Lexington, South Carolina (CNN) — The second double-murder trial of disbarred South Carolina attorney Alex Murdaugh will be moved out of his home county over concerns he can’t get an impartial proceeding there, a judge said Friday in a series of rulings impacting the long-running legal saga.
Also, the prosecution will be allowed to introduce testimony that Murdaugh gave at his first murder trial – under certain conditions – in the 2021 deaths of his wife and son at their estate in rural Colleton County, the judge ruled.
Circuit Court Judge Debra McCaslin made these and other decisions in a lengthy status hearing ahead of Murdaugh’s April 2027 retrial.
“I’m going to order that venue be transferred to a county outside of (South Carolina’s) 14th Judicial Circuit because I believe that the defendant cannot receive a fair and impartial trial in Colleton County,” McCaslin said.
Murdaugh had been convicted of murder in the June 2021 fatal shootings of his wife, Maggie, and 22-year-old son, Paul, but the South Carolina Supreme Court overturned the convictions this May over what it said were improper interactions between a clerk and the jury.
McCaslin postponed a decision on which county will host the retrial. Murdaugh’s defense wants the retrial to be held in Charleston, the state’s most populous city, saying it would provide the greatest chance to find fair jurors.
“Getting a jury in this case is going to be extraordinarily difficult,” defense attorney Dick Harpootlian said. “Why make it more difficult by limiting your choices?”
“The Murdaugh case is a local freakshow (in Colleton County),” he added.
Prosecutors said Charleston would pose logistical challenges and be unnecessarily expensive, and the judge said she was mindful of that.
“Cost is a concern because Colleton County does bear the cost of the retrial in this case,” McCaslin said. “Colleton County is not a rich county. It’s a poor county.”
At the beginning of Friday’s three-hour hearing, the judge ruled testimony given by Murdaugh at his first murder trial can be heard in his retrial if it meets certain conditions.
“When you testify in a case, there’s consequences,” McCaslin said.
Murdaugh’s defense asked for the testimony to be barred from the second trial, saying some of it focused on financial crimes that the state Supreme Court advised had been too much of a focus by the prosecution in the first murder trial.
Only the portions of Murdaugh’s 2023 testimony on the stand that are relevant to the new trial – largely, testimony relating to the deaths of Maggie and Paul – will be allowed, McCaslin said Friday.
“It’s all subject to rules of evidence,” she said. “If it’s not relevant, if it’s not in your case in chief, then that prior testimony is not coming in obviously.”
Murdaugh, 58, appeared in court for the status hearing in Lexington in a dark suit and lavender striped tie, reminiscent of his previous life as a personal injury attorney from a Lowcountry legal dynasty.
Murdaugh was convicted of murder in March 2023 after a six-week trial, with prosecutors alleging he fatally shot Maggie and Paul outside their home in Islandton in South Carolina’s Lowcountry to stave off investigations of financial crimes authorities said he committed against his law firm and clients. He admitted on the stand that he lied about his whereabouts, but denied killing the two. He was sentenced to life in prison – but that was nullified when the murder conviction was overturned.
Murdaugh separately pleaded guilty to dozens of financial crimes and is serving concurrent state and federal sentences of 27 and 40 years.
He barely spoke at Friday’s hearing, once answering a question from the judge about access to case materials in prison. Outside that, he chuckled when Harpootlian told the judge that, not having a job for the past four years, Murdaugh was now “broke.”
During two days of dramatic testimony in the 2023 murder trial, Murdaugh confirmed that he repeatedly lied to investigators. On the stand he admitted that he’d been at the property’s kennels – near where Paul and Maggie’s bodies were found – the night of the killings. But he added under oath that, “I was nowhere near Paul and Maggie when they got shot.” He also admitted to both trying to hire someone to kill him and a substance abuse problem, while detailing extensive financial crimes against vulnerable clients.
The South Carolina Supreme Court overturned the murder convictions this May and ordered a retrial, saying Colleton County’s then-clerk tainted the first trial with what the defense said was prejudicial comments to the jury.
McCaslin on Friday agreed to a defense team request that she personally oversee the process of drafting a list of potential jurors to receive a summons in the second trial, and raised the former clerk’s actions in the first trial as a reason.
“Call me suspicious, but when we have evidence that the clerk of court is attempting to influence the jury to obtain a guilty verdict … when did that (influence) start?” Harpootlian asked. “Did it start when she started winnowing down people she thought might be helpful to us? And I’m not saying that could happen again, but … I need to say to the court, I never expected it to happen the first time.”
“Wherever this trial is going to be, I will certainly make sure that it is on the up and up. I can promise you that,” the judge said Friday.
Ahead of Friday’s hearing, the defense in a series of court filings asked for the retrial to be held outside Colleton County, partly because of heavy case publicity. It noted Murdaugh’s name was synonymous with the local legal system – his father, grandfather and great-grandfather served as local prosecutors for decades – and the population was small and interconnected. By this week, it asked for Charleston specifically.
The state in court documents said it was open to discussing other locations if the defense would consider any county other than Charleston – which it called “the most expensive and logistically challenging” in the state – but would oppose a change of venue if the defense insisted on Charleston.
Defense allowed access to independent DNA testing
Murdaugh’s team won a victory Friday in its effort to get access to DNA evidence found underneath Maggie’s fingernails.
McCaslin ordered law enforcement to turn over that evidence to the defense so they can do their own independent testing.
Authorities had said the DNA was from an unknown unrelated male, and the state said in a court filing “there is nothing ‘new’ or recently discovered about the DNA result from Maggie’s left-hand fingernails.”
Harpootlian argued Friday there was no good reason to deny Murdaugh’s team the opportunity to have its own experts do a separate analysis.
McCaslin ruled law enforcement must turn over a sample to Murdaugh’s team, but added they must then turn any remaining samples that are still capable of being tested over to the prosecutors once the defense experts are done.
McCaslin did not rule on several other issues raised by the defense, including a Monday motion from Murdaugh’s attorneys to dismiss the 2022 murder indictments foundational to the case. That motion claimed a key witness gave “perjurious testimony and fabricated evidence” to the grand jury that indicted Murdaugh.
The motion alleged the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division’s lead agent for the case “testified that he presented physical evidence directly inculpating the defendant to the Colleton County grand jury that he had admitted was false and which the defendant has proven was fabricated by law enforcement.”
Murdaugh’s attorneys did not provide additional detail in the filing, noting more information would be included in subsequent memorandums. As of Friday, no further memo had been filed, and prosecutors had not responded.
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