Transcript of The Murdaugh Family Murders

Thanks for listening to 2020. Remember, you can follow us on Amazon Music to hear this podcast and other ABC news podcasts ad-free, or you can ask Alexa to play the podcast, 2020 on Amazon Music. I'm I mean, now, we're in a weird emergency. This is Alec Murdoch. I need the police to pass us immediately. My wife and Tom could stop badly. On June 7, 2021, at 10: 06 PM, Alec Murdoch calls 911, and he is frantic. Are they breathing? No, ma'am. They're on the ground out of my kennel. He sounds extremely upset. His voice is in a totally different high pitch tone. The scene that Alec Murdoch is looking at is his 52-year-old wife, Maggie, and his 22-year-old son, Paul. You're the one helping me. They were both shot to death outside their property, a place they call Moselle. Please hurry. We're getting somebody out there to you. Colin County Sheriff's office Deputy Daniel Green was the first to arrive on the scene at Moselle. It is very dark, but he's able to see the two bodies that are laying on the ground. Got a Whisky Fox, Whisky Mike, both gunshot wounds to the head.

Maggie and Paul are clearly dead. He sees Elik Murdoch standing there as well in a T-shirt and shorts. I want you to let you know because of the scene, I did go get a gun and bring it down here. It's in your vehicle? Do you have any guns on you at all? No, sir. It's leaning up against the side of my car. You're You're fine, man. You're fine. Turn around for me. I don't have any. Okay. Yes, sir. I see that. Okay. This is your wife and son. I'm fine. Okay. This is a scene of a crime involving very powerful people. What's your first name, sir? My name is Alex Richard Alexander Murdoch. What unfolds on this June night will mushroom into a years long saga that transfixes the nation and sees Alec Murdoch go from the seeming victim of a horrific crime to the accused in multiple crimes. Your Honor, he has fallen for grace. A disgraced attorney has just been indicted for the murders of his wife and son. Mr. Murdoch, are you a family annihilator? A family annihilater? You mean like, did I shoot my wife and my son? Yes. No. It's one of the most interesting cases of the last two decades.

It just never stopped making me wonder. The case now inspiring the new Hulu scripted series, Murdoch: Death in the Family. What happened? It's been an accident. Starring Jason Clarke as Alec Murdoch. I need police and an ambulance immediately. An Academy Award winner Patricia Arquette as his wife, Maggie. This is yours to the Murdochs. Long may we live. Amen. These people are unknowable, but they put on a really amazing show. They're very charming, they're fun, they're warm, they're diabolical, they're manipulative, they're cheaters. Oh, you're cheating, bastard. It's the only cheating if you get caught. In multitudes of ways, I think he steamrolls through everyone. My daddy has this old saying, Son, he says, Just because you don't want to pay a bill, doesn't mean it ain't due. This is a man of huge appetites in every way. You portrayed every single one of them. There is an appetite. There is no filling this hole that he digging, man. You know what I mean? I dig, man, I just need more dirt. But I'm shoveling this dirt out, and eventually, it caves in. Hey, I love you. Baby, your sons love you. Please, please, please pull yourself together.

I will. I will, I promise. The characters are so three-dimensional. It's not just victim perpetrator. There's much more depth. Absolutely. But we felt like Maggie Murdoch was a footnote. She was the matriarch of this family, and so we needed to know more. These Murdoch men, they're tough. So you got to be tough right back. What drew you to Maggie? I was really fascinated by the story as it was coming out, this well-respected, beloved man of the community with this family. Then as it started to unravel, it was so hard to imagine. On the night of the murders, when the Sheriff's deputies realized they're dealing with a Murdoch family, they decided to call in the state agent Agency, the South Carolina State Law Enforcement Division, known as Sled. We've got Sled on the way. They are asked to take the lead on this investigation because they are the state's top police agency. You all familiar with this family? Everybody, for better or for worse, knew the Murdoch family. This family has been there for over a century, powerful in the legal community. Ellic Murdoch is the fourth generation of this legal dynasty. And so there's already a sense that this is different, that this is not your everyday crime scene.

In the meantime, the deputies are doing what they can to preserve the scene until Sled can get there and take over. Why are there so many shell cases? There's one there. There's blood over here. Evidence at the scene suggested that Paul was shot with a shotgun, and Maggie was shot with a rifle. Once Sled arrives, agent start to process the scene. Meanwhile, the lead agent wants to talk to Alec Murdoch to find out what happened, and he agrees to be interviewed. Just start the top, take your time. When I came back here, I pulled up and I could see him, and I knew something was bad. I ran out. I knew it was really bad. My boy over there, I could see it was Alex starts sobbing when he describes the condition in which he found Paul's body. And then from the back seat, these two hands come out and they comfort Alex. One is a detective who's working on the case, and the The other one is his colleague who's working as his attorney. Actually, I think I tried to turn Paul over first. Then I went to my wife, and I could see Did you touch Maggie at all?

I did. I touched them both. Alec explained to the investigators that he had been at his mother's. He told them that he hadn't seen Maggie and Paul right before he left, and that he believed he'd even texted and called Maggie to let her know he was leaving, but that he hadn't gotten any response. So that was odd, but it wasn't that big a deal. Investigators ask Alec, Is there anyone who would want to kill his family in such a violent manner? What comes to my mind is my son Paul was in a boat wreck a couple of years ago. Paul Murdoch, who allegedly killed a young lady, has been shot and killed. Was this Backwoods justice? He says that Paul was receiving threats. Recently? Yes, sir. I mean, he gets them all the time. This is not the first time that Alec had suggested that Maggie and Paul were killed because of the boat accident. He starts telling officers, whoever will listen, that there was a boat crash. This is a long story. My son was in a boat wreck a few months back. He says somebody's out to get against my family. I know that's what it is.

The entire history of this newspaper, this is the biggest, most impactful story that we've ever covered. Even as it sprawls across the low country, this is a story that engulfs Hampton County people and Hampton County families. Hampton is a very small town in South Carolina. It's in the low country of South Carolina. There's an occasional church. There's an occasional farm. There's a Piggly Wiggly grocery store. It's a quiet town. Everybody knows everybody, that's for sure. And they're all in everybody's business, that type of small town life. Palmetto trees, sweepy Spanish moss everywhere. Swampy is probably a word that you would describe the low country. It was a beautiful, but beautiful setting. If you knew where Hampton County was at all, you associated us with the Watermill Festival. Started in 1939. It used to be a seed-spitting contest. The mayor of every town would get together and see who would spit a watermelon seed the farthest. Welcome to life in the rural south, right? You know, most folks have roots here, usually, and have family here, and We certainly did. Alec Murdoch lived a very comfortable life on this sprawling estate called Moselle, with his wife, Maggie, and his two sons, Paul and Buster.

