WALTERBORO, SC (WSAV) — What we first thought we knew about Alex Murd’s alibi the night his wife and son were killed has changed over the course of a lengthy trial.
When the disbarred attorney took the stand, he admitted he lied about many details in his story, which changed each time Murdo spoke with South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED) investigators. Some legal experts believe that his false alibi is one of the main reasons why the jury found him guilty of murder.
“But what a tangled web we weave, once I lied … I had to keep lying,” Murdaugh told jurors on the witness stand.
A big focus of the state’s case against Murdoch was his history of cheating.
Murdo allegedly stole millions from his former law firm, PMPED, now Parker Law Group. Despite testimony from friends and family members who said Murdo was emotional and barely able to speak the night of the murders, Murdo was able to spin a story full of lies about where he was and what he was doing that fatal night.
“The last time you saw Paul and Maggie was when you all had dinner,” SLED agent Jeff Croft asked Murdo in an interview on June 10, 2021. “Yes, sir,” Murdo replied.
Murd’s first story goes like this. He said he showered, ate dinner, took a nap and then went to check on his sick mother when Paul and Maggie were brutally murdered. But that story unraveled when jurors saw a video recorded by Paul of Murdo at the scene minutes before the murder.
“Come here, grandma, come here, grandma,” Murda can be heard saying in the video, which Paul recorded at 8:44 p.m. Paul sent the video to his friend Rogan Gibson because they were talking about a dog named Cash that Paul found himself watching over the night his father shot him.
Several friends and families recognized Murd’s voice in the video. From there Murdo began to write a new story.
In his new story, he said he made a short trip to the kennels after Paul and Maggie got there first. He said he pulled the chicken out of the dog’s mouth, put it in his golf cart and headed back to the house, marking the last time he saw his wife and son alive.
When asked what he was doing when his phone tracked 283 steps shortly after the murders, he simply said he didn’t know.
“Why don’t you remember what you were doing when you were so busy for those four minutes? Except I was getting ready to leave,” lead prosecutor Creighton Waters asked Murdoch in a very combative cross-examination.
“Well, because that’s what I’ve been doing,” Murdo told him.
Another story Murdo changed was what he did when he found the lifeless bodies of Maggie and Paul. At least two of his friends who were comforting him the night of the murders say Murdo told them he checked on Paul and Maggie before calling 911. According to police GPS data, Murdo should have parked his SUV, jumped out, checked for a pulse , and then call 911, in 17 seconds.
“I tried to turn him over … I tried to take a pulse on both of them, and you know, I called 911, pretty much immediately,” Murdaugh told investigators in his first interview the night his wife and son were killed .
When Murdo took the stand, he said he didn’t do it. He testified that he checked their pulse while on the phone with the police. He also disputed that he ever told police he checked their bodies first.
“I’m not quite sure what I did, but I know I got out of the car. I know I ran to my car and I called 911. I called 911 and I was on the phone with 911 and I was trying to take care of Paul Paul, I was trying to take care of Maggie. And I just walked between them,” Murdo said in his testimony.
When he stood trial, he said the decision to lie came to him during the first interview at the scene of the murder. Murdo blamed his decision squarely on his paranoia caused by his opioid addiction, even saying he had a pocket full of pills as he sat in the police car.
“That night after it all happened, it didn’t go away in a matter of seconds. And I decided to lie,” Murdo said.
The state asked jurors not to allow Murdo to deceive them, as he had done to so many clients and friends in the past.
“This defendant cheated everyone… and he cheated Maggie and Paul too, and they paid for it with their lives. Don’t let him fool you either,” Waters said in his closing remarks.
And the jury – no. They found Murd guilty on all four counts of murdering his wife and son and sent him to prison for the rest of his life. Murdaugh faces two consecutive life sentences.
“They won this case the day the judge believed he let them put everything … from children who lost their mothers to a man with pancreatic cancer to a paraplegic,” Murdoch’s defense attorney, Dick Harputlian, said at a press conference after issuing a guilty verdict. All these two and a half weeks before they were done with it. The last argument didn’t matter. It didn’t matter what we put out. It would never have mattered what we would have delivered.”
This trial attracted the attention of many across the country. Twelve jurors also delivered a quick verdict, deliberating in less than three hours. Murd’s defense team will further appeal the verdict.