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by JENN WOOD
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Disgraced former South Carolina attorney and accused murderer Alex Murdaugh has filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against former Colleton County clerk of court Rebecca “Becky” Hill — accusing her of deliberately violating his constitutional right to a fair trial by improperly influencing jurors during his nationally watched double homicide trial in 2023.
The seventeen-page complaint, filed on Sunday (May 17, 2026) in U.S. District Court in Charleston, seeks compensatory and punitive damages under a federal civil rights statute — 42 U.S.C. § 1983 — which allows individuals to sue government officials accused of violating their constitutional rights while acting under color of state law.
The lawsuit (.pdf) comes on the heels of last week’s unanimous – and unambiguous – South Carolina supreme court ruling overturning Murdaugh’s murder convictions based on findings that Hill engaged in “shocking jury interference” during the six-week trial in Walterboro, S.C.
That decision vacated Murdaugh’s convictions for the June 7, 2021 murders of his wife, 52-year-old Maggie Murdaugh, and younger son, 22-year-old Paul Murdaugh – and the life sentences handed down against him by former circuit court judge Clifton Newman.
Now, Murdaugh’s attorneys are attempting to convert those findings into a federal civil case targeting Hill in her official capacity as an agent of the state.

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‘FINGERS ON THE SCALES OF JUSTICE’
The lawsuit leans heavily on the blistering language included in the Supreme Court’s bombshell May 13, 2026 opinion reversing the convictions.
“As the Supreme Court of South Carolina has now held, Ms. Hill ‘placed her fingers on the scales of justice,’” the complaint stated.
Murdaugh’s attorneys allege Hill — acting “under color of state law” as elected clerk of court — repeatedly inserted herself into jury deliberations and attempted to steer jurors toward a guilty verdict for her own personal financial gain.
According to the filing, Hill made repeated comments urging jurors not to be “fooled,” “confused,” or “thrown off” by Murdaugh’s defense – and encouraged them to scrutinize his body language while testifying.
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The complaint directly quoted the supreme court’s conclusion that Hill “became a character witness on behalf of the State” and “essentially implored the jurors to find him guilty.” The filing further alleged Hill’s conduct was motivated by her desire to profit from publicity surrounding the case through book sales and media attention.
“She wanted to write a book about the most high-profile trial in South Carolina history so she could buy a lake house,” the complaint stated.
To support these claims, the lawsuit extensively recounted testimony presented during the January 2024 evidentiary hearing before former chief justice Jean Toal — the proceeding after which Murdaugh’s request for a new trial was initially rejected.
The complaint highlighted testimony from jurors who said Hill made comments regarding Murdaugh’s testimony and demeanor – including one juror who stated Hill’s remarks influenced her verdict.
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The complaint referenced testimony from multiple jurors who said Hill made comments about Murdaugh’s testimony and demeanor, including one juror who testified Hill’s remarks influenced her verdict. It also highlighted testimony from Barnwell County clerk of court Rhonda McElveen, who stated Hill repeatedly remarked that a guilty verdict would help her sell more books.
According to the filing, even Toal concluded Hill was “not completely credible” and had allowed “the siren call of celebrity” to overcome her duty as clerk of court.
Although Toal denied the motion for a new trial at the time, the supreme court later reversed that decision – rejecting the former chief justice’s assertion that federal case law required Murdaugh’s attorneys to prove the jury tampering and improper outside influence impacted jurors.
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RELATED | DEBATE ON CHARGES REIGNITED
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DAMAGE CLAIMED…
Perhaps the most unusual aspect of the federal lawsuit was the damages claim itself. Murdaugh alleged in his complaint that Hill’s misconduct caused him to lose approximately $600,000 in funds he spent defending himself during the murder trial. According to the complaint, these funds came from a court-authorized withdrawal from his 401(k) retirement account — which his attorneys described as his “sole remaining asset.”
The lawsuit seeks compensatory damages, punitive damages, attorney’s fees and costs.
The filing marks the latest — and perhaps most extraordinary — development in the continuing fallout surrounding the Murdaugh jury tampering scandal, which intensified dramatically last week.
Hill already pleaded guilty in 2025 to misconduct in office, obstruction of justice and perjury charges unrelated to direct jury tampering allegations. But the supreme court’s opinion fundamentally reshaped the legal landscape surrounding her conduct by formally concluding she improperly influenced jurors and violated Murdaugh’s constitutional right to a fair trial.
Now, for the first time, Hill faces direct personal civil liability tied specifically to the collapse of the murder verdicts themselves.
Additional developments in the case are expected Monday afternoon.