They were college sweethearts. They fell in love. They got married. He truly doded on her and wanted her to be happy at all times. After law school, he came back and worked with Randy and Daddy at the firm. The The firm is also the family business, a thriving law practice with a big footprint in Hampton for more than a century. In addition to their civil firm, the Murdoch also serve as top solicitors in the area. We have to go back to the history of the Murdoch family, and it goes back a very long time. For 85 consecutive years, some member of the Murdoch family was the solicitor. What we call solicitor in other states is district attorney. They're connected to every single police department and every single Sheriff's office. All of law enforcement has connections with them because they work with each other. But the Murdochs took it further, and it was a social thing. They might go hunting or fishing with the Jasper County Sheriff. They might drink whiskey with the Buford County Sheriff. They might invite the Hampton County Sheriff over to the house for barbecue. They were the big fish in the small pond.

In the area, the Murdochs weren't above the law. They were the law. The name still brings respect or even fear to some people. But in 2019, the influence of the Murdoch name would be tested. It all starts when Alex's son, Paul, and five of his friends head out for what should have been an evening of fun. Paul, who was 19 at the time, was borrowing his father, Elec Murdoch's boat for the night, and it was a 17-foot center console boat, so it wasn't very big for six kids. These are kids who grew up together. They played together as kids, and they went out on boats all the time. Paul Murdoch was there with his girlfriend, Morgan Dauety. Anthony Cooke was there with his girlfriend, Mallory Beach, and Anthony's first cousin, Connor Cooke, was with his girlfriend, Miley Altman. They were all together that night because the girls wanted to do a date night. The group makes a couple of stops that night. First, a cookout on the water where there's hours of drinking, then to a local bar where Paul continues to drink before finally getting back on the boat to head home. There's video footage.

We can see them walking on the dock. Paul is swaying. He clearly is intoxicated. Mallory and Anthony were sharing such sweet moments. It's heartbreaking because you know it's about to happen to them. The following day, Miley Altman does an interview with law enforcement, and it's videotaped. Paul was just driving, doing donuts, and we're not going anywhere. We're just doing circles and more gets mad and like, yelling at him. He was like, Listen, you need to stop. I want to go home. His behavior was getting increasingly belligerent. When you get drunk, you just don't mess with him. They are telling him, Let You can't drive. We were just like, Anything is better than Paul right now because he knows what he would do. Because he was riding and he pushed sailboats apart and just being very reckless. He wouldn't stop or wouldn't let anybody else drive. Eventually, Paul was like, You all want to go home? We're going home. So he puts the throttle down, planes to boat out. There's no big, bright searchlights on this boat. One of the boys was holding a flashlight ahead of him while they were driving. Mallory was in the back of the boat, seated on a cooler that's immediately behind the console.

The boat's going pretty fast at this point. Mallory is on Anthony's lap. I saw the bridge coming, and I was just in shock. Then at the last second, I got a scream. The boat had a dolphin head, which is three pilings that are lashed together. The boat hits the piling, it throws Anthony and Mallory into the and Mallory is nowhere to be found. There's a panic that starts. There's a feeling that this isn't just a little accident. This is really, really bad. Connor had his phone still on him, so I was like, calling 911. It's absolutely disturbing. You hear screaming in the background, screaming for Mallory. Please send someone. I don't think We're going, we're going, we're going, okay? How hard is it to kill a planet? Maybe all it takes is a little drilling, some mining, and a whole lot of carbon pumped into the atmosphere. When you see what's left, it starts to look like a crime scene. Are we really safe? Is our water safe? You destroyed our town. And crimes like that, they don't just happen. We call things accidents. There is no accident. This was 100% preventable. They're the result of choices by people, ruthless oil tycoons, corrupt politicians, even organized crime.

These are the stories we need to be telling about our changing planet. Stories of scams, murders, and cover-ups that are about us and the things we're doing to either protect the Earth or destroy it. Follow Lawless Planet on the WNDRI app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to new episodes of Lawless Planet early and ad-free right now by joining Wondry Plus in the Wondry app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Dublin, your brand new and improved American golf store is now open on West End Retail Park Blanchardstown. Step inside and explore our performance studios with the latest tech, a state-of-the-art Pudding Green with PUT view and a bespoke footwear fitting service, all designed to take your game to the next level. Right now, shop our Black November deals in store and online at americangolf. Co. Uk with up to 50% off men's, women's, and junior products across your favorite brands, including TaylorMade, Adidas, and Garmin. But hurry, deals end first December. Paul What bridge is there? 911, where's your emergency? Hello? So when the boat hits, it's a bad crash. Everybody's thrown around, and Mallory Beach is thrown off the boat. We're in a boat crash on Archer Street.

Where about's on Archer Street? In Archer Street. The only bridge on Archer Street. Okay. We have a home on this. At first, nobody can pinpoint exactly which bridge and which river they're talking about. Is anybody there? Is anybody injured? Morgan's hand is injured. She's bleeding. Connor has a fracture in his jaw and a laceration where he hit the console during the impact. Paul is in the water, comes out of the water. He's only wearing his boxer shorts. Anthony, apparently injures his shoulder. Then Mallory's missing. Police, send someone. No, I'm coming. We're going, we're coming, okay. No more. I'll be in around to the Beaubridge. This scene is chaos from the start. You've got law enforcement from several Different agencies responding. Between EMS, fire, and police, the first job is to find Mallory. One of those agencies has a dash camera recording. And although you can't see much, you can hear quite a bit. You hear Anthony Cooke, Mallory's boyfriend. At one point, he's yelling at Paul. Bro, you're smiling like you're funny. Sit down. My girlfriend, go, bro. Do you think you're so funny? Sit down. Anthony Cooke is losing his mind. He's telling them, That SOB killed my girlfriend.

He's right in the middle. And what Anthony says next is telling. He seems to warn officers of just who they're dealing with. Do you all know Elec Murdoch? Yeah, I know his name. That's his son. That's so driving the boat. Good luck. And he says he's never going to go to jail. Paul is still being aggressive. Paul is still acting like he's drunk. And so you would think that that would be a signal to the first responders that they need to do a field sobriety test, but that isn't done. I got a call from my mom Mom asked me if Mallory was home with me, and I told her no, and she just said that there had been a boat accident. I had a phone call from Mallory's Mom. She was frantic. I hung up the phone and said, No, God, not my child. Paul and the others were transferred to the hospital. So there are investigators there at the hospital, and they're trying to figure out what happened. That's their job to do. Alex Murdoch and his father, Randolph, that former solicitor, also arrive at the hospital, but they appear to have a different job to do.

