Alex Murdaugh has asked a South Carolina judge to dismiss the murder charges against him, arguing that investigators misled a grand jury about crucial forensic evidence ahead of his first trial.
The 58-year-old former attorney appeared at Lexington County courthouse on Friday, November 13, where his legal team challenged the validity of the indictments over claims that lead investigator David Owen provided false information about blood spatter allegedly found on Murdaugh’s clothing.
The hearing comes less than five months before Murdaugh is scheduled to face a second trial over the June 2021 murders of his wife, Maggie, and their son, Paul.
Defence Claims Investigator Misled Grand Jury
Murdaugh’s attorney, Jim Griffin, argued that the murder indictments should be dismissed because Owen, an agent with the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED), allegedly gave the grand jury inaccurate information about forensic findings.
Griffin said Owen testified that Paul’s blood spatter had been discovered on a white T-shirt Murdaugh wore on the night of the killings.
The investigator also allegedly claimed that DNA belonging to Murdaugh, Maggie and Paul was identified in the area of the supposed blood evidence.
However, Griffin told the court that subsequent testing conducted by SLED’s own laboratory found no human blood on the shirt.
He displayed photographs of the garment during a lengthy PowerPoint presentation, arguing that the allegation had played a significant role in securing the murder indictments in July 2022.
According to Griffin, the claim suggested that Murdaugh had been present when his son suffered the fatal head injuries.
“If it were true,” Griffin told the court, “it is as good as a fingerprint at the murder scene.”
He added that the problem was that the alleged blood spatter evidence had never existed.
Griffin maintained that the grand jury had been misled and said the allegation had spread among Murdaugh’s relatives, friends and surviving son, Buster.
Defence Challenges Evidence About Ammunition
Griffin also questioned another part of Owen’s grand jury testimony concerning ammunition discovered on the Murdaugh family’s 1,700-acre Moselle estate in Islandton, South Carolina.
The investigator allegedly told jurors that buckshot and birdshot matching the types used in the killings had been found in weapons belonging to the family.
However, Griffin argued that none of the guns recovered from the property was loaded in the same configuration as the weapons used in the murders.
Maggie and Paul were killed with two different firearms. Paul was shot with a shotgun, while Maggie was killed with an AR-style rifle.
Neither murder weapon has been recovered.
The defence attorney also referred to another criminal case involving Owen in which a murder indictment was dismissed after previously undisclosed evidence emerged.
Griffin asked Judge Debra McCaslin to throw out the current indictments, arguing that prosecutors could present their evidence to another grand jury as early as next month.
Prosecutors Say Blood Spatter Was Not Key Evidence
Prosecutor Creighton Waters rejected the defence’s argument, describing the disputed blood spatter testimony as a secondary issue in the grand jury proceedings.
Waters maintained that the most significant evidence supporting the murder indictments was a video recovered from Paul’s cellphone.
The recording placed Murdaugh at the family’s dog kennels shortly before the killings, contradicting his earlier account of his whereabouts that evening.
Prosecutors have previously argued that Murdaugh lied about his alibi and suggested that he changed his clothes and cleaned himself after the murders.
Waters also disputed the suggestion that Owen’s statements about the ammunition were false, arguing that similar types of ammunition had indeed been discovered on the family property.
Judge McCaslin said she would issue a ruling on the motion to dismiss by the end of next week.
If she grants the request, prosecutors will have to return to a grand jury to secure new indictments before proceeding with another murder trial.
Murdaugh Set for Second Murder Trial in April 2027
Murdaugh was convicted in 2023 of murdering his wife and younger son at the family’s Moselle estate on June 7, 2021.
Maggie, 52, and Paul, 22, were found shot dead near the property’s dog kennels.
Murdaugh called emergency services that evening, reporting that he had returned from visiting his mother to discover their bodies.
He was subsequently convicted of the double murders and sentenced to life imprisonment. However, he has continued to deny responsibility for their deaths.
In May 2026, the South Carolina Supreme Court overturned the convictions and ordered a retrial after finding that Murdaugh’s right to a fair trial had been violated by alleged jury interference involving former Colleton County court clerk Becky Hill.
The new trial was scheduled for April 5, 2027, in Sumter County, following a decision to move the proceedings away from Colleton County, where the original trial took place.
New DNA Testing Could Introduce Alternative Suspect Theory
Friday’s hearing also revealed that Othram, a forensic laboratory specialising in investigative genetic genealogy, had received the DNA evidence for further examination.
Murdaugh’s defence team is seeking to establish whether the evidence could point to another individual being responsible for the killings.
DNA belonging to an unidentified male was reportedly discovered beneath the fingernails of both Maggie’s hands and on her cellphone.
The phone was recovered beside a road near the Moselle estate.
The defence has argued that the unidentified DNA could provide evidence of another killer, while prosecutors have previously dismissed the findings as a red herring.
The court had earlier approved the defence’s request to send the samples to Othram, the laboratory that helped identify Bryan Kohberger in the Idaho student murders investigation.
Now that the laboratory has received the evidence, the testing is expected to be completed within 90 days or less.
Financial Crimes Featured in Original Murder Case
Although Murdaugh continues to deny murdering his wife and son, he has admitted to a series of financial crimes at both state and federal levels.
He pleaded guilty to multiple offences involving financial fraud, which prosecutors presented as a central part of their proposed motive for the killings.
The investigation into the murders also brought renewed attention to several other deaths and controversies connected to the prominent South Carolina family.
In 2019, Paul was charged over a boat crash that killed his 19-year-old friend, Mallory Beach.
He was awaiting trial in that case when he was murdered.
The family’s former housekeeper, Gloria Satterfield, had also died following a reported trip-and-fall accident at the Moselle property.
Additionally, the Murdaugh family name was linked, without supporting evidence, to the unsolved 2015 killing of teenager Stephen Smith.
Alleged Hitman Plot Added to Murdaugh’s Legal Troubles
Three months after the murders, Murdaugh allegedly attempted to arrange his own killing through Curtis Smith, known as “Cousin Eddie.”
The plan involved staging a shooting that would allow his surviving son, Buster, to receive a life insurance payout.
The attempted scheme ultimately failed and became another major development in the investigations surrounding Murdaugh.
Buster, who is Murdaugh’s only surviving son, has since welcomed his first child.
Murdaugh remains imprisoned in a maximum-security facility in South Carolina, where he is serving separate sentences of 27 and 40 years for his financial crimes.
He is expected to return to court on January 20 as the legal proceedings surrounding the murders continue.