Murdaugh attorneys Dick Harpootlian and Jim Griffin are scheduled to hold a 1:00 p.m. press conference at the Harpootlian Law Firm in Columbia to discuss the supreme court’s ruling and “new developments” in the case.
With a retrial looming, mounting scrutiny surrounding Hill and now a federal civil rights lawsuit targeting the former clerk personally, the legal and political fallout from South Carolina’s most infamous murder trial appears far from over.
This is a breaking news story based on the latest information available. Stay with FITSNews for updates …
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THE COMPLAINT…
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR …

As a private investigator turned journalist, Jenn Wood brings a unique skill set to FITSNews as its research director. Known for her meticulous sourcing and victim-centered approach, she helps shape the newsroom’s most complex investigative stories while producing the FITSFiles and Cheer Incorporated podcasts. Jenn lives in South Carolina with her family, where her work continues to spotlight truth, accountability, and justice.
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5 comments
Okay – we now know beyond a shadow of a doubt that Murdaugh has money hidden somewhere that Pooty Poot and Jimbo are drawing against. There’s NO WAY that those two are doing this because they believe “Elick” is innocent. Neither one of them are the sharpest knives in the drawer but they’re not that stupid.
Alex Murdaugh is innocent of the shootings; but now they want to execute him.
So, Creighton Waters now vindictively brandishes the death penalty?
He’s in over his head.
Now that the Catholic Church has declared its opposition to the death penalty to be a core belief, Prancing Creighton Waters (“PCW”) cannot exclude jurors opposed to the death penalty if they are Catholic.
Instead of itching to execute the innocent, Alan Wilson should show some zeal in improving murder investigations.
To expiate for his Frankenstein creation, FITS should do a whole show or a whole story on the scientific failures of the investigation into Paul and Maggie’s shootings.
Here is more about ballistics which is augmented by this (link to video deleted for publishability).
It shows SLED, presumably in the early morning of 8 June 2021, supposedly collecting evidence from around and inside the house at Moselle.
Many mistakes appear in that short clip:
1. The spent bullets collected from around the exterior seven-step stoop are BASICALLY rubbed together by the evidence gatherer thus HOPELESSLY contaminating the subsequent tool-mark microscopic examination and analysis if such analysis were a science to begin with.
2. The evidence gatherers arrived without simple plastic or paper bags in which to put each bullet separately with an identification of the precise location it was found.
3. They then resort to a quick and dirty non-solution of putting a bullet in each finger of a “new glove” again without precise location identification and after the bullets had scarred each other from being basically rubbed together.
4. The exterior door handle is not dusted for fingerprints nor swabbed for DNA.
5. Once inside the house, no effort or attention is paid to any food or drink containers with residue or unconsumed content. That should be basic in any murder investigation even where the victims had been visibly shot: had they been poisoned or attempted to be poisoned before the shootings? Were they under the influence of anything they had consumed before being confronted by their shooter(s)? That may not necessarily have been the case here; but these are basics of any investigation started on a blank slate.
6. They are heard commenting to each other that the autopsies already started. They should have carefully looked for evidence of unconsummated or recently-consummated food and drink to supply to the autopsy performer.
Or course, many more mistakes appear even in that short clip.
Now that the Sixth Amendment right to a fair and impartial jury has been vindicated, it is essential to vindicate the DUE PROCESS right to a scientifically-sound investigation before charges are even brought against anyone.
Of course, many more mistakes appear even in that short clip.
Now that the Sixth Amendment right to a fair and impartial jury has been vindicated, it is essential to vindicate the DUE PROCESS right to a scientifically-sound investigation before charges are even brought against anyone.
Trying again:
So, Creighton Waters now vindictively brandishes the death penalty?
He’s in over his head.
Now that the Catholic Church has declared its opposition to the death penalty to be a core belief, Prancing Creighton Waters (“PCW”) cannot exclude jurors opposed to the death penalty if they are Catholic.
Instead of itching to execute the innocent, Alan Wilson should show some zeal in improving murder investigations.
To expiate for his Frankenstein creation, FITS should do a whole show or a whole story on the scientific failures of the investigation into Paul and Maggie’s shootings.
Here is more about ballistics which is augmented by this (link to video deleted for publishability).
It shows SLED, presumably in the early morning of 8 June 2021, supposedly collecting evidence from around and inside the house at Moselle.
Many mistakes appear in that short clip:
1. The spent bullets collected from around the exterior seven-step stoop are BASICALLY rubbed together by the evidence gatherer thus HOPELESSLY contaminating the subsequent tool-mark microscopic examination and analysis if such analysis were a science to begin with.