Alex and Randolph Murdoch come in All right, it's not just a concerned parent and a concerned grandfather. You've got two attorneys walking in. Randolph was reported as saying, You're not talking to him anymore. You're talking to us. We're his attorneys. You can clearly see that Alec is is wearing his volunteer solicitor's badge on the outside of his pants. We also know from court records that Alex went from room to room telling these young kids to be quiet, don't talk. According to police interviews, many people at the hospital felt Paul's dad and grandfather's main goal was to circle the wagons and protect Paul. The family has always denied that they tried to influence this investigation in any way. Authorities say the Murdoch name had no sway over their investigation. I've never been involved in a fatality where the operator of a vehicle was under the influence that that person didn't go to jail immediately. And so that night, I'm worried about finding my child, and they're worried about how they're going to cover up Paul driving. The search for Mallory went on about a week. Dozens, if not hundreds of people were spreading out over the marshes of the low country.

You had DNR searching, Coast Guard searching. Volunteers. Anybody would have hoped. They were putting in the water, and they were looking for Mallory. 911, where's your emergency? We're on the search team rescue. We think we found Mallory's body was found one week later by two fishermen about five miles from where the boat crashed. Paul is not charged, even After she's found, month goes by, he's not charged. And people in the community, some thought, maybe he's going to get away with it. He's a murdok. You began to see this wondering, Is justice going to be served? There was talk of a whisper campaign to cover this thing up. The family of Mallory Beach hires an attorney, Mark Tinsley, and he files a wrongful death lawsuit against the Murdochs. They believe that Elec should have been held accountable for his part and contributed to the death of their daughter. He knew that he was entrusting this vehicle to someone who was habitually abusing alcohol. What motivated me was getting evidence of everything. I knew who we were up against and how things would probably disappear if we didn't act quickly. Her life meant something. For us, she was our baby.

We had to defend her honor. In their reply to the Beach family wrongful death suit, Alec Murdoch's attorneys denied all wrongdoing and even claimed Paul was wasn't driving the boat at the time of the crash. We all doubted that there would ever be charges, but we kept covering it and kept pressuring, DNR, what are you guys doing? What's taking so long? As powerful as the Murdochs are, they could not prevent Paul being charged with boating under the influence three counts. I heard it described as a gentleman's treatment, if you will. He was not handcuffed in the courtroom. When one of the deputies after he's arraign, went to cuff him, which is the procedure, he was waved off by the prosecutor. No, no, no, it's not necessary. Not necessary, not necessary here. When we found out that Paul was charged, I thought for sure he'll at least have to spend some time in jail. He'll have to wear the orange jumpsuit like everybody else in Buford County does and have his mugshot taken. Later that day, I asked the attorney general's office for a mugshot, and I was sent a photo where Paul was in just regular outfit.

He had a plaid shirt on. And I opened the files of that photo and saw the properties, and it was taken from an iPhone 7 in the hallway of the courthouse. Who has a mug shot taken in the hallway of the courthouse? I've never seen that. Paul Murdoch was released on his own recognizance, and for two years, the criminal case just dragged on. But that civil case was moving forward. Tinsley determined someone must be held accountable for Paul's actions. I wanted accountability. I wanted Paul to just own up to, yes, I was driving the boat. It was an accident. I'm sorry. But the only way to do that is through a settlement for money or an award of money damages. But lawyers for the wealthy and successful Alec Murdoch contend you can't squeeze blood from a stone. Tinsley is told Alec Murdoch is broke. If you claim that you're broke, I want to see your bank accounts. Tinsley is determined to follow the money and take a long, hard look at Alec's finances. There was no possibility that he was broke. What brings you in, Mark? Well, you heard I was representing Renee and Philip Beach.

Yes, sir, I did. I'm sorry, but they decided to file a lawsuit. Enjoy those tacos now. I think by most people's standards, if you have to write a check for $10 million, it's a level of accountability. That's what the Beach family wanted. Paul Murdoch may have been criminally charged in the death of Mallory Beach in that boat crash, but Mallory His family is convinced the Murdoch name will still protect him. Paul has gotten in trouble before, but he knew to call his family before anyone else. I see words like 'dynasty' used and 'power'. And I don't know exactly how people use those words, but we're just regular people. Fearing that Paul might never actually face any time behind bars. Mallory's family is determined to hold Alex Murdoch himself, personally responsible for allowing his underage son to allegedly drive the boat while under the influence. They want him to pay out of his own pocket for this tragedy. Mallory Beach's family have been pushing to get access to Alex's financial records. He had told their lawyers, even if they won a judgment against him, he didn't have money to pay, and they didn't buy it. There was no possibility that he was broke.

And beyond the money that he was making, he had property. And so if you claim that you're broke, I want to see your bank accounts because I don't trust what you're going to say. And so they've been going back and forth for months. And finally, they were going before a judge to find out whether he was going to have to give up access to his books. Alex Murdoch was preparing to be at this June 10th hearing, and he was looking at what he might have to disclose. But then, just three days before that hearing. This is Alex Murdoch. I think the police to answer immediately. The murder change everything. In the aftermath of the slayings of Maggie and Paul, that June 10th hearing was delayed, and it was never rescheduled. Instead of being in court on June 10th, I'm a defendant in a civil case involving my son. I told you about the boat wreck. Alex is in this car with his lawyer, giving his second interview to law enforcement, describing everything he did on the day of the murder, starting with going to work. And there were some motions coming up in that on Thursday, and I was mostly just getting ready for those things.

He says that around five o'clock, he went home and he met up with Maggie and Paul. Maggie had gotten home, and we sat down, we ate supper, which we usually eat supper together. We hung around the house for a little while. I know that Maggie went to the kennels. I I don't know exactly where Paul went, but he left the house, too. Okay. What did you do once Maggie and Paul left? I stayed in the house. Okay. I was watching TV, looking at my phone, and I actually fell asleep on the couch. Okay. He says they weren't at home when he woke up around 9: 00. It wasn't much time between me waking up and me leaving the house. I drove to my mom's. I checked on my mom's. She lives right out here. After visiting his mother, who has dementia and had a caregiver with her, he says he made the roughly 20-minute drive back home. I got to the house. I went inside. Nobody was there. I got in the car. I went back to the kennels, and I saw Maggie, and I saw Paul laying down. I didn't know. I knew it was I went over there and I saw it.

He had a difficult time talking, and he would try to talk, and he would break down. It seems like overnight, the news media was all over this story. Tonight, investigators working to unravel a mysterious double homicide involving one of South Carolina's most prominent legal families. We see it in the world. We see it on the news. You don't think it's going to happen in your small community to your family. It's just hard to imagine somebody can be so sick as to do this, intentionally kill people like that. Law enforcement put out a statement that said, At this time, there is no danger to the public. And that has raised questions from a lot of people, the public, media. I was really scratching my head because generally, when you say something like that, you have a good idea who did it. They must believe that the Murdoch were targeted. Remember, Alec Murdoch told investigators the night of the murders, he thought the killings had something to do with the boat crash. I don't know of any direct threats between any of the people on the boat, specifically, but I do think there's been a small amount of yip-yap between a couple of them, but not recently.

