Murdaugh's lawyer attacks state's alleged motive in South Carolina double murder trial

A lawyer for Richard "Alex" Murdaugh on Thursday accused investigators of fabricating evidence and said their theory of why their client killed his wife and son made no sense, seeking to raise doubts with the jury in the high-profile murder trial.

A lawyer for Richard "Alex" Murdaugh on Thursday accused investigators of fabricating evidence and said their theory of why their client killed his wife and son made no sense, seeking to raise doubts with the jury in the high-profile murder trial. In his closing argument, Jim Griffin said the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED), the state's version of the FBI, failed to examine DNA samples from the deceased and other key evidence that could have exonerated Murdaugh, and instead focused on him due to his mounting drug and financial troubles.

"That made him an easy, easy, easy target for SLED," Griffin said, arguing Murdaugh could have been ruled out as a suspect. "SLED failed miserably in investigating this case. Had they done a competent job, Alex would have been excluded from that circle." Murdaugh, the 54-year-old scion of an influential legal family in an area west of Charleston, has been charged with fatally shooting his wife Maggie, 52, and youngest son, Paul, 22, at dog kennels on their estate on the night of June 7, 2021.

He faces 30 years to life in prison if found guilty by the jury, which is set to begin deliberations later on Thursday. The case has drawn intense media coverage given the family's immense political power in and around Colleton County, where the trial is taking place. For decades until 2006, family members served as the leading prosecutor in the area, and Murdaugh was a prominent personal injury attorney in the Deep South state.

Throughout the monthlong trial and during his final remarks on Wednesday, the state's lead prosecutor Creighton Waters sought to portray Murdaugh as a serial liar and argued that only he had the means and the opportunity to commit the murders. Waters has argued Murdaugh gunned down his wife and son to generate sympathy and distract from a litany of financial crimes, including the theft of millions of dollars from his law partners and clients - money used to feed a years-long addiction to opioids and support an expensive lifestyle.

Griffin described the state's alleged motive as preposterous, arguing that the murders would only draw more scrutiny to the allegations of Murdaugh's financial misdeeds. "That is their theory of the case. If you don’t accept that beyond a reasonable doubt, ladies and gentlemen, I submit the verdict has to be 'not guilty' because there is no reason for him to do it, no reason whatsoever."

Griffin repeatedly highlighted the high legal bar in criminal cases of proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, underscoring the challenge for prosecutors who have built their case on circumstantial rather than direct evidence. "If there's any reasonable cause for you to hesitate to write 'guilty,' then the law requires you to write 'not guilty,'" he said.

Griffin also outlined a handful of examples where he alleges the state fabricated evidence. They included the claim that Murdaugh had high-velocity blood spatter on his shirt, an assertion contradicted by testing by SLED. Among the state's strongest evidence is Murdaugh's admission from the stand last week that he'd lied about his whereabouts on the night of the killings, telling investigators he was not at the dog kennels before the murders. Murdaugh changed his account after the jury listened to audio evidence placing him at the crime scene minutes before it occurred.

Griffin repeated Murdaugh's claim that he lied to investigators because of paranoia tied to his drug habit, as well as his mistrust of the police. "He lied because that’s what addicts do. He lied because he had a closet full of skeletons," the attorney said.

Earlier on Thursday, Judge Clifton Newman removed a juror found to have engaged in "improper conversations" with people not involved in the trial, and replaced her with an alternate. "Though it does not appear that the conversations were that extensive, it did involve the juror offering her opinion regarding evidence received up to that point in the trial," Newman said.