2. The evidence gatherers arrived without simple plastic or paper bags in which to put each bullet separately with an identification of the precise location it was found.
3. They then resort to a quick and dirty non-solution of putting a bullet in each finger of a “new glove” again without precise location identification and after the bullets had scarred each other from being basically rubbed together.
4. The exterior door handle is not dusted for fingerprints nor swabbed for DNA.
5. Once inside the house, no effort or attention is paid to any food or drink containers with residue or unconsumed content. That should be basic in any murder investigation even where the victims had been visibly shot: had they been poisoned or attempted to be poisoned before the shootings? Were they under the influence of anything they had consumed before being confronted by their shooter(s)? That may not necessarily have been the case here; but these are basics of any investigation started on a blank slate.
6. They are heard commenting to each other that the autopsies already started. They should have carefully looked for evidence of unconsummated or recently-consummated food and drink to supply to the autopsy performer.
Or course, many more mistakes appear even in that short clip.
Now that the Sixth Amendment right to a fair and impartial jury has been vindicated, it is essential to vindicate the DUE PROCESS right to a scientifically-sound investigation before charges are even brought against anyone.
Of course, many more mistakes appear even in that short clip.
Now that the Sixth Amendment right to a fair and impartial jury has been vindicated, it is essential to vindicate the DUE PROCESS right to a scientifically-sound investigation before charges are even brought against anyone.
I shall, for now, God willing and FITS permitting, leave aside the insane idea which won’t go away but insists that Becky Hill was bribed by Richard Alexander Murdaugh (“RAM”) and/or his defense team to push the jury to find RAM guilty!?!?!
And the more I ask the logical question: “If the Defense had bribed Becky Hill to influence the jury, wouldn’t she have influenced them to return a NOT GUILTY verdict and been done with it?” the more I get insulted.
But what alarms me more than the insults is RAM’s Defense team’s failure to appreciate and counter the hold insanity has taken hold of the public.
It’s the same insanity which made the first jury buy the Prosecution’s insane motive theory.
And RAM’s current Defense team STILL thinks its shock at the insanity of the Prosecution’s motive theory will carry the day with the next jury if only it were not manipulated by Becky Hill.
The majority of internet commenters are not manipulated by Becky Hill; yet, they buy the Prosecution’s insane motive theory and even defend it and confabulate reasons to defend it.
I wrote that I shall put that aside for now but didn’t quite do that.
Yet, I move to the ONE AND ONLY item of true evidence the Prosecution has and warn RAM’s Defense that unless they counter it more effectively, they will doom RAM again.
Here is part of a thread from David Pascoe for AG’s FaceBook post:
“Janice Squires Randall
She needs to be in jail. He admits to lying about being there before his wife and son were murdered. Now he gets a new trial at taxpayers expense. No wonder it’s called CRIMINAL justice.
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Marie Faltas
Janice Squires Randall , Alex Murdaugh was in his HOME of Moselle which has many parts BEFORE and AFTER, but NOT DURING the shootings. There is ABSOLUTELY NO EVIDENCE of when EXACTLY the shootings occurred between Paul’s video of 8:49 pm and Alex’s 911 call of 10:10 pm. We know FOR SURE that the dinner all three of Alex, Paul and Maggie, had TOGETHER ended at 8:30 pm and that the kennels are some 100 or so yards from the house. How does that prove Alex did the shootings?
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Janice Squires Randall
Marie Faltas why did he tell an employee at his mother’s I believe what to say. You have your opinion I have mine.
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Marie Faltas
Janice Squires Randall, again, if the shootings occurred AFTER Alex Murdaugh left Moselle for Almeda, it does not matter how long or how short his visit to Almeda was. We know FOR SURE that he left Moselle for Almeda at 9:02 pm. That is from THREE UNDISPUTED SOURCES: Alex’s own phone, the FBI download of his car, and General Motors’ BELATED production of Alex’s car’s tracking data. All you need to know to understand that Alex could NOT be the shooter is that the shootings AND THE CLEANING OF THE SCENE could NOT have happened between 8:49 pm and 9:02 pm. There are more compelling medical reasons, too. These are not “opinions”; they are facts.
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Linda Lollis Reece
Marie Faltas why would he lie about not being at the kennels? What would make him not tell the truth about being there?