Authorities would eventually clear everyone on board the 17-foot boat of any involvement in murder. We were thinking and praying for their family because we knew what it felt like. We've heard that statement that you finally got justice. This is not justice for us. These people were brutally murdered from what we were told, and he did not deserve it, neither did his mama. But as the intensity of the media coverage grew, so did the question swirling around Alec Murdoch. A lot of people said, Did you hear what happened to the housekeeper? She's cracked her head and there's blood on the concrete. It's like, How much worse could it get? And how much deeper does this go? Just out of control. From 20th Century Studios and the director of Pray, Predator Badlands. Welcome to the most dangerous planet in the universe. This Friday. Everything in this world is trying to kill you. You are prey until you become the Predator. Experience it in 3D and IMAX. We might not be alone in this hunt. Predator Badlands. Wpg 13 may be inappropriate for children under 13. Friday, get to get to now. Introducing the new ESPN Fox One bundle.

Unlock all of ESPN and all of Fox One with one unbeatable price. Catch the biggest games, college football, NBA, NHL, and more on ESPN. Stream your faves, Big Noon Saturday, The World Series, and NASCAR on Fox One. All for just 39. 99 a month. That's 20% off. The ESPN, Fox One bundle. Offer valid for eligible subscribers only. Access content from each service separately. Savings compared to purchasing both plans separately. See stream. Espn. Com for complete terms and conditions. We are following a developing story out of Colleton County. Today, state police now investigating a double homicide. Two members of a prominent and powerful legal family found dead on a sprawling estate State. State investigators saying little about the murders, but insist there's no danger to the public. I don't think anyone could have ever predicted the amount of attention that this case was going to foster. When the boat crash happened in 2019, that was local news. But after Maggie and Paul were murdered, that's when the Murdoch name was catapulted into the national spotlight. The glare of the investigation into Maggie and Paul's double murders is raising more questions than ever about a different untimely death.

A lot of people said, Did you hear what happened to the housekeeper? And I thought, No way. And then I was looking through the public index of different documents associated with Alec Murdoch, and I find a wrongful death settlement for $500,000. Gloria Satterfield, who worked for the Murdochs for years, had died after a trip in fall accident, and Alec Murdoch's insurance company had agreed to pay $505,000 for her wrongful death. Gloria Satterfield was in the fabric of the Murdoch family. She had helped raise the children, Paul and Buster, for more than 20 years. She was a hard-working woman, a people person. Everywhere she went, she never met a stranger. Always made a When Gloria started working for them, she took pride in that and honor in that, and she treated them like her family. My sources have said Paul looked at her like a mother. He was barely walking whenever she started working for them, and he called her gogo, and she called him Paul Paul. 911, what was your emergency? My housekeeper has fallen, and her head is bleeding. I cannot get her out. In February of 2018, Maggie Murdoch calls 911 and says that Gloria had tripped and fallen on their stairs.

She fell going up the steps, up the brick steps. She cracked her head and there's blood on the concrete. So at one point, Paul gets on the call, and you can hear him getting a little irritated with the 911 operator. Can you ask the patient what pain she's having? Ma'am, she can't talk. Do you know if she's ever had a stroke or anything before? Ma'am, can you stop asking her to stop? I already have them on the way. Me asking questions does not slow them down in any way. She was rushed to the hospital, and then Alec Murdoch told them exactly what happened to the best of his knowledge, that it was the hunting dogs. They must have tripped up, gone in between her legs. She fell down the stairs. She lives for three weeks. She never regains full consciousness. She laid laid in the bed, and I took her hand and asked her, Mom, what happened? And she couldn't tell me nothing. There were ups and downs. You thought things were going to get better, and of course, they didn't. According to the family, at her funeral, Alex Murdaugh says, It's my fault that she died at our house.

She tripped over our dog. And so I'm going to get you a lawyer. Here. He can represent you, and he can bring a lawsuit against me. I will agree to it, and you will get money for it. We had no reason not to judge him. We've known him all our lives. He always took care of Gloria, and he knew how important her children were to her. Gloria Satterfield came from a very humble background, and she had two young men who needed support. The Satterfield boys would say, Alec Murdoch looked him in the eye and said, Trust me, I got you guys. You're going to get a lot of money, and I'm going to handle everything. But that money for Gloria's boys never arrives. Fast forward to August of 2021, two months after Maggie and Paul are murdered, Alec is sitting down with Sled investigators for the third time. He has questions for them. Is this one person, two persons, three persons? And they have questions for him, especially on his whereabouts the night of the murders. He gives the same timeline that he'd given in previous interviews with law enforcement. So the three of us ate dinner together.

And after dinner, Maggie and Paul went to the kennels? I stayed on the couch and I dozed off. One thing Alec always maintained was that he never went down to the kennels that night. As the nearly 90-minute interview comes to a close, the Sled agent has two more important questions. Did you kill Maggie? No. Did I kill my wife? Yes, sir. No, David. Did you kill Paul? No, I did not kill Paul. So does that mean that I am a suspect? I don't have anything that points to anybody else at this time. But if investigators are zero in on Alec, what happens next has people asking, Does someone have a hit list targeting even more of the Murdoch's? Next to a murder mystery in South Carolina, taking a bizarre turn, Alec Murdoch was shot in the head and wounded on a rural country road yesterday. Alec Murdoch got shot? I mean, his wife and son have just been killed, and now he's been shot? It just took this story to a whole 'nother level. It's news to the Murdoch. And now, the Hulu scripted series that everyone's talking about, Murdoch: Death in the Family. The walls are just getting closer, Randy.

They're getting closer. And closer and closer, and I can't breathe. It is a tragedy, Shakespeare in tragedy. We're in a boat crash. The boat hits the piling. They're calling to come home and found him. No one else there. Did you see that they're dead? Yes, sir. That's what it looks like. How, how. Two shots. If you had to sum up this entire saga, with one sentence, it would be the fall of the house of Murdoch. My wife and child got mad with me. The audience thinks they know the Murnaugh case. What do you think might surprise audiences in this? Now, the real story behind the hit Hulu series. What else is there that I don't know about? Got to give each other's backs. Family first. A murder mystery in South Carolina taking a bizarre turn. What? Alex Murdoch shot? Oh, my gosh. Is there somebody out there going after the entire Murdoch family. Everywhere you went, everyone was talking about it. It was something that you could not escape. South Carolina's trial of a century. Did you take this gun and blow your son's brains out? I did not. You all know me. I'm an honest man.

