the court needs to know what happened to them. You know, this was a very, very, very horrible accident. It actually left Mr. Hocking Pinkney a quadriplegic in a nursing home.

And it is important to note that some of the money that was misappropriated was actually done after the young man had suffocated to death in the nursing home and effectively became brain dead. And the reason I mentioned that, Your Honor, is some may say there's no threat of violence. Speaking to danger to the community, Mr. Lafitte does have access to firearms per social media. It appears that just seven days ago he was out turkey hunting. I mean, it's not as simple because it's white collar or stolen money. The callousness that was displayed with regards to what the victims were going with at the time, I think, is indicative of being a danger to the community, not caring about what happened to somebody or what was going on in their life as to flight risk. Ah, the turkey pictures on social media that Liz mentioned earlier. Justin makes a great point.

It's not just about the turkeys. It's about how Lafitte clearly has access to guns and clearly knows how to use them. Justin also mentioned that Russell Lafitte put his house on the market on April 11th. And as far as the victims know, they have no idea. They live in these communities and they have no idea where he does intend to reside or whether he intends to go somewhere else. But if you're going to sell your house, you obviously don't intend to live there. So we would raise that to the court. Mr. Lafitte also has access to friends and associates, for example, who have access to private planes. Some of the money that was misappropriated from these individuals was used by apparently some of his friends and associates to fly to Omaha, Nebraska. Finally, Justin Bamberg argued that Russell Lafitte is a wealthy person who can afford basically any bond. But he has the ability to pay any bond set by the court.

Mr. Lafitte owns 9% of the shares in Palmetto State Bank. That is 23,365 shares of a bank that has a value of over $700 million. So any bond, even if your honor made bond equal to the dollar amount of the monies that were misappropriated from the victims, he still would have the ability to pay it. So your honor, we ask that the bond amount given ensure that Mr. Lafitte does not run and ensure that Mr. Lafitte has a vested interest in sticking around. And that would be the statement on behalf of the victim's honor. Thank you so much for allowing me to speak on behalf. Matt Austin, Russell Lafitte's attorney quickly responded to Justin's speech and he made jokes. You know, Mr. Lafitte likes to hunt and there may be some danger to local turkeys, but there's no indication that he is a danger to anybody else in the community. He hasn't been charged with doing anything that's physically violent.

I know we sometimes make jokes on this podcast, but we're not the ones sitting on a remote screen in a courtroom with handcuffs on and in a jumpsuit that makes us look like Kermit the Frog's mechanic. There may be some danger to local turkeys is definitely retirement speech material. Oh wait. And it's just, it's, I can't think of a case with less risk for defendant to have any concerns like that. With regard to his cooperation with law enforcement as well, he said I would respectfully disagree with Mr. Waters characterization is just statements. Mr. Lafitte has met with the AG's office, the attorney's office, the FBI sled and has been grilled, has answered questions, has provided statements, but also answers and clarified things and provided helpful information for law enforcement. And so I think it goes beyond your statements. Again, it's not worth quibbling over, you know, it's worth noting because it shows you where he is mentally in this whole process. He's not trying to hide from anything. And that speaks to another point in all of this as well that is just, I think, interesting with these facts is that he was appointed with the court's permission to be conservator. And so many of these filings that are used and referred to throughout this process, they haven't been located through in some safety deposit box somewhere and scrolled away.

They've been in court. And so to the extent he's trying to get away with crimes, he is doing so by putting his own name, not other people's names on documents and filing with the court. So if you were to continue to commit crimes in that way, then I think there'd be a pretty good paper trail for the government. So I just don't do it to any risk of him engaging in that kind of conduct. And then Creighton Waters was like, Your Honor, if I may, would you like some more breadcrumbs? Your Honor, that money that he promptly took down when things started to fall apart and things started to come to light. And again, this always, always will work for a really long time as long as people trust and they don't look at what the documents say and what's really going on. My distinction between cooperation and statements has to do with content. And I will leave it at that. The money that Mr. Lafitte promptly took once things started to come to light and he knew light would start to shine on him. Well, it wasn't out of his personal funds. It was out of the funds of the bank. So, Your Honor, I would question how much credit I would give him for that.

We want to talk about his statements. You know, one of the things that he mentioned in his statements was how, you know, he liked to vote to the Bahamas. So he has the ability and the access to do that. I'm honestly trying to picture a scenario where Russell would put that fun fact about voting in the Bahamas in a statement to police. But anyways, Waters added that the charges are serious and the court needs to issue a substantial bond to ensure both the safety of the community and to make sure he shows up for court. He pointed out that Russell put his house up for sale, which could be an indication that he has no plans or reason to stay in the area and he was trying to liquidate his assets quickly. Although the general consensus seems to be that Russell put his house on the market to raise money to pay for his attorneys, but Russell's lawyers actually told the judge Russell was selling his house to raise money for the victims, which is interesting because we thought he said he was tricked in all of this. Wouldn't that make them elix victims in this case? And wouldn't that mean that Russell didn't steal anything and therefore has nothing to pay back?

There's one bright side in Russell's lawyers putting that on the record. Here's Justin Bamberg. The information that is out and the information that has been talked about is very, very disheartening in terms of the failures of people who are supposed to have these folks back and the breaches of duties, the judiciary duties, and it's a lot of them, you know, and it is very disheartening. And we're going to see what the system does and what the prosecutors do with the case, but I can't say this. I was pleased to hear this as was on the paintings when one of the criminal lawyers for Mr. Lafitte actually said at the bond hearing one reason Mr. Lafitte was trying to sell that home and some other stuff was to try and make it right with victims or whatever. And that was very positive to hear. Back to the bond hearing, Judge Lee ordered a $1 million surety bond for Lafitte with house arrest when he posts bail. Here were her reasons for that. Well, he is a respected member of the community and he has not posed any physical threat to any person. There are allegations that he engaged in behavior that would be less than honorable and potentially criminal, depending on the view of the evidence once the jury has the opportunity to hear it. So I think that he does have the ability to be able to flee while he may not be inclined to do so. The fact of the matter is that there's very serious allegations that are pending against him. Many of them carry multiple years of potential for incarceration. And while it's not always a desire for someone to leave the state, oftentimes that does occur. And so that hence my reason for house arrest with electronic monitoring and he may not leave the state.

