In the matter of the indictments of the defendant,
alec Murdoch for the murders of his wife Maggie and his son paul.
The state of south Carolina rests.
The prosecution has rested its case in the murder trial of disbarred south Carolina
lawyer alec Murdoch who is accused of killing his wife Maggie and his son paul at Moselle their
family hunting estate the night of june 7th 2021.
Turn around for me.
Okay?
Yes sir,
I see that.
Okay,
This is your wife Murdoch has pleaded not guilty to both
murder charges over roughly four weeks,
the prosecution has called on more than 50 witnesses to testify in front of the jury and presented
hundreds of pieces of evidence.
The Wall Street Journal's Valerie bore line breaks down some of the key moments we've seen so far and
looks ahead to what we can expect from the defense,
Murdoch isn't only facing murder charges,
he's been jailed for more than a year on 99 felony counts,
primarily related to allegedly swindling clients at his law firm out of $8.8 million
dollars over the last decade.
He's pleaded not guilty to most of the financial charges against him.
The state argued,
we need to be able to tell the jury what was going on in the background as we got to June seven how this
financial fraud that Alec had been,
you know,
is accused of running for a decade,
how it was unraveling on that day,
but the defense said he's accused of murder.
This is not a trial for these other things.
They shouldn't be able to bring all that in.
Its prejudicial.
It'll confuse the jury.
Judge Newman ultimately sided with the state.
So the jury then heard testimony from financial witnesses,
including forensic accountants and Murdoch's former colleagues who explained how murdock allegedly
created a shell account to move his money and why do you call it fake ford?
Because there is a real forge consulting.
But this was a fake company that he set up to mimic and look like and designed to
look like forge.
There was also very kind of wrenching personal testimony,
including from The son of his former housekeeper,
Gloria Satterfield and so Tony Satterfield took the stand and talked about growing up
knowing that his whole life trusting him after his mother died to arrange some sort of
financial settlement so the boys could pay her medical bills.
They can't pay the rent on their mobile home,
you know,
and he really trusted Alec to do that.
Angelique has acknowledged taking more than $4 million dollars that belonged to those boys.
Murdoch signed a confession of judgment last year admitting to the theft.
A key part of the prosecution's case hinged on a piece of video evidence,
which prosecutors say was filmed on paul's phone and places murdock at the scene moments before
the shootings occurred and several witnesses have taken to the stand to say they hear
murdock's voice in the
video.
Hey Bubba,
it's a chicken.
One of the things the state has tried to establish is putting very,
very close friends of the family,
very close friends with paul on the stand to ask them Yes,
I I love paul,
I love Alex and Maggie.
They were loving family.
Yes,
but whose voice do you hear on that?
Can you point out Alex Murdoch,
the person whose voice you recognize in this video in this courtroom please?
They said,
I hear alec Maggie and paul and it's been devastating to see these young men,
friends of paul who clearly still have great affection for the family,
acknowledge that it's his voice that they hear and while the prosecution has *** out a
detailed theory of what they say happened on the night of the murder and why the presentation of the
story was disconnected at times,
the state has not really told a story kind of beginning,
middle to end.
There have been friends of paul murdock on the stand and then financial testimony and
then ballistics evidence that has created some sense of
disjointed nous in the courtroom at times.
Now that the state has rested the defense will have the chance to present its case.
You can expect them to continue to try and and poke holes in the state's
case and particularly in the process and it just doesn't stand a reason because all this other stuff was going on
that he would kill two people he loved very much the defense could echo a theory they've
previously brought up in opening statements that a third party was involved in the murders,
one shooter to don guns,
shotgun and an A.
R.
And by the way,
Maggie has no defensive room wounds because she's running what's he running from.
But one question remains,
as the defense prepares,
its case will murdock himself testify.
The theory is that,
you know,
the jury has heard alec lie,
they've heard him say,
and repeatedly in sled interviews that he did not see Maggie and paul in the hours before the homicide,
something that has been belied by a video that shows that he was there.
And so the theory is that the only person that can address that adequately is alec Murdoch
himself.