Is Alec Murdoch going to get up and look those jurors in the eye and try to convince them, I did not kill my wife and my son? This is a long story. Two members of a well-known low country family were discovered overnight. No arrests have been made, no suspects named. The FBI is now involved in the Murdoch investigation. This is a story that gripped not just the state of South Carolina, but the entire country. You never know what the next twist and turn is going to be. Every time something happens, your jaw drops and you gasp. I feel like I'm in a three-ring circus. There's no bottom to this case. I'm shocked every single day. There are more new details. Alex Murdoch calling 911 for help for a gunshot wound to the head. It's got all the elements of a great story. I have been following this story since 2019, and I've always thought that it would make for a really good podcast. Ever since I heard the news of the bow crash on February 24th, 2019, I just couldn't stop. Over the years, I have spoken to over 100 people about the Murdoch family, about the power they held over others, and the story just got crazier and crazier.

My name is Mandi Matney, and this is the Murdoch Murders podcast. And the new Hulu series, Murdoch: Death in the Family, while partially fictionalized for dramatic purposes, is inspired by Mandi's podcast. Mandy, in real life, and now played by actress Brittany Snow, begins digging into who the Murdochs are. Who are you again? Mandy Matney, breaking news editor at the Island Packet. Mandy Matney saw something going on and said, I want to do a story on this. People didn't want her to do it. She fought so many men to go out there and do that. Eventually, the Hulu show creators, Erin Lee Carr and Michael Fuller, also dive into the power and influence that this family held. Did the Murdochs tell you not to talk to me? I'm a researcher by heart. I want to know every single detail, and that is what makes this story, is that you can think about it for years, but there's just still some things that will never fit together in the puzzle. This real story, obviously, is so incredibly documented. There's actual footage of the arrival of authorities that Alec called, and we have the 911 tape. I think for us, it was something we worked with Jason and Patricia so much on, and especially Jason as Alec.

This is Alec Murdoch. I need police and an ambulance immediately. We're making all these choices about the patterns of certain people. We do our research, and we do the best work we can, but this is our approximation, our version into this world. Tell me about the mama bear instinct that Maggie infuses into everything she does. I think it was a very primal thing that when her son, he had made this terrible decision, the loss of his friend, I mean, her death was such a serious thing. How do you ever recover from that? He could go to prison. That he could. Try not to fret now. We're doing what we can. I think she was like, Yes, use whatever access you have to make this go away. He can't go to prison. I always saw Alex as a great white shark. The minute he stops, he will die. If he doesn't stop, you just keep going. And I think by dramatizing and bringing actors to it, you get some understanding of the destruction he wrought. He is a narcissist, and those people can be cunning, powerful, nice, friendly, can do good, but they are always looking for their angle.

And three months after the murders of his wife and son, both shot to death on the family's property, it seems Alec Murdoch is looking for a new angle. The mystery surrounding the double murder of a prominent South Carolina family intensifying. On September fourth, 2021, a 911 call comes in from Alec Murdoch. I got a flat tire, and I stopped, and somebody stopped to help me. And when I turned my back, they tried to shoot me. Alec Murdoch was shot in the head and wounded on a rural country road. It's like, what? Alec Murdoch got shot? I was shocked. Oh, my gosh. Is there somebody out there going after the entire Murdoch family? They got targeted. That was the immediate reaction. But there's confusion every step of the way. There were so many details right off the bat that just didn't add up. Police are saying one thing, his attorney saying something else. When Sled sends out their first press release about what happened, they make it abundantly clear that this is a superficial head wound to the head. Immediately, doubt is cast on what happened. Who's lying here? Two days later on Labor Day, Alec's PR team released a statement.

He says that he's resigning from his law firm and that he's checking into rehab. Alec Murdoch saying, I have made a lot of decisions that I truly regret. I'm resigning from my law firm and entering rehab after a long battle that has been exacerbated by these murders. Alec Murdoch is, he says, addicted to opioids. To just send everybody into chaos. Like, what is going on here? And why are they telling us this? If that's not someone saying, I've committed crimes, I don't know what it is. It's wild. As everybody's trying to process what that means, another statement comes out from Alec Murdoch's law firm. The law firm is saying, Well, actually, he was forced to resign because he's been misappropriating millions of dollars from our firm. They alleged he had been doing that on an ongoing basis for years. And it just keeps snowballing from there. He loses his law license. He loses his privileges to be an assistant solicitor. I mean, his life is falling apart. A picture starting to come into focus, and it does not look good Alec Murdoch. Just as speculation is boiling over whether Alec Murdoch was ever even shot on the side of the road, an arrest is made.

And breaking overnight, a suspect is now in custody in connection with the mysterious shooting of Alex Murdoch. But just who that suspect is only raises more questions about what really happened here. And Alec Murdoch seemingly confesses to an attempted murder, his own. He said, I need you to kill After that supposed roadside shooting, Alex Murdoch is released from the hospital and then immediately checks into rehab. He says taking painkillers for an old football knee injury ballooned into a decades-long opioid addiction. Then Alex's story about what he first said happened at that roadside shooting completely falls apart. I was one of the first journalists, and I'm proud of this, to really question, was he even shot? What's actually going on here? And I got a lot of flak for that. So while Alec Murdoch is in a detox center, he decides he's going to confess to what he says really happened that day on the side of the road. So he's in a room with his attorneys present, and they decide to call Sled. I called Curtis Smith on the I took my phone, asked him to meet me. I told him that things were getting ready to get really bad, and I would be better off not here.

And I asked him to shoot me. Alex said he asked his friend, Curtis Eddie Smith, to kill him so his son, Foster, could collect $10 million in life insurance. So what happened next? He shot me. He missed and hit me in the back of the head. What was your intent? For him to kill me. Breaking overnight. A suspect is now in custody in connection with the mysterious shooting of Alex Murdaw. And authorities say Murdaw arranged for the man to do it. Curtis Eddie Smith is arrested on a slew of charges, including aggravated assault and battery, pointing a weapon, insurance fraud, criminal conspiracy, and assisted suicide. But in an interview from jail in 2023, he says that he never agreed to Alex Murdaw plan. I ain't done about no life insurance, no nothing. He said, I need you to kill me. I said, Yeah, that ain't happening. And I figured I was going to try to scare some sense into him. And I shot the gun up in the air because he felt like I had to cut his legs out from him with a chunk of salt. I know he didn't get shot because I didn't shoot him.

There was a wound. In my opinion, it's not a gunshot wound. It's very easily a wound that could be explained when someone falls to the ground on a gravel road and hits their head. That's totally untrue, according to Alec. He met with Smith on the side of the road, gave him the gun, said, I'm going to look like I broke down, drive by and shoot me, which is exactly what Smith did. You see the roadside shooting happened right after. Yet again, people were asking questions about his finances. None of his messes were going away. They were just getting worse. So what do you do? You pretend like a random guy tried to shoot you on the side of the and that somebody's after your family. That's how you get people to feel sorry for you. Now we begin to see that these are the actions of a desperate man. Curtis Smith is arrested. Then a few days later, Alex Murdoch is arrested. Alex Murdoch was charged with insurance fraud, conspiracy to commit insurance fraud, and filing a false police report. He's handcuffed. He's wearing shackles. He's wearing a Hemp County jumpsuit. Your Honor, he has fallen for the grace.

