Stalled Justice: Alex Murdaugh’s Lawyers Call Out South Carolina Attorney General

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Attorneys for convicted killer Alex Murdaugh challenged South Carolina’s top prosecutor this week, urging him to move forward with cases against two key figures in the ‘Murdaugh Murders‘ crime and corruption saga – and suggesting prosecutorial nefariousness in the event his office refused to do so.

S.C. attorney general Alan Wilson and his team secured a pair of high-profile murder convictions against Murdaugh in March of 2023. Following an internationally watched trial, Murdaugh – a former assistant solicitor and influential Lowcountry attorney – was unanimously found guilty of savagely murdering his wife, 52-year-old Maggie Murdaugh, and younger son, 22-year-old Paul Murdaugh, on June 7, 2021 at Moselle, the family’s 1,700-acre hunting property straddling the Salkehatchie River in the picturesque Palmetto Lowcountry.

The following day, Murdaugh was sentenced to life in prison without parole by S.C. circuit court judge Clifton Newman.

Those convictions are now in jeopardy, however, due to jury tampering allegations against former Colleton County clerk of court Becky Hill – whose office oversaw the administration of Murdaugh’s double homicide trial last year. There is also an alleged jury rigging conspiracy which the state seems eager to keep under wraps.

Hill has yet to be charged with jury tampering – or charged in connection host of other alleged ethical violations and criminal acts. Meanwhile, Wilson’s office has been criticized for failing to refer her case to an independent prosecutor.

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This week, Murdaugh’s attorneys took direct aim at the state’s controversial interest in maintaining Hill’s credibility – specifically accusing Wilson and his office of refusing to prosecute the disgraced former official because it could further imperil the state’s guilty verdicts against Murdaugh, which have been accepted for review by the S.C. supreme court.

“There’s an obvious reason for the delay,” Murdaugh attorney Jim Griffin told FITSNews on Monday. “They don’t want to take any action that would influence the supreme court against her.”

According to Griffin, the stalling tactic exposes “the inherent conflict of Alan Wilson’s office overseeing this case.”

“If they were to prosecute and convict Becky Hill, that would be harmful to their efforts to preserve their verdicts against Alex Murdaugh,” Griffin told FITSNews.

Indeed it would. This is precisely why my media outlet criticized Wilson’s office this summer for failing to refer Hill’s case to a prosecutor who was not conflicted. Wilson had a chance to make such a referral, but failed.

At the time, I questioned whether Wilson’s “decision to effectively retain control of Hill’s cases (would) only further stoke concerns regarding the integrity of the Murdaugh verdicts.”

And now it has…

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The state’s ongoing interest in maintaining secrecy surrounding the jury tampering (and alleged jury rigging) at Murdaugh’s trial has only emboldened the suspicions of those who believe that Murdaugh – while guilty of murdering his wife and son – was denied his Sixth Amendment right to an impartial jury.

Murdaugh attorney Dick Harpootlian accused Wilson’s office of trying to run out the clock on the Hill charges, specifically accusing state prosecutors of using Hill’s upcoming hearing on alleged ethics violations as an excuse not to move forward with criminal charges.

“If she has violated the law, she ought to be prosecuted,” Harpootlian told FITSNews. “There’s no requirement for them to wait on an ethics hearing.”

Harpootlian also drew a bead on another high-profile “failure to prosecute” by Wilson’s office. Questioned as to the status of more than a dozen pending charges against former Murdaugh “fixer” Curtis ‘Eddie’ Smith, Harpootlian questioned why Wilson’s office was refusing to move forward on the “massive crimes” Smith is accused of committing in connection with this saga.

Smith was Murdaugh’s alleged personal drug dealer/check casher. He has been accused of cashing more than 400 checks totaling at least $2.4 million at Murdaugh’s behest – funds which prosecutors claim supported “a myriad (of) unlawful activities” between 2013 and 2021. Smith is further staring down a slew of drug trafficking charges tied to Murdaugh – which were filed in an indictment in June of 2022.

The biggest headlines involving Smith, though, were generated in October of 2022 when Murdaugh’s attorneys accused him of being the murderer of Maggie and Paul Murdaugh based on a failed polygraph examination. Smith’s attorney flatly refuted that allegation – and challenged investigators to test his DNA with evidence found at the crime scene.

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RELATED | MURDAUGH SAGA LOOSE ENDS

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In addition to all of this, Smith has been criminally charged in connection with his role in a bizarre roadside shooting involving Murdaugh in September of 2021. The stated purpose of the shooting? A suicide-for-hire scam intended to route insurance settlement proceeds to Murdaugh’s surviving son, Buster Murdaugh.

Smith was subpoenaed to testify at Murdaugh’s murder trial but was never called to the stand. Had he testified, he was widely expected to assert that Murdaugh confessed to the murders of his wife and son during the roadside shooting incident.

According to Harpootlian, the state’s failure to charge Smith after more than three years indicates they have an interest in keeping him “on the hook.”

“All of the evidence would indicate Eddie was the source of the millions of dollars in drugs – and he was accused of laundering the money,” Harpootlian said. “His crimes were integral to the murders… why isn’t he being prosecuted?”

“I think the attorney general owes the public an explanation,” Harpootlian said. “Either schedule the case or drop the charges.”

According to Griffin, “one theory why (prosecutors) haven’t disposed of Eddie’s case is that they are expecting the Murdaugh case to come back for a retrial.”

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In such an event, the state would have an interest in maintaining its leverage over Smith to secure his testimony in the event it were needed at a second double homicide trial.

“They want Eddie with charges hanging over him,” Griffin said. “He is central to their whole theory of the case. But if their theory was really the motive for murder, why are they not closing the loop?”

Harpootlian also questioned whether the state – which revoked Smith’s bond in August of 2022 only to reinstate it the month after the trial – was monitoring and enforcing the conditions of his release from a Midlands-area detention center.

“I’d be fascinated to see the records of his house arrest and drug testing,” Harpootlian said.

Following Griffin and Harpootlian’s comments, our media outlet reached out to the attorney general’s office seeking clarity as to its prosecutorial plans for Hill and Smith – and questioned its decision not to recuse itself from Hill’s case. No response was immediately forthcoming.

In the event we do receive a response, however, we will publish it unedited and in its entirety…

Our media outlet has broken nearly all of the major news in the Murdaugh saga – from the first reports of the homicides in the spring of 2021 to the ongoing scrutiny of the guilty verdicts secured against Alex Murdaugh in the winter of 2023. Count on us to continue following this case wherever it goes…

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UPDATE |

Our media outlet received the following response this morning from Robert Kittle, spokesman for the attorney general’s office…

1. There is nothing scheduled for Eddie Smith at this time.
2. We are not aware of any bond violations.
3. The state will announce its decision regarding potential charges against Becky Hill after the investigation has concluded.
4. I would refer you to our letter of July 10 (.pdf) asking for Solicitor Rick Hubbard’s assistance on the Becky Hill case. The review has been moving forward with due diligence. However, as you may be aware, Solicitor Hubbard has been heavily involved in the recent Columbiana Mall shooting cases and trial, which has consumed a lot of his time.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR …

Will Folks is the founding editor of the news outlet you are currently reading. Prior to founding FITSNews, he served as press secretary to the governor of South Carolina and before that he was a bass guitarist and dive bar bouncer. He lives in the Midlands region of the state with his wife and eight children.

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