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South Carolina prosecutors revealed that 22-year-old Paul Murdaugh sent a Snapchat video to his friends shortly before he was shot dead.
Murdaugh’s father, Alex, a scion of one of the state’s most famous legal families, will go on trial Monday charged with the murder of Paul and his 52-year-old mother Maggie.
Paul and Maggie Murdaugh were found dead at the family hunting lodge in June 2021.
Prosecutors allege that Alex, whose life was spiraling out of control amid years of opioid addiction and mounting debt, lured his wife and son into the 1,700-acre lodge and shot them.
Alex Murdaugh pleaded not guilty in June, and the successful trial, expected to last three weeks, with wild accusations of dark family secrets, financial ruin and hedonistic excesses, will be enthusiastically watched across the country.
On Wednesday, prosecutors revealed that a Snapchat video was “critical to the case.”
Paul Murdaugh (right) was shot and killed in June 2021. Prosecutors revealed on Wednesday that he sent a Snapchat video to friends about an hour before he died. His father Alex (left) will go to trial on Monday, accused of his murder
From left: Paul, Alex, Maggie and Buster Murdaugh in a photo released in January 2019
Several views of the crime scene where Paul was shot were in court files.
The 22-year-old was shot in the feeding room connected to the kennels on the Moselle estate, while his mother was shot five times, including in the back of the head, with a semi-automatic rifle; the couple died just 30 meters from each other.
Paul sent the video shortly before 8 pm on the night he was killed.
Investigators believe he and his mother died between 9 p.m. and 9:30 p.m.
Prosecutors are seeking permission to call a Snapchat executive to testify about the veracity of the video.
“Among other things, central to the case is a video sent to several friends at approximately 7:56 pm on the night of the murders,” wrote Creighton Waters, senior deputy assistant attorney general.
“The content of this video is important to prove the case of the State in Chief.”
Waters asked Judge Clifton Newman to order Snapchat’s representative to appear in court.
Newman signed the order.
“Because this video was provided by Snapchat, a Snapchat custodian is required to testify in person that the video is a true and accurate record maintained in the normal course of business,” Waters argued.
They did not reveal what was in the Snapchat video.
Murdaugh (photo center), the heir to a once powerful legal dynasty, is accused of shooting his youngest son Paul (left) and his wife Maggie (right) and is due to go to trial on Monday.
A crime scene photo showing what appears to be blood drops on the floor, a mannequin, and an evidence marker in the feeding room where Paul was fatally shot.
Earlier this week, state forensics expert Dr. Kenneth Kinsey described Paul’s horrific injuries.
In his affidavit, Kinsey said that Paul Murdaugh was shot twice, with the second bullet entering through the left shoulder into the neck and brain.
Kinsey said that his “brain was completely separated from the head.”
The 22-year-old received a first blow to the chest while standing in the feeding room connected to the kennels on the Moselle estate, while his mother was shot five times, including in the back of the head, with a rifle. Semiautomatic.
The couple died just 30 yards from each other.
Kinsey’s description matched a December FitsNews report in which the outlet said Paul’s head “exploded like a watermelon.”
‘I mean, you can see his face, but the rest, his head, is just gone. Totally empty,’ a source who saw the crime scene photos told the news site.
The affidavit was included in a motion filed Tuesday by Murdaugh’s lawyers asking Judge Clifton Newman to exclude a blood spatter expert from testifying for the state at the upcoming trial.
The South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED) enlisted Oklahoma-based forensics expert Tom Bevel to analyze a white T-shirt Murdaugh was wearing the night of the murders.
Defense attorneys Jim Griffin and Dick Harpootlian argued in an earlier motion that any blood on the shirt was transferred when Murdaugh found the bodies and “frantically checked them for signs of life.”
The court filing also had a close-up of the blood spatter where Paul was shot twice, once in the chest and a second time entering his left shoulder into the neck and brain.
But Bevel concluded that the jersey is “stained with high velocity blood spatter as a result of shooting Maggie and Paul” after his initial report found the stains to be “consistent with transfers and not spatter from a gunshot wound.” .
Murdaugh’s lawyers accused SLED of “pressure” Bevel to change his report.
The jersey was later destroyed “for forensic evidence purposes by the unnecessary application of an oxidizing chemical stain,” the court filing states.
Bevel’s initial report only came to light when prosecutors from the South Carolina Attorney General’s Office accidentally gave a copy to Murdaugh’s defense team, according to the motion.
The white T-shirt is critical evidence for state prosecutors, who have suggested in court documents that the family patriarch shot his wife and son after fearing his decades-old corruption schemes would be exposed.
In the affidavit, Kinsey said he cannot judge whether the stains on Murdaugh’s jersey are consistent with the splashes on his back.
Murdaugh was indicted by a grand jury in July 2022 and the Colleton County trial is scheduled to begin with jury selection, which authorities say could last until February 10.