Per the conditions of his bond, Russell Lafitte will be required to surrender his passport and will be electronically monitored while under house arrest. He is also barred from conducting any banking business. Lee also froze Lafitte's assets. Lafitte posted bond later Friday afternoon. Let's hope that the state does a better job tracking the whereabouts of Lafitte's ankle monitor than they did with Bowen Turner. And speaking of that, we'll be right back. So now we need to talk about the Bowen Turner case. I have to be honest, what happened this week made me both angry and terrified. And frankly, I'm so relieved I'm not sitting here telling you about another girl's life being ruined. Or worse. So 19 year old Bowen Turner, who was accused of raping three girls between 2018 and 2019 was arrested Sunday evening in his hometown of Orangeburg County, South Carolina on Mother's Day evening. An Orangeburg County Sheriff's Office deputy reportedly found Bowen stumbling around the middle of a road and wreaking a booze. Sources told Fitznews that earlier that evening he bought more than $100 of booze at a local bar and repeatedly tried to get a female employee at the bar to give him a ride home. When a deputy found him, Turner originally claimed he was visiting Tads, a local bar about three miles from his house, but later he claimed he came from the woods. It's important to note here that two of the three teen girls who Turner is accused of raping each said they were assaulted in the woods late at night while Bowen was drinking.

Late Sunday evening, Bowen Turner was charged with public disorderly conduct. He was taken to the detention center where he reportedly threatened to bite the finger off of a deputy. He could face more charges. Though the Orangeburg County Public Index indicated that Turner received and posted a surrogate bond of about $250, which was set by county magistrate Derek Dash, he was still detained until Monday afternoon for a hearing related to his second charge of violating his probation. During that hearing, Judge Mary Williamson told the court that she considered Bowen Turner to be a danger to the community and she denied bond on the probation violation charge. It is not lost on us that a female judge made this crucial decision to choose public safety over the good old boys. According to our sources, Turner is being held without bond at the detention center until June 8th when a hearing is scheduled in his probation violation case. It is not known if State Senator Brad Hutto is still representing him. During the hearing, Turner apparently argued that he should be released because this was the first time he violated his probation and he said that he'd never missed a court date prior. One of my sources told me he came across as entitled and showed no empathy. Here's the thing. Exactly one month before this incident, Judge Mark Lee Dennis sentenced Bowen to five years probation after he pled guilty to assault and battery in Chloe Bessa's case.

It was a sweetheart deal of a lifetime considering the charges that were stacked against him. And in less than one month, Bowen Turner predictably proved to everyone that he was not a defendant who deserved the benefit of the doubt. He could not stay out of trouble for one month. While this is incredibly disturbing, there are two bright spots. One is that it was validating for the victims and their families who despite the pressures they have faced at great personal risks to themselves have pushed hard to get our state's justice system to see that they have made a big mistake here. And two, thank God it was just public disorderly conduct because there are very legitimate concerns that prosecutor David Miller, Judge Dennis and Brad Hutto had inadvertently conspired to put the community in danger. And with the spotlight of the national press shining bright on Orangeburg County, the good old boys could no longer protect their prodigal son. And for now, at least until his hearing on June 8th, he will be in jail where he can't hurt any girls.

But I don't want to talk about Bowen right now. I want to talk about all of the people who helped him get here. People who should be very, very relieved that the woman at the bar didn't take Bowen home Sunday evening. I want to be clear about something here. Every single person who has normalized Bowen's bad behavior over the last few years, every person who supported him and bullied his victims and their families, every person who drank at his parties, who gave him a pass, who served him booze underage and hung out with him like everything was fine, you are the problem. I have seen a couple people making excuses for his parents, people saying things like there is only so much a 19 year old's parents can do to control him. No.

These parents, allegedly, threw a party for him the day he got the sweetheart deal for the rape charges. These parents got a state senator to represent their son who shielded him from all consequences. Bowen's parents have chosen to protect their son at all costs, even above the safety of others. Judge Dennis, prosecutor David Miller and Senator Brad Hutto, a.k.a. the good old boys who play their cards for Bowen, they are all the problem. What scares me the most is I see so many shocking similarities between Paul Murdock and Bowen Turner. Both Paul and Bowen were shielded by their parents and the good old boys, and yet their parents still had no control over them. Like Paul, Bowen has a history of getting violent when he drinks. This pattern is disturbing and terrifying.

How many times do we have to learn this lesson about what happens to our girls when our system chooses to protect boys like Paul and Bowen? We will continue shining sunlight on this case because accountability matters. In the systems that enabled the criminality in the Murdock saga also allow Chloe, Dallas and countless others to be re-victimized with its failures. Stay tuned. We would like to take a moment to thank Katie Gambler for her huge donation to Hopeful Horizons. Katie is an expert in residential sales throughout Buford and Jasper counties with her team at Charter One Realty. Katie, thank you for believing in Hopeful Horizons' mission to create safer communities by changing the culture of violence and offering a path to healing. To learn more about Katie, Charter One or Hopeful Horizons, click the link in the description or call her at 843-605-8862.

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