5h
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Marie Faltas
Linda Lollis Reece, I explained many times that I do NOT KNOW, and I do not think he even knows, why he DID NOT VOLUNTEER having been at the kennels at 8:49 pm; but I do not think that has ANY IMPORTANCE because it is clear from MEDICAL EVIDENCE (victims’ stomachs’ contents at autopsy compared to the KNOWN time and contents of their last meal at 8:30 pm) that the shootings happened closer to 9:30 pm than to 8:54 pm. He had volunteered that he was with them at dinner in the house; and the house is within few minutes walking distance from the kennels. So, what is the big deal? He could not have been the shooter even if had VOLUNTEERED having gone to the kennels if you accept the MEDICALLY-CORRECT time of the shootings. And remember again, he NEVER ever says to first responders that he never went to the kennels. They just did not ask him; and he did not volunteer it.”
This is a long but NECESSARY and UNIQUE comment. So, please read it carefully. After all, I was THE FIRST to comment that Becky Hill’s book should cause Alex Murdaugh to seek a new trial.
The key to everything is: when EXACTLY did the shootings occur?
A penny of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
Those who pinch the penny of prevention want to cash in on the pound of cure.
That goes for the penny to properly train law enforcement and crime scene investigators compared to the pound of high-salaried prosecutors and defense attorneys and prosecutors-turned-defense-attorneys all in a case bound to ultimately fail due to investigatory failures from the start.
Ever heard the expression “like a chicken with its head cut off”? It means furiously flapping around.
Ever heard the expression “a stick-to-your-ribs mean”? It means fatty meals are emptied from the stomach much later than light ones.
Now, you might say human observation is that one has a bowel movement almost immediately after a large and fatty meal.
True; but that movement is NOT the meal you just ate. It is the prior meal(s) that got SLOWLY moved down the digestive tact, broken down, and absorbed with ONLY the indigestible residue passing down to the terminal part of the digestive tract and waiting there.
Waiting there for what?
For one of both of two things: enough volume to open the anal sphincter and/or signals from the very upper digestive tract that “more food is coming so you, distal colon and anus, better get empty and ready for it because you do not know how much it will be.”
How do the terminal colon and anus get those signals? The reflexes of the autonomic nervous system.
They start with the dento-colonic reflex. You are more likely to have a bowel movement after brushing your teeth in the morning.
Next is the gastro-colonic reflex. Even babies have bowel movements right after every feed. If that were the milk they just received, they would starve to death. Instead, it is the residue of the milk from the prior feeds.
The reflexes go the other way, too.
Adults and babies feel hungrier after a bowel movement because the terminal colon tells the stomach “I’m good and empty and ready for the residue of the next meal to come down my way.”
That is why babies have more bowel movements a day because they need more feeds a day at the stage of fastest growth. As the growth curve slows, the number of bowel movements decreases until one bowel movement a day becomes the norm for adults.
These are, of course, the physiological, not pathological, sequences.
What does this have to do with Paul and Maggie?
We know FOR SURE that their last meal started after 8:00 pm on 7 June 2021 and ended at 8:30 pm that day.
We also know with relative certainty what they had eaten because Blanca testified what she had cooked and left on the stove for them.
It would have been MANDATORY for properly-trained first investigators on the scene to collect that/those pots left on the stove and precisely measured how much, if any, food was left and precisely subtracted that from the total capacity of the pot(s) left on the stove and the dirty dishes, if any, around.
Of course, with three people sharing the same dinner from the same pot(s), it would have been an educated guess to apportion how much each of the three ate and drank.
But the bottom line is the Prosecution’s FALSE time of death at 8:49 or 8:52 pm, is ONLY 19 to 22 minutes after the last meal. THAT SOON after the last meal, the stomach contents should look almost exactly as they looked on the dinner plates.
THEY DID NOT.
They were too digested into “tan material” for the pathologist to tell exactly what they were and she “did not see any corn or beans or anything like that.” That pretty much rules out death 19 to 22 minutes after the last meal.
And it puts the most likely time of death around 9:30 pm.
Why did Maggie’s phone have some activity around 8:52 pm but not thereafter? EASY! She had laid it on the side-by-side or somewhere to have both hands free to handle the dogs; and one member of the shooting cabal got hold of it to prevent her from using it to record the events or to summon help. Once they realized someone was calling Maggie, they had to discard it far away to prevent her from reaching for it but not too far away for that member to return to the shooting cabal.
And the Defense team fell into the Prosecution’s trap and spent a lot of money proving that Alex would not have heard the shots fired at the kennels when he was at the house for some acoustic reason or another.
The real reason Alex could not hear the shots is that they were fired by the real shooter(s) AFTER Alex had left for Almeda. And, no, he would not have seen, much less suspected a pedestrian disposing of Maggie’s phone on the side of the road.
All that stuff about the phone lighting or not lighting when thrown assumes it was thrown from a moving car.
It need not have been. It could have been placed by a pedestrian.
Tell me, if you can, where I am wrong.