South Carolina decide sentences former lawyer to 2 consecutive life sentences for homicide of spouse and son.
A disgraced former lawyer who was convicted of killing his spouse and son after a six-week trial that riveted the US has been sentenced to 2 consecutive life sentences.
via the trialsAlex Murdaugh had stated he was not responsible within the June 7, 2021, taking pictures deaths on the household’s sprawling residential and farming compound within the US state of South Carolina.
Choose Clifton Newton on Friday steered Murdaugh’s opioid habit might have made him “a monster” and that “the particular person standing earlier than me was not the one who dedicated the crime, though it is the identical particular person.”
Earlier than handing down the sentence, Newton stated the murders certified for the demise penalty, however he didn’t “query in any respect” the prosecutors’ choice to not pursue that choice.
Murdaugh maintained his innocence earlier than sentencing.
“I respect this court docket, however I’m harmless, and I might by no means beneath any circumstances damage my spouse, Maggie, and I might by no means beneath any circumstances damage my son Paw-Paw,” Murdaugh stated, utilizing a nickname he used for his son. Paul.
Murdaugh is a part of a authorized dynasty. He was sentenced in the identical courtroom on the circuit the place his father, grandfather and great-grandfather tried instances as elected prosecutors for greater than 80 years. His grandfather’s portrait hung behind the room till the decide ordered it taken down for the trial.
As an alternative of the gown shirt and sport coat he wore via the six-week trial, Murdaugh, who made thousands and thousands suing large corporations on behalf of individuals injured in accidents, arrived at court docket in a jail jumpsuit the day after he was convicted of two counts of homicide.
The Colleton County jury deliberated for lower than three hours earlier than discovering Murdaugh. responsible of killing his 22-year-old son with a shotgun and his 52-year-old spouse with a rifle.
Juror Craig Moyer advised US broadcaster ABC Information that when deliberations started, the jury instantly took a ballot that got here again with 9 responsible votes. It did not take lengthy to steer the opposite three jurors to convict Murdaugh.
The juror agreed with prosecutors that the important thing piece of proof was a video locked on his son’s cellphone for a 12 months — video shot minutes earlier than the killings on the similar kennels close to the place the our bodies could be discovered.
The voices of all three Murdaughs might be heard on the video though Alex Murdaugh had insisted for 20 months that he hadn’t been on the kennels that evening. When he took the stand in his personal protection, the very first thing he did was admit he had lied to investigators about being on the kennels, saying he was paranoid of legislation enforcement as a result of he was an opioid addict with capsules in his pocket the evening of the killings.
“A great liar. However not adequate,” Moyer stated.
Prosecutors didn’t have the weapons used to kill the mom and son or different direct proof like confessions or blood spatter. However they’d a mountain of circumstantial proof, together with the video placing Alex Murdaugh on the scene of the killings 5 minutes earlier than his spouse and son stopped utilizing their cellphones perpetually.
“As appeals are most likely anticipated, I might not count on a confession of any sort,” Newton stated on Friday.