If anyone wants to see the face of what opioid addiction does, you're looking at it. It was certainly a bombshell to drop that in court that all of this was brought on from opioid addiction. At that hearing, Alec Murdoch is released on a personal reconnaissance bond, and he's allowed to return to rehab. Murdoch and Curtis Eddie Smith both pleaded not guilty to the charges related to that alleged roadside shooting, and they remain pending. The scrutiny on Alec Murdoch now is on an all-time high. Investigations are popping up, civil, criminal. In the midst of all this craziness, a lawsuit drops from Gloria Saterfield's sons. There was already reports that there was something fishy with the whole Saterfield case. Murdoch settled a $500,000 wrongful death claim brought by Saterfield's family, but the family says they haven't seen dime. They just want answers. They want answers to know what happened to their money. We knew she died at the Murdoch house in 2018. She was in their household for 25 years. This isn't just some random person that cleaned their house every once in a while. This is somebody day in and day out who became a part of their family.

It wasn't just 505,000. It was millions. Not only did those boys not get a dime of the $500,000, but there's a whole 'nother settlement that was for a lot more money that they didn't even know about and nobody knew about. And that was for 4. 3 million dollars. Gloria's sons, Brian and Tony Satterfield, they were waiting for any amount of money, $5,000, anything. Alec had the money for the settlement, for the death of their mother, and he let let them be evicted out of their mobile home after losing their mother. There was no way that this was the first time that Alec had stolen client money. Your kid doesn't come in and just take the whole cookie jar. They come in and they take one cookie. She doesn't notice. Now they're taking two or three cookies. And the next thing you know, the jar is almost empty. Sled is now looking into allegations that Murdoch had been stealing from his law firm and his clients for years. And then one month later, he's arrested again. Murdoch is charged with crimes related to stealing that wrongful death settlement money from the Satterfield family. But this time, he's denied bond and goes to jail.

Even though nobody has been charged in Paul and Maggie's murders, Alec Murdoch is now facing an avalanche of charges related to financial crimes. Now, there have been separate state grand jury charges that allege every financial crime you can think of. Insurance fraud, money laundering, computer crimes, embezelment. This is an ongoing investigation, Your Honor. This is the tip of the iceberg. This is a house of hearts. By the time the anniversary of Paul and Maggie's murders hits the one year mark, Alec had been sitting in jail for almost eight months on a slew of charges related to financial crimes. But some wondered if we'd ever see someone charged for the murders. Everyone who really knew the The system doubted the fact that a Murdoch would ever be charged with murder in the low country of South Carolina. They said never going to happen. Very little was known about the murder investigation at all. Sled never confirmed any suspects or persons of interest. In fact, the only reason we knew that Elec was a person of interest, and maybe the person of interest in the investigation was because one of his defense attorneys admitted it in a TV interview.

You were constantly checking in with sources. I was one of my sources That was probably my best source in law enforcement. I use code language. I would say, are we on our hurricane watch this week? And that meant that that would be the point when they were taking the indictment to the grand jury, and so that would be go time. We are following breaking news from South Carolina, where a disgraced attorney has just been indicted for the murders of his wife and son. Tonight, the dramatic new turn in this case. Alex Murdaugh is now charged with two counts of murder and possession of a weapon during the commission of a violent crime. The indictments were very, very brief, like maybe one paragraph each. They just said, On this date, Alec Murdoch killed his son, Paul, with a shotgun, and he killed his wife, Maggie, with a rifle. Then he was also charged with possessing each of those guns during the commission of a violent crime. That was all he got. When Alec Murdoch comes for his arraignment, he looks like a different person. He's shackled, which we were expecting, but what we weren't expecting was him to be completely bald.

He looked very thin, very gaunt when he walked into that courtroom. Are you guilty or not guilty of a felony were in your stand and died? Not guilty. How shall you be troved? By God, my mercy. What went through your mind when you heard Alex Murdoch had been charged with the murder of his wife and son? Relief, overwhelming relief and feeling like a lot of people who were brave enough to attempt to hold a man like Alex Murdoch accountable, that they did it. It was a David and Goliath type of story. Shortly after Elec was indicted, his defense attorneys pushed for a speedy trial. He believed that the killer or killers are still at large. He has been a lot of sweat. Put this behind him and go look for the real killer. You had two groups of thought, right? You had one group that was like, Oh, he absolutely did that. And then you had a second group that was like, If it was only the wife, I could see him doing it. But his son, too? How could a man do his son like that? This highly anticipated trial is about to begin, and everyone is wondering what evidence the state is going to present to try and prove that Alec Murdoch murdered his wife and son.

Everywhere you went, everyone was talking about it. It was something that you could not escape. On January 25th, 2023, the long-awaited trial of Alec Murdoch finally gets underway, with Judge Clifton Newman addressing the jury. The defendant is charged with two counts of murder. Only the 12 of you who will deliberate can decide the facts of this case. With all eyes on that South Carolina courtroom, the prosecution and the defense, both with starkly different stories, square off before the jury. Paul Murdoch is standing in a small feet room. The defendant over there, Alec Murdoch, took a twelve-shaped shotgun and shot him in the chest and his shoulder. Just moments later, he picked up an AR-style rifle and opened fire on his wife Maggie. How, how. Two shots, admin in the leg and took her down. There's no eyewitness. There's no camera. There's no fingerprints. None. None. He didn't do it. It started with a phone call in the early hours of the morning. 911, what is the address to your emergency? A terrified woman tells the operator she's been kidnapped, assaulted, and that she's trapped in a room with her attacker. He's fallen asleep, so she quietly and ever so carefully finds his phone and calls for help.

Is there any way you can get out of the building? I don't know without waking him, and I'm scared. This 911 call began an investigation that would turn the town of Ashland into a crime scene. We've got something big going on here. The first thing that hit my mind is a monster. A new series from ABC Audio in 2020, The Hand in the Window, coming November fourth, wherever you listen to podcast. 20th Century Studios presents Springsteen. One, two, three. Shaps like us. Baby, we were born. Witness a true story of risking it all. These new songs, they're the only thing making sense to me right now. To fight for what you believe in. This is not going to be good for Bruce. I don't need to be perfect. I just need it to feel right. Springsteen. Rated PG 13. Parental guidance suggested for children under 13. Now playing only in Peters. The Murdoch murder trial has been called South Carolina's Trial of the Century. Alec Murdoch is still charged with all those financial crimes, but the murder trial comes first. We've moved straight into a 19th-century Colton County courthouse to try one of the most notorious murders that we've ever had in South Carolina.

