Alex Murdaugh faces uphill battle for new murder trial as judge limits permissible evidence
COLUMBIA, S.C. — Alex Murdaugh faces an uphill battle in his pursuit of a new murder trial after a state judge on Tuesday limited questioning of witnesses and imposed a high burden of proof surrounding allegations that the clerk tampered with the jury during last year’s sensational proceedings.
Even if Murdaugh’s attorneys prove that Colleton County Clerk Becky Hill told jurors not to believe his testimony and pressured the jury into returning a guilty verdict, they must also show that she did so with prejudice against Murdaugh , former South Carolina Supreme Court Justice Jean. Toal ruled.
Toal also said she will not ask about other extensive allegations of misconduct against Hill, including that the elected official misused public funds and plagiarized parts of her new book on the Murdaugh saga. Toal took over the request for a new trial after the judge overseeing the case, Clifton Newman, retaliated late last year.
Hill has sworn she did not ask jurors about Murdaugh’s guilt and never suggested he committed the murders. State police are investigating jury tampering and misuse of charges against Hill, but have not charged her with any crime. However, her lawyers acknowledged last month that she had presented a BBC reporter’s writing to her co-author “as if they were her own words.”
The evidentiary hearings beginning Jan. 29 will involve Hill and the deliberating jurors. The judge will not require testimony from Newman. She also expressed doubt that she would allow thousands of Hill’s emails into evidence.
“I am very reluctant to turn this hearing on juror contact into a full-scale investigation into any conduct by the clerk that would in itself have been inappropriate, indicative of her characteristics or personality, or anything of that nature,” she said. Toal.
“This is not the trial of Ms. Hill,” she later added, emphasizing that the investigation focuses on the clerk’s interactions with jurors and the jury’s ability to reach a verdict impartially.
Murdaugh is serving a life sentence without parole after a jury found him guilty last March of murdering his wife Maggie and youngest son Paul in June 2021. He also faces an additional 27 years after pleading guilty to stealing in November of millions of dollars.
Toal’s strictures were stricter than those of Murdaugh’s lawyers during Tuesday’s hearing, which was held to determine the scope of the three-day evidentiary hearing later this month. Attorney Jim Griffin argued that prejudice should be assumed. The state bears the burden of proving that “unauthorized third-party communications,” such as Hill’s alleged interaction, were “harmless,” Griffin said.
Toal sided with the state, noting that the court has an affidavit from only one deliberating juror swearing outside contact occurred. She said she wants to hear specific evidence about how the juror perceived Hill’s alleged comments.
Toal dealt another blow to the defense by blocking questions about what effect Murdaugh’s lawyers alleged jury tampering might have had on jury deliberations. She will only ask jurors about the potential impact on their final conclusion, not how they reached their decision.
“No one – not myself or anyone else – is going to ask a juror about the details of their deliberation,” Toal said.
District Attorney Creighton Waters had asked Toal to prevent a “far-reaching fishing expedition” into the post-trial revelations of Hill’s plagiarism and wiretapping allegations against her son. Waters said conversations with jurors and clerks indicate the verdict was not influenced by anything “unprofessional or inappropriate.”
Defense attorney Dick Harpootlian argued that Hill’s new book — which her legal team says is currently unpublished “for the foreseeable future” — is relevant because it establishes a motive. He said Hill told an assistant during the trial that a guilty verdict would be good for her book sales.
Toal chided the longtime lawyer for his continued suggestion that Hill was trying to enrich himself by coercing jurors into a guilty verdict.
“I hope this is the last time you’re going to repeat that until I ask for it again,” Toal said at one point. “Let’s move on from that.”
The evidentiary hearings will be recorded and held in open court. Court television cameras will be allowed but cannot focus on the testifying jurors, who are referred to by their numbers and not their names. Toal also expressed openness to other ways to ensure jurors’ privacy, such as hiding their faces during testimony.
An attorney for two jurors asked Toal to deny news media access to the courtroom to limit the “litigation burden” on his clients. Lawyer Joe McCulloch suggested Toal avoid the “distraction and imposition” of the news media by allowing journalists to watch the exams elsewhere via livestream.
“No harm would be done to the public’s right to know and participate in the proceedings,” he argued, to no avail.
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Pollard is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.