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The court drama surrounding convicted killer Alex Murdaugh shows no signs of letting up. While last week’s action was in federal court – with prosecutors aggressively pushing back against the confessed fraudster’s bid to reduce his federal sentence on financial crimes – this week the flurry of filings shifted to the state court system.
And specifically to Murdaugh’s bid for a new trial…
As we reported yesterday, Murdaugh’s attorneys – Dick Harpootlian, Jim Griffin, Phillip Barber and Maggie Fox – successfully convinced the South Carolina supreme court to hear his appeal of a controversial decision reached back in January to deny him a new trial on the basis of alleged jury tampering by disgraced former Colleton County clerk of court Becky Hill.
The latest motion filed on Tuesday (August 13, 2024) by Murdaugh’s attorneys was originally submitted to the S.C. court of appeals, but was subsequently resubmitted to the supreme court after it granted his motion to hear the jury tampering question.
The motion indicates which specific parts of the record or proceedings Murdaugh’s attorneys believe are relevant to the issues being raised on appeal. Unsurprisingly, based on what was included in the filing, the issues most relevant relate to the jury tampering allegations. Murdaugh’s attorneys also filed a motion requesting the supreme court to pause the filing schedule of his broader appeal while it reviews the jury tampering question (pdf).
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A QUICK(ISH) RECAP
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At the conclusion of a six-week, internationally watched trial, a Colleton County jury unanimously found Murdaugh guilty of the graphic murders of his wife, 52-year-old Maggie Murdaugh, and younger son – 22-year-old Paul Murdaugh – on the family’s hunting property near Islandton, S.C. on the evening of June 7, 2021.
Murdaugh was subsequently sentenced to life in prison.
On September 5, 2023 – six months after the verdicts were announced – Murdaugh’s attorneys filed a motion publicly accusing Hill of tampering with the jury. Murdaugh’s bid for a new trial on the basis of this tampering was rejected in January by former S.C. chief justice Jean Toal. However, based on the contorted nature of Toal’s ruling, the stage has been set for viable appeals process at both the state and federal levels. In fact, the controversial decision to deny Murdaugh a new trial – despite the threshold for tampering by clerk Hill clearly having been met – has many believing Murdaugh will be granted a new trial.
Toal’s decision to deny Murdaugh a new trial came two weeks after she narrowed the scope of the inquiry – ruling against the defense regarding the standard of proof she would be following at the retrial hearing.
“Prejudice is presumed under the circumstances,” Griffin told the former chief justice.
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“Prejudice must be proved, not presumed,” Toal fired back. “For the purposes of what the defendant must show, the presumption – simply by the contact, which we don’t have any sworn evidence about… is not the way to examine this issue but rather specific evidence of what was said, when it was said and how it impacted the jury.”
“That is the approach I will take,” Toal added.
Murdaugh’s attorneys argue Toal reached this decision “by committing legal error and by abusing its discretion.”
They further argued the only evidence presented by the state to contradict sworn testimony describing the tampering was Hill’s own denial – a denial Toal found not credible.
According to Murdaugh’s lawyers, Toal concluded there was “no presumption of prejudice from tampering with jurors during a trial about the matter pending before the jury and Mr. Murdaugh failed to prove that Ms. Hill’s comments actually changed the jury’s verdict.”
The new defense filing focused heavily on Toal’s decision to “disregard (the) binding precedent of the U.S. supreme court.” According to Murdaugh’s defense, Toal incorrectly ruled that a South Carolina case – State v. Green – directed its courts to ignore the standard established by the U.S. supreme court in Remmer v. United States.
Murdaugh’s attorneys have argued Toal misinterpreted – and misapplied – the Green case to Murdaugh.
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RELATED | DENIED: ALEX MURDAUGH’S BID FOR A NEW TRIAL SHOT DOWN
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‘NOT OVERT AS TO OPINION’
During the evidentiary hearing in January, three jurors (christened P, X, and Z) – and an alternate juror – testified that Hill made comments to the jury about Murdaugh’s testimony. Additionally, one deliberating juror – and the alternate juror – testified that Hill told jurors either not to believe or not to be fooled by the defense. Furthermore, the deliberating juror testified that these comments made by Hill influenced her decision as to the guilty verdict.
According to Murdaugh’s attorneys, those communications could not be rebutted by the state simply by arguing what the outcome would have been absent such tampering.
“Hill was a state official who used her official authority to obtain private access to jurors so she could argue the merits of the evidence outside of the presence of the court, the defendant, and his counsel,” Murdaugh’s attorneys argued. “This is, fortunately, a rare event, but it is one that requires a new trial.”
The motion further challenged Toal’s finding that Hill’s comments to jurors were “not overt as to opinion.” According to them, such a conclusion was unsupported – and actually contradicted – by “the evidence in the record.”
