THE notorious Murdaugh family has made headlines for years, wrapped in murder and mystery.
Once a high-profile lawyer, Alex Murdaugh is now a convicted criminal who is serving two consecutive life sentences in jail.
Who is the Murdaugh family?
The Murdaughs were once known for being a prominent South Carolina legal family that had decades of success, but now, the name is associated with death and tragedy.
The Murdaugh family members include:
Alex Murdaugh
Alex is a convicted killer from Hampton County, South Carolina.
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Once a highly successful lawyer, he graduated from the University of South Carolina with a Bachelor of Arts Degree in political science and a Juris Doctorate Degree.
In 1994, Alex was admitted to the South Carolina Bar, and later on, he became known for "representing injured people in all areas of personal injury law, including trucking cases, products liability and wrongful death."
He also served as a part-time prosecutor for the 14th Judicial Circuit.
Despite all his success, on September 3, 2021, Alex announced that he would be resigning from his family’s law firm and entering rehab.
Later in the day, leaders of the Hampton firm disclosed to The New York Times that he was forced out after he allegedly misused money from the company.
He worked as a partner at Peters, Murdaugh, Parker, Eltzroth, and Detrick (PMPED), founded by his great-grandfather more than 100 years ago.
Since resigning, Alex has faced several hardships, from being shot in the head to being accused of killing his wife and son.
He was later sentenced to life in prison in March 2023 after he was found guilty of killing his wife, Maggie, and youngest son, Paul.
One year later, in March 2024, it was announced that Alex's mother, Elizabeth "Libby" Murdaugh, passed away in hospice care.
Maggie Murdaugh
Margaret “Maggie” Kennedy Branstetter Murdaugh was best known as Alex's wife.
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She met her husband back in the late 1980s while studying at the University of South Carolina.
Tragically, she and her son, Paul, were fatally shot on June 7, 2021, at the family hunting lodge, known as "Moselle," in Hampton, South Carolina.
The bodies were found with multiple gunshot wounds yards apart from each other near the family's dog kennel.
An early forensic investigation suggests they were murdered with two different firearms.
Paul Murdaugh
Paul Murdaugh was Alex and Maggie's youngest son.
In June 2021, he was found murdered alongside his mother.
At the time, he was awaiting trial on a boating under the influence charge in connection with a 2019 crash that killed 19-year-old Mallory Beach.
Beach was reportedly ejected from the boat after Paul crashed into a bridge early in the morning on February 24, 2019.
Her body was found seven days after the crash.
Paul was released on a $50,000 personal recognizance bond in May 2019 after entering a not-guilty plea.
Buster Murdaugh
Richard Alexander Murdaugh Jr. - also known as Buster - is the oldest and only surviving son of Alex and Maggie.
He tried following in his father's footsteps by studying to become a lawyer, but in 2019, he was expelled from the University of South Carolina for plagiarism, according to Seventeen.
Since then, he has stayed out of the spotlight, but in November 2022, Fox News reported that he was "living a quiet life with his longtime girlfriend" in the Hilton Head Island area.
However, on June 17, 2024, the Daily Mail reported that Buster filed a massive defamation lawsuit against Netflix and Warner Brothers over documentaries that connected him to the murder of his former classmate Stephen Smith.
Why was Alex Murdaugh denied a new trial?
In early 2023, Murdaugh's attorneys accused Colleton County Clerk of Court Rebecca Hill of tampering with the jury during his trial.
His attorneys allegedly claimed that Hill pressured jurors into finding Murdaugh guilty to publish her book, Behind the Doors of Justice: The Murdaugh Murders, which was about the trial.
However, a judge denied Murdaugh's appeal for a new trial on January 29, 2024.
The decision came after Justice Jean Toal determined that Hill was "not completely credible as a witness" and was "lured by the siren call of celebrity," though her actions did not influence the jurors.