It was very much like the circus is coming to town. It's bananas. On Until the trial, Elik Murdoch's family's thoughts about all this were unknown. We weren't sure, are they going to show up? But then once the jury was seated, you saw them file in, and there was his sister Lynn, and there was his brothers, John Marvin and Randy, and of course, his son Buster. Now proceed to opening statements. Lead prosecutor, Creighton Waters, got up and he was very dramatic. Two shots, admin and led. Capsivated the jury's attention. The evidence is going to be such that you're going to reach the inescapable conclusion that Alec murdered Maggie Paul, that he was the storm, that the storm was coming for them And the storm arrived on June seventh, 2021, that they died as a result. But once the testimony begins and the state's presenting its evidence, a really full picture of the day of the murders is emerging. One thing Alec always maintained was that he never went down to the kennels that night. I laid down, took a nap on the couch, probably, I don't know, 25, 30 minutes. That's when prosecutors present what they say is a smoking gun that obliterates Alec Murdoch's alibi.

They call Paul Murdoch's friend, Rogan Gibson, to the stand, who spoke to Paul by cell phone that night. On June seventh, Paul was taking care of Rogan's puppy Cash, and there was some concern that there was something wrong with the puppy's tail. Get me. Where was Paul when he called you? He was at the dog kennel. And how do you know that? I could hear the dogs barking. Paul promised to send Rogan a video of his dog, Cash, so he could see the dog's tail. Rogan never received that video. But the day after the murders, he told investigators that he heard more than just Paul on that call. Who else did you hear? And I thought it Mr. Alex. Rogan said that he was 99% sure he heard Alex's voice. But when investigators asked Alex, he denied being at the kennels. Was it you? At nine o'clock? Yes, sir. No, sir. Not if my time's all right. Who do you think it could have been? I have no idea. More than a year later, after investigators were finally able to get Paul's cell phone unlocked, They brought Rogan in and played in the video Paul had taken that night of Rogan's puppy.

Give it. That just broke the case wide open. Quit, Cash. The skeleton key for it all was the cell phone video that was unearthed on Paul's phone. Here, dog's barking. Paul is pointing the phone at the dog during the entire video, but you can hear Maggie talking about the family dog, Bubba, having something in his mouth. Hey, he got a bird in his mouth. What voices did you hear? Paul, Ms. Maggie, Ms. Tilly. And how sure are you now? Positive. How did the video upend Alex's alibi? It placed him where he said that he wasn't, and that's at the murder scene right before a murder occurred. I think the very interesting part of that video is how distinct his voice is. It was absolutely Absolutely him. According to prosecutors, Paul's video lasted about a minute, and it ended at 08: 45 PM. And then less than four minutes later, both Maggie and Paul's phones lock forever, never to answer another text or call. That's when prosecutors say Alec shot Paul first and then Maggie. If you're the jury, you sit back. So he was out there. Even as prosecutors lay out evidence that places Alec Murdaugh Murdoch at the scene, they know they need to explain to jurors why a seemingly loving father and husband would commit such a heinous crime.

The prosecution argued that Alec Murdoch murdered Maggie and Paul to prevent the exposure of what they said was more than a decade of financial crimes. The state called several witnesses who testified how Alec had stolen from them, starting with the CFO of his law firm, Jeanne Seconder. She testified that some at the The firm suspected Alec had diverted money owed to the law firm, and that she confronted him about this on June seventh, just hours before the murders. But they backed off after Maggie and Paul were killed. Was anybody at all concerned about getting the proof for those missing fees after those murders happened? We weren't going to go in there and harass him about money when his family had been killed. He was dealing with extreme pressure unlike anything that he had dealt with before. And I believe that he got the crazy idea that public distraction was the answer to his problems and sympathy. When the murders happened, everything else stopped. The law firm quit asking Alec about missing money. Even Mark Tinsley, the civil lawyer for Mallory Beach's family, who had been suing Alec, testified that he planned to remove Alec from the boat crash lawsuit after the murders.

If Alec is the victim of a vigilante, nobody's going to hold him accountable. Alec was in a much better position with regards to protecting himself after Maggie and Paul were murdered. After 17 days of testimony, the state rested and all eyes turned to the defense. Have you made a decision as to whether you're going to testify? Everyone is wondering, is Alec Murdoch going to get up and look those jurors in the eye and try to convince them, I did not kill my wife and my son. And what is your decision? By week four of the trial, it's a full-on frenzy. It has been described by everyone as the non-fiction fiction that even John Grisham couldn't write. There are lines outside the courthouse. People have been arriving since 4: 30 in the morning. We sit down here for about two and a half hours. I've been following this for as long as it's been going on. Very interested in the outcome. It's pretty wild. This is the trial that people travel to go see live and in person. The defense has a lot of cards to play. They just have to have reasonable doubt, and it's just one juror.

Family and friends are called to the stand to try to show a different side of Alec than what the prosecution has portrayed. The defense has called its first witness of the day, Murdoch's only surviving son, Buster. We have heard so much about Buster Murdoch, but we really haven't heard from him. Buster talked about the night of the murders and how he finally got to Moselle and how emotional his father was. His demeanor was... He was destroyed. He was heartbroken. I walked in the door and saw him and gave him a hug and just broken down. Could he speak? Not really. He crying? Yes, sir. The defense seemed to want to humanize Elec with Buster's testimony to try to illustrate that there was no major tension in the family. Rumors were flying everywhere of whether Elec was going to testify. Will he actually do it? Was on everyone's mind. And it kept changing by the hour. Have you made a decision as to whether you're going to testify? Yes, sir. All And what is your decision? I am going to testify. I want to testify. We have breaking news. Alex Murdoch, the disgraced South Carolina attorney accused of killing his wife and son, is taking the witness stand in his own defense.

It's really tricky for a defendant to take the stand. But if that person can explain away the things that don't make sense to the jury, you can get an acquittal. I'm Alex Murdoch. M-u-r-d-a-u-g-h. Good morning. Mr. Murdaugh, did you take this gun or any gun like it and blow your son's brains out on June seventh or any day or anytime? No, I did not. Mr. Griffin, I didn't shoot my wife or my son anytime, ever. And then he's asked about that kennel video, the one piece of evidence that's the linchpin to the prosecution's case. Come here, Bob. Coming in, Cash. Coming in, Bob. Cash. Mr. Murdoch, is that you? On the kennel video at 8: 44 PM on June seventh, the night Maggie and Paul were murdered. It is. Did you lie to them by telling them that you were not down at the kennels on that night? Yes. Alec said that he lied about being at the kennels because it would have made police suspicious of him. You continued lying after that night, did you not? But once I lied, I continued to lie, yes, sir. Why? You know, what a tangled web we weave.

