The state of South Carolina and Alex Murdaugh’s legal team responded on Monday to a juror’s ongoing battle to make the records of her dismissal public.
Murdaugh, a former South Carolina lawyer, was convicted on two counts of murder last year. The 56-year-old allegedly fatally shot his 52-year-old wife, Maggie, and 22-year-old son, Paul, at their home in 2021.
He was sentenced to two consecutive life terms without the possibility of parole. He is also serving 40 years for federal financial crimes he pleaded guilty to.
Last month, the South Carolina Supreme Court agreed to hear an appeal filed by Murdaugh’s attorneys alleging jury tampering in the initial trial. The attorneys claim that former Colleton County Clerk Rebecca Hill pressured jurors to convict Murdaugh so she could profit from a book she was writing about the trial.
Myra Crosby, juror No. 785 in the original trial, filed a petition to publicize the record of her removal from the jury.
Crosby gained notoriety in the original trial after being dismissed mere hours before deliberations began, after listening to six weeks of testimony in the case. Hill allegedly told Judge Clifton Newman, who presided over the initial trial, that Crosby’s ex-husband had made a Facebook post about the trial.
Hill claimed the ex-husband, Tim Stone, posted that he had been drinking with his ex-wife when she drunkenly voiced her views on whether Murdaugh was innocent or guilty.
Crosby denied Hill’s claim and said she had not seen her ex-husband in 10 years.
Hill allegedly told Crosby that she spoke to Stone at his house and he admitted to making the post.
Stone later denied making the post in a sworn statement to Murdaugh’s attorneys.
On Monday, the Office of the Attorney General submitted a response opposing Crosby’s petition to make her dismissal records public. The attorney general’s office argued that Crosby’s legal counsel signed a consent order, which states that she and her counsel cannot “further publish or disseminate” the records of her removal.
“Although the petitioner asserts that she has changed her mind about the agreement she entered into with the Court in November 2023, the State has not changed its position,” the attorney general’s office wrote.
Attorneys for Murdaugh did not take a position on the juror’s request in its response, but they did comment on “the critical importance of public access to judicial proceedings.”
“Appellant Richard Alexander Murdaugh’s admitted financial crimes likely could not have happened in the sunlight of full public access to the involved judicial proceedings,” his attorneys wrote. “Appellant himself then became a victim of secret misconduct in a Lowcountry courtroom when the Clerk of Court engaged in secret jury tampering for personal gain during his murder trial.”
Who is Alex Murdaugh?
Alex Murdaugh is a member of a prominent family of lawyers in the Lowcountry region of South Carolina.
His father, grandfather and great-grandfather all served as the solicitor in the 14th Judicial Circuit. Murdaugh worked as an attorney in the local prosecutor’s office and at his own law firm.
Murdaugh allegedly shot his wife and son multiple times in the head, wrists and chest with different guns on June 7, 2021. He then called officials and claimed he had found their bodies. He was later identified as a person of interest.
Murdaugh was arrested in July of 2022.
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