Alex Murdaugh is back in court Friday for a hearing ahead of his upcoming trial for alleged financial crimes.
The cutthroat legal scion, 55, faces more than 100 financial crimes charges, alleging he embezzled $9 million from friends and clients at his former law firm.
Prosecutors are expected to allege he killed his wife Maggie and son Paul to distract from his financial crimes, saying his life spiraled out of control as he battled a secret opioid addiction.
Murdaugh’s trial is set to begin on November 27, but his lawyers have requested that the trial be moved to another location or rescheduled as they raise concerns about the impartiality of the jury in the notorious killer’s case.
Similar accusations of jury tampering were made earlier this year during his murder trial, when Colleton County Clerk of Court Rebecca Hill was accused of inappropriately advising jurors to ignore Murdaugh’s testimony and pressuring them to quickly to reach a judgement.
Alex Murdaugh returned to court Friday for a hearing as he faces more than 100 financial crimes charges
Murdaugh will speak with his attorney Dick Harpootlian in court on Friday
Attorney Dick Harpootlian (left) speaks with prosecutor Creighton Waters (right), who is expected to argue that Murdaugh killed his wife and son to distract from his alleged financial crimes
In his financial crimes trial, Murdaugh faces 19 criminal charges and more than 100 felony charges, including tax evasion, money laundering, forgery and fraud.
Ronnie Richter, an attorney representing the victims of Murdaugh’s alleged financial crimes, has claimed that the legal scion’s actions amounted to a “Ponzi scheme.”
“Alex’s financial crimes are nothing more than a Ponzi scheme, and all Ponzi schemes work the same way: I have to continue stealing from new people to replace the money I stole from old people,” he said.
“All Ponzi schemes end the same way. Sooner or later it’s like musical chairs: the music stops and someone doesn’t have a chair.
‘And that’s exactly what happened to Alex. The music stopped, he ran out of places to get money and all his financial crimes were exposed.”
The financial crimes case will be presided over by Judge Clifton Newman, who this week recused himself from Murdaugh’s future hearings on his murder conviction while his lawyers ask for a new trial.
Newman came under fire for a controversial interview with NBC News a month after the trial, where he commented on the blockbuster trial just a month after its conclusion.
Murdaugh was convicted on March 2 of murdering his son Paul and wife Maggie at their South Carolina hunting lodge in June 2021. He is now serving life without parole and is appealing his sentence
Murdaugh’s attorneys want the Lowcountry financial crimes trial moved or postponed until at least March, arguing his case could be tarnished by the media and public interest surrounding him.
Last week, Murdaugh’s attorney Dick Harpootlian cited answers to a pretrial juror questionnaire asking how well potential jurors understand his criminal charges because of “exhaustive media reporting.”
In response, Eric Bland, an attorney representing one of Murdaugh’s alleged financial victims, said the request was without merit since a juror is not selected based on their knowledge of the case.
‘It’s a bit like the pot calling the kettle black. The fact is, you can go to Tanzania and try to get the trial to happen there, and there are people there who heard about the Murdaugh case,” Bland said.
“Just because people have heard about the Murdaugh case doesn’t mean they can’t be fair, impartial, and objective jurors.
“You don’t need to pick a jury where 12 people have never heard of the Murdaugh case. “They have to be willing to put aside whatever knowledge they have, listen to the evidence and be fair and impartial, that’s the norm and I think they can do that.”
Buster, Paul, Maggie and Alex Murdaugh are pictured in a photo presented to jurors during the trial in Colleton County District Court on Tuesday, February 14
As Murdaugh prepares to stand trial for his alleged financial crimes, the lead investigators of his murder investigation have revealed the moment they found the smoking gun in his case.
Investigators Brett Dove and David Owen broke their silence for the first time since the trial of the prominent South Carolina attorney in March. Dateline NBCin an episode airing tonight at 9 p.m., about the discovery of video evidence proving he lied about being at the scene of the crime.
The evidence in question was a final cellphone video recorded by Murdaugh’s son Paul on the night of the murders, in which a voice believed to be the patriarch could be heard at a time when he claimed he was not at the scene.
“I listened to it three or four times just to make sure I heard it, because I didn’t believe it,” Dove said, while Owen described the moment as “really exciting.”
“I can prove Alex lied to me,” he added, agreeing that this was the smoking gun that “blew the case wide open.”