Murdaugh/SC Murder Trial

[qtlaw]

So disgraced lawyer who cheated his clients out of millions decided to testify today and admitted he lied to the police multiple times about his whereabouts the night of murder then says “I didn’t do it.”

I’d take my chances with a conviction now. How are we supposed to believe you now? You lied before why should we think you’re not lying now.

Im not a defense attorney but that’s an awful choice that client obviously decided to make on his own. Have fun in prison.

 

[UNCGrad]

I had been lightly following this story for a while, but never really had all the details. The three-episode Netflix docuseries that just dropped this week was a perfect primer and done really well. What a ****ing horrible family, and with him as the father, no wonder.

 

[TheSportsPredictor]

Been pretty obvious he did it from the time it hit the headlines.

 

[User 4332]

I'm gonna guess his lawyers advised him not to take the stand and he couldn't help himself from doing it anyway.

I've never seen the "I was lying then, but I am telling the truth now" excuse go well with a jury.

 

[Shropshire Slasher]

MSNBC provided gavel-to-gavel coverage today for lack of a better term. They're in the post-game show now.

I have absolutely no interest.

 

[swingline]

I'm gonna guess his lawyers advised him not to take the stand and he couldn't help himself from doing it anyway.

I've never seen the "I was lying then, but I am telling the truth now" excuse go well with a jury.

Wolf!

 

[SixToe]

I'm gonna guess his lawyers advised him not to take the stand and he couldn't help himself from doing it anyway.

I've never seen the "I was lying then, but I am telling the truth now" excuse go well with a jury.

Seems like many times in situations like this with a gigantic, entitled ego involved, the defendant believes he or she can just explain away everything. They're psychotic, always blaming others, it's never their fault, whatever someone says can be explained away, and they believe they're always right.

Still can't figure out why the son and wife were murdered. To what end? And if he did it, and I think he did, you have to be a truly psychopatic, cold-hearted, mentally defective MFer to shoot your kid in the chest and then your wife.

 

[hondo]

The New Yorker article was outstanding in explaining this dysfunctional family. The part that boiled my blood was cheating the two kids of his housekeeper out a settlement when she "fell down some stairs" and died. They had half a mil coming to them and Mudaugh stole it all.

As one person who knows Murdaugh told New York:
“If Alex had just told the brothers he’d won them a twenty-five-thousand-dollar settlement, they’d have thought he hung the moon. But he stole every cent.”
Alex even stood by as the bank foreclosed on the mobile home where Brian [one of the housekeeper's sons], a cognitively impaired adult, had been living on fourteen thousand dollars a year from a grocery-store job.
“The scope of Murdaugh’s depravity is without precedent in Western jurisprudence,” a lawsuit filed by the Nautilus Insurance Company states.

William Faulkner or Tennessee Williams couldn't have concocted this dark of a tale about a Southern family as this one.

The Corrupt World Behind the Murdaugh Murders

 

[Neutral Corner]

Sweet Jesus. That's another reason I'm not going to put time into following this story. I hope karma absolutely crushes him though. Or the legal system.

 

[tea and ease]

I'm with what @SixToe said: Why did he murder the wife and son? I believe he did it, but the motive (for that) is unclear. I believe he had Stephan Smith (the openly gay high schooler) killed to quash rumors his son dabbled in bi sexuality, and I believe he and his wife killed Gloria Satterfield (the housekeeper) because she was an insurance payday. Wait, I guess do know his motive. Separate circumstances, but they each knew too much.

 

[Regan MacNeil]

Do we have to ask why an evil son of a ***** did an evil thing?

 

[garrow]

MSNBC provided gavel-to-gavel coverage today for lack of a better term. They're in the post-game show now.

I have absolutely no interest.

Exactly! I missed my daily dose of Deadline White House because of this and that made my commute was worse.

 

[User 149557]

This did lead last evening to my wife telling me all her thoughts on putting defendants on the stand and the things she weighs between the jury’s expectations to hear from the defendant, that same jury’s bias against the defendant when he or she gets on that stand and the incapacity of most defendants to hold up against a skilled prosecutor. It was very interesting and something I’d never asked her about.

She rarely recommends her clients go on the stand, but in the end it is their choice.

 

[Shropshire Slasher]

Sounds like he's copping to enough charges to put himself away for the rest of his life even if he skates on murder.

 

[DanOregon]

Surprised he put himself on the stand. Isn't that usually what happens when you have nothing to lose?

 

[Jake from State Farm]

Bubba and Paw Paw would agree dad is a piece of work

 

[sgreenwell]

Surprised he put himself on the stand. Isn't that usually what happens when you have nothing to lose?

I think he was pretty firmly in that position anyway, but yeah. The Today Show's legal analyst said that some of the jury was crying while he testified, which makes me worry that it might have worked for the ****er. I think he's still facing like 90-something counts of fraud, drug distribution and other crimes, and kind of like OJ, it wouldn't surprise me if prosecutors and the judge are quite comfortable with the maximum amounts that those crimes account for, instead of sending him to some white collar prison.

 

[TigerVols]

Bubba and Paw Paw would agree dad is a piece of work

Wouldn't Paw Paw have to be dug up and told that's the name daddy is now using...since apparently no one heard daddy call him that when he was alive.

 

[qtlaw]

I think he was pretty firmly in that position anyway, but yeah. The Today Show's legal analyst said that some of the jury was crying while he testified, which makes me worry that it might have worked for the ****er. I think he's still facing like 90-something counts of fraud, drug distribution and other crimes, and kind of like OJ, it wouldn't surprise me if prosecutors and the judge are quite comfortable with the maximum amounts that those crimes account for, instead of sending him to some white collar prison.

Damn, the jurors bought that crap? Maybe they're just feeling for the wife and son. If not, it's just more of the king worshiping which is the worst. I mean get a life, why root for the guy who has had every possible advantage ever given? Maybe it's because I'm the offspring of immigrants but I'm never rooting for those clowns.

 

[SixToe]

I'm with what @SixToe said: Why did he murder the wife and son? I believe he did it, but the motive (for that) is unclear. I believe he had Stephan Smith (the openly gay high schooler) killed to quash rumors his son dabbled in bi sexuality, and I believe he and his wife killed Gloria Satterfield (the housekeeper) because she was an insurance payday. Wait, I guess do know his motive. Separate circumstances, but they each knew too much.

The likely perception: "Gay teen in S.C. won't be missed by too many. Whack him and it's one less fag around here among the good folk of the Lowcountry. He probably knows things, too."

Wrong. You'd have to be a complete f'ing moron to think that murdering a gay person of any age won't create attention these days. But we go back to the ego thing of explaining it away, we're the good people around here, "got what he deserved as a sinner" and all that claptrap.

Similar perception about the housekeeper. Two sons struggling to get by, one with mental problems and "just an old trailer," nice guys but not a big loss in the overall and they're beneath us, etc.

Daddy Psycho got away with that one until he didn't, and it just underscores how much of a POS he is.