When questioned by Toal, Juror Z testified the statement in her affidavit that Hill’s comments influenced her verdict was accurate:
TOAL: Second paragraph says:
Toward the end of the trial, after the Presidents’ Day break but before Mr. Murdaugh testified, the clerk of court, Rebecca Hill, told the jury, quote, not to be fooled, unquote, by the evidence presented by Mr. Murdaugh’s attorneys, which I understood to mean that Mr. Murdaugh would lie when he testifies.
Is that what your recollection is of that statement?
JUROR Z: Yes, ma’am.
TOAL: Is there anything in the statement that on reflection you think is not correct?
JUROR Z: No, ma’am.
-Murdaugh evidentiary hearing transcript.
“She made comments about Murdaugh’s demeanor as he testified, and she made some of those comments before he testified to at least one and maybe more jurors,” Toal said in denying Murdaugh’s motion. “The clerk of court allowed public attention of the moment to overcome her duty.”
Yet according to Murdaugh’s lawyers, Toal inexplicably concluded Hill’s statements were “not overt as to opinion.”
“Allowing the state to insert a ‘finding’ contradicted by all evidence in the record and by the trial court’s own ruling from the bench, simply to shore up its position on appeal, was an abuse of discretion by the trial court,” the pleading argued.
Accordingly, Murdaugh’s attorneys want the supreme court to “disregard the finding that Ms. Hill’s statements were not ‘overt as to opinion.’”
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‘PREJUDICE WAS PROVEN’
Murdaugh’s attorneys noted that in the case of Parker v. Gladden, the U.S. supreme court overturned Oregon’s supreme court – which determined a bailiff’s statement to a juror regarding the guilt of a defendant did not require a new trial because the defendant did not prove the comment affected the verdict.
According to their argument, the clerk of court is a much higher-ranking official than a bailiff – not to mention one who “made equally direct comments (and more of them) to jurors during a criminal trial.”
The motion argued that not only did Murdaugh prove the comments were made, but also that a juror also testified those comments influenced the verdict.
Murdaugh’s attorneys also argued Toal erred in requiring Murdaugh to prove the tampering affected the deliberating jurors’ decision to vote for a guilty verdict because “questioning jurors about what motivated them to vote in a certain way when rendering their verdict is improper.”
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‘SECRET ADVOCACY FOR A GUILTY VERDICT’
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The motion argued that that ruling to sustain a conviction based on the court’s opinion regarding the strength of the evidence against the Murdaugh “regardless of improper external influences on the jury from court officials about the merits of the case is effectively a directed verdict for the prosecution.”
The statement that whatever happened at trial does not matter because the evidence can result in one outcome is a “structural error.”
When the jury returned guilty verdicts on March 3, 2023, circuit court judge Clifton Newman congratulated them on reaching the “proper conclusion.”
“Certainly the verdict that you have reached is supported by the evidence, circumstantial evidence, direct evidence, all of the evidence pointed to only one conclusion, that’s the conclusion you all have reached,” he said. “So, I applaud you all for … coming to a proper conclusion.”
The defense argued this statement “foreshadowed the outcome of the ‘harmless error’ analysis it applied to Mr. Murdaugh’s new trial motion” when the trial court ruled Hill’s jury tampering could not “in any way undermine the fairness and impartiality of [the] six-week trial with its extensive evidentiary presentations, arguments from counsel, and instructions from the trial court” and “any possible presumption of prejudice was overcome by these facts.”
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WHAT’S NEXT?
In their filing, Murdaugh’s attorneys aptly pointed out Murdaugh’s case is an “exposé of privilege and corruption in South Carolina’s legal system and the citizens of South Carolina need more from this case than confirmation of their own social-media-fed ideas about the details of a crime they did not witness.”
According to them, the public needs to see “that their legal system actually works” and to see Murdaugh “convicted by a process they would agree is fair if they were the defendants.”
”This is the biggest case in South Carolina history,” noted South Carolina attorney Lauren Taylor, who provided us with expert analysis during Murdaugh’s evidentiary hearing in January. “With a new Supreme Court, the justices had little choice but to accept this petition and try to right the wrongs that were perpetuated by a court employee.”
“There are still federal implications depending on this court’s interpretation of Remmer and Green and the analysis they set forth,” Taylor added. “If the court determines the burden has shifted to the prosecution to show the contact was not harmless, this could have implications across the fourth circuit.”
Following Tuesday’s filing with the supreme court, prosecutors in the office of attorney general Alan Wilson will have thirty days to submit their reply.
Based on that timetable, the court could schedule oral arguments in the case as soon as December…
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THE FILING…
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR …
Jenn Wood is FITSNews’ incomparable research director. She’s also the producer of the FITSFiles and Cheer Incorporated podcasts and leading expert on all things Murdaugh/ South Carolina justice. A former private investigator with a criminal justice degree, evildoers beware, Jenn Wood is far from your average journalist! A deep dive researcher with a passion for truth and a heart for victims, this mom of two is pretty much a superhero in FITSNews country. Did we mention she’s married to a rocket scientist? (Lucky guy!) Got a story idea or a tip for Jenn? Email her at jenn@fitsnews.com.
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