But once I told a lie, then I told my family I had to keep learning. On the stand, Alec tries to explain the lie, pointing to his opioid addiction and how it gave him paranoid thoughts. Normally, when these paranoid thoughts would hit me, I could take a deep breath real quick. Just think about it, reason my way through it. On June the seventh, I wasn't thinking clearly. Eilidh gives a version of the events that we've never heard before. Now, he says after having dinner with Maggie and Paul, he admits he did ride down to the kennels in a golf cart, staying there briefly before heading back to the house alone, and then leaving to check on his mother. He describes in gory detail on the stand the moment he says he came home and found the bodies. Paul was so It was so bad. Me and my boys laying face down. I could see his brain laying on the sidewalk. I didn't know what to do. I was trying to tend to Paul Paul. I was trying to tend to Maggie. On the stand, he introduces some nicknames for Paul Maggie. Maggie is Mags. I saw Mags talk to Mags.

Paul is Paul Paul. He couldn't be any closer than Paul-Paul. These are nicknames he uses over and over while on the stand. But when you listen to his interviews with law enforcement, he doesn't use them. I think I tried to turn Paul over. You had to wonder whether he was doing this as a way ingratiate himself with the jurors. When it's time for prosecutor Creighton Waters to cross-examine Alec, he questions him for hours about his alleged financial crimes going case by case. And you would agree with me that for years, you were stealing money from clients? Yes, sir. I agree with that. He's portraying Murdoch as this manipulator, this conman that's telling the jury, You can't believe a word this guy says. Then after hours of testimony, the prosecutor puts Alec's new timeline under the microscope. He wanted more of a down to the minute, down to the second breakdown of what Alec was actually doing. It was a battery of questions designed to stress test this story by Alec. Prosecutors want to know what he was doing back at the house from 1902 to 1906. When his phone becomes active for the first time in about an an hour and tracks 283 steps, faster than he'd been moving all day.

So what were you so busy doing? Going to the bathroom? No, I don't think that I... Get on a treadmill? No, I didn't get on a treadmill. Doing what? You've been so clear When you're hearing your news story about everything, what were you doing during these four minutes? I was going to check on my mom. But specifically what I was doing, I don't know. These are points where Waters is looking at Murdoch's story, looking over to the jury and saying, Does that sound believable to you? And as I sit here today, that I believe that boat wreck is the reason why Paul and Maggie were killed. So what you're telling this jury is that it's a random vigilante that just happened to know that Paul and Maggie were both to be at the kennels alone on June the seventh, that knew that you would not be there, but only between the times of 8: 49 and 9: 02. That's what you're trying to tell this jury? You got a lot of factors in there, Mr. Waters, all of which I do not agree with, but some of which I do. In total, Alex spent more than eight hours on the stand, and over the course of six days, the defense called 14 witnesses before resting.

Now, the case heads to the jury. And behind the scenes of that new scripted series, bringing the explosive story to streaming. Here's to the Murdoch. It was just so outrageous. It It was so diabolical. It was so hard to imagine. You have heard the testimony. It is your duty as jurors to deliberate in an effort to reach an agreement. So if all of you will now go to the jury room. Good evening. We're coming back on the air because the jury has reached a verdict in the high-profile Alec Murdoch murder trial in South Carolina. The defendant will rise. Madam clerk, you may publish the verdict. The State versus Richard Alexander Murdoch, defendant. Indictment for murder. Verdict, guilty. Judge Newman sentences Alec Murdoch to spend the rest of his life in prison. Alec is now appealing that conviction. He also pleaded guilty to 22 state charges and 22 federal charges related to his financial crimes. This has been perhaps one of the most troubling cases, not just for me as a judge, but for all of the citizens in this community. A family was destroyed, and so many people question whether or not justice would prevail because they do believe that there are some people who are above the law.

In South Carolina, no one is above the law. And now, almost three years after the trial captivated the country, that Hulu scripted series, Murdoch: Death in the Family, is taking a fresh look at the epic case and the troubled family at the center of it. Jason Clarke and Patricia Arquette disappear into the roles of Maggie and Alec Murdoch. The physicality of your transformation is remarkable, down to the accent. What we're after, what I'm after, to be blunt, is money. How did you get the accent? How did you nail the physicality? The physicality is like you've got to be in that ballpark. You get up and work. You eat, you read, you listen, you listen, you work with a dialect coach, you listen to books, you read about the South. It's not a magic trick. You put the miles in. It's been a crazy week. It's so crazy that you can't pick up the phone when your son needs you, when I need you? You studied women who are with narcissists. What did you learn about that formulation? Well, yeah, there's a whole pattern. There's a lot of things to reverse engineer from what we know of the facts of this relationship, right?

There are patterns narcissists have. There's things that they do. They're pathological liars. They're habitual cheaters. They have incapacity to really take accountability. We We survived. And we are strong before it. Maggie is a stand-in for so many partners who are trapped in toxic marriages. Oh, yeah. But I decided that She never would ever have thought that he would kill her son or her. There's a reason they were together all those years. She believed at the end of the day, We're family. You would protect us. Sometimes in acting, you have that moment where you get killed because it's a very strange thing. Actors go through that all the time, and you feel something. But in this, it was like, This doesn't make any sense. Why is Paul on the ground? Why are you there? Why are you holding a gun? She runs around the corner and says, What is happening? Yeah. It's like there's no way he could ever do that. But the truth is, in these kinds of relationships, when they are being discovered and when everything is starting to come out, that is when they are very dangerous. We got to have each other's backs.

Family first. I think one of the things we work to dramatize is the sphere of protection. And it starts with the boat crash where we must protect the family unit and we must protect Paul. And then as things unravel, as that chaos just unfolds, that sphere of protection just gets smaller and smaller until it just encapsulates Alec. Eventually, it's just I have to protect me. One of the beauties of this whole show is we do not dictate why did he do it. There is no solving that in that quiet moment. But it was a choice, without a doubt. It is a tragedy, a Shakespearean tragedy. I love you. I think we really do give respect to the story we're telling and the people that we're telling it about that remain in the aftermath of this mess. We should point out tonight that those civil suits with the Satterfield family for the stolen settlement money and the Beach family for that boat crash have been resolved. As for Buster Murdoch, David, he remains in South Carolina, where the family's property, Moselle, has been sold. You can stream Murdoch: Death in the Family now on Hulu and Disney+.

That's our program for tonight. Thanks for watching. I'm Deborah Roberts. And I'm David Muir from all of us here in 2020 in ABC News. Good night. You know what a girl's best friend is? Not diamonds. Her lawyers. From executive producer Ryan Murphy comes a fiery new legal drama. It's our own boutique. Women representing women. You can't afford to miss. Make it raven. Showtime, ladies. Stand up straight. And breeze into that room like a storm no one saw coming. Hulu Original Series, All's Fair, premieres November fourth on Hulu and Hulu on Disney Plus for bonus subscribers. Terms apply.