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October 21, 2025 62 mins

The Murdaugh’s were the most influential family in Hampton, South Carolina. But when two members of the family were brutally murdered, a slew of death and deception lead back to one person. 
This week, Emily and Shane are diving into the once-powerful Alex Murdaugh.

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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hi, guys, Welcome to another episode Illegally Brunette. I will
be your host, Emily Simpson and Shane Shane. Okay, first
of all, we have to do some updates on some
cases that we've done previously. If you have not listened
to our episode on Ellen Greenberg, I would suggest that
you do that if you haven't, because it's a really,
really interesting case. It's so interesting because you'll never actually

(00:24):
know what happened, but we have some like breaking news
or some new things that have happened.

Speaker 2 (00:30):
Breaking only heard here.

Speaker 1 (00:33):
The Philadelphia Medical Examiner reaffirms Ellen Greenberg's twenty eleven stabbing
death was a suicide. Now, you know, when we talked
about it previously, it was originally ruled a suicide, then
it was ruled a homicide. Then I think it even
may have gone back to a suicide, then maybe back
to a homicide because the parents were pushing. They wanted
it ruled as a homicide, because they wanted it investigated,

(00:54):
and they never believed that their daughter took her own life,
especially with twenty stab wounds. However, just recently, the Philadelphia
Medical Examiner's office issued a report affirming its ruling that
the twenty eleven stabbing death of Ellen Greenberg was a suicide.
It was a thirty two page report. The chief medical
examiner was doctor Lindsay Simon, and she said that Ellen

(01:16):
Greenberg would have been capable of inflicting the injuries on herself,
noting that there was no sign of a struggle at
the scene, no sign of an intruder. Her fiancees alibi
was supported through surveillance footage, and his DNA was not
found on the knife. The medical examiner also noted that
Greenberg was under the care of a psychiatrist at the

(01:37):
time for her anxiety, but quote, she did not survive
long enough to address the actual anxiety itself. Thus she
had to increase it energy to act on her anxious thoughts.
I mean, that's really the crux of the issue. Was
she going through such a psychosis episode that she was
able to inflict those wounds herself or did her fiance

(01:59):
have something to do with it. At the end of
the day, we'll never know, but it is officially ruled
a suicide, and I think at this point that's probably
a final determination. I don't know if the.

Speaker 2 (02:11):
Right I mean, whether he did or not. It's a
good thing. I stoked, we didn't do it.

Speaker 1 (02:17):
He stoked, well exactly. William Trask is the Greenberg's family attorney.
He blasted these findings in a statement and said the
medical examiner so called independent review of Ellen's death is
a deeply flawed attempt to justify a predetermined conclusion by
ignoring key evidence that contradicts suicide, a recreation which proves

(02:39):
Ellen could not self inflict all of the wounds. There's
unexplained bruises, missing surveillance footage, and intact Locke accounts of
a toxic relationship, et cetera. The medical examiner builds a
flimsy case on distorted portrayals of Ellen's mental health. So
obviously the family attorney is disagreeing, and we'll continue to

(03:01):
follow that and see if there's any other breaking news.
But as of right now, it has beneficial told a suicide. Again.

Speaker 2 (03:06):
Side note, if it's a homicide, insurances may be available.
If it's a suicide, it's likely excluded.

Speaker 1 (03:14):
Is that because we're going into the Murdau murders? Is
that why that's on your mind?

Speaker 2 (03:17):
That was my transition.

Speaker 1 (03:18):
That was, well, we're not transitioning yet.

Speaker 2 (03:21):
We have sorry more updates.

Speaker 1 (03:22):
We have some breaking news. Well actually it's just an update.
I just like to say breaking news on Amy.

Speaker 2 (03:27):
Bradley again, another unsolved another.

Speaker 1 (03:31):
Right, Well, some people believe that she jumped, and then
other people believe that she was trafficked. So the success
of the Netflix docuseries Amy Bradley Is Missing has helped
put Bradley's case in the national spotlight, bringing in hundreds
of new leads to the FBI and Bradley's family. There
are three very significant leads that a source close to

(03:52):
the production has told the Hollywood Reporter. These are actually,
these are really interesting. So I'm glad we're going to
break these three new leads down just for a little bit.
First of all, a female bar server that was on
board the cruise ship that night has come forward to
corroborate the kidnapping version of events on the night Bradley
went missing. A source says that this server was heard

(04:13):
exclaiming to passengers and crew seniority to kidnapped, seniority to kidnapped.
The server does not speak much English, and the bar
server was then told to shut up and take into
the back by a bartender. This server is currently being
interviewed by investigators. So that is new tip number one.
Number two, there has been a new highly suspicious hit

(04:36):
to Amy Bradley's missing person's website. The site is being
professionally monitored for activity, with the idea being that Bradley
herself may use it as a way to feel connected
with her family, or that her potential captors may use
it as keeping tabs on the investigation. Through geolocating, investigators
were able to trace the suspicious hip to an IP

(04:58):
address of a device on a boat off the west
end of Barbados. That seems like a more viable lead
to me, Oh well, timely, because really, the only you
have to find her, you can't. You can interview a
server all day long that says that she saw something
that night thirty years ago, but that's not gonna help
you find her if she's still alive and she's existing.

Speaker 2 (05:20):
Now, and just seeing her, I mean, we need seeing
her alone may not do anything at all. I guess
there'd have to be more.

Speaker 1 (05:27):
Tips, right, But the website with an IP address is
definitely more viable because then you can go to a
location and search, all right. The third new information surrounding
that Aby Bradley has a potential child. New evidence makes
a more compelling case that Bradley has at least one child.
The source believes the child is more than likely the

(05:49):
result of Bradley being forced into sex work, and not
a signal that she has settled down to have a family.
Though this information is vague, I guess the source knows
more information, but it is only sharing a little.

Speaker 2 (06:01):
That right there, just credits it.

Speaker 1 (06:03):
Why because they're not sharing everything. Well, maybe they're not
publicly sharing it. Maybe they're sharing information, but they're not
putting Okay, they're not putting the information a lot of
information out publicly, all right, because obviously, if someone's following
this case and she was sex trafficked, and there's people
looking into it and following it, you don't want to put.

Speaker 2 (06:19):
All your right deliberately withheld from the public.

Speaker 1 (06:22):
Right it is the most significant piece of new evidence.
If Amy Bradley has a child, then we know she
didn't die at sea, and then maybe there's a way
to locate her. All right, Let's move on to the
twisted and crazy case of the murdaw murders. First of all,

(06:46):
there's two documentaries that I watched. There is a Hulu
documentary called The Murdaw Murders A Deadly Dynasty, which is great.
I would suggest that there's also a documentary on Netflix
called The Murdaw Murders A Southern Scandal, which is great. Also.
Now Hulu has come out with a new It's not
a documentary, it's a dramatization. And Shane and I watched

(07:09):
the first three episodes, and I will tell you, like,
I have a big problem with this dramatization, but we're
going to come back to that because I feel like
we need to get into the story more. However, when
it comes to dramatizations, what do you think? Like, I
liked the Amanda Knox one because they did a good
job as following the story as accurately as possible with
facts and pulling all the testimony right.

Speaker 2 (07:33):
Otherwise you just watch an action flick, any kind of
murder mystery movie.

Speaker 1 (07:36):
Right. They stuck to the facts, and that's why I
liked it. And then obviously with a dramatization, it's the
it's the director or producer or whoever.

Speaker 2 (07:45):
You know.

Speaker 1 (07:46):
They had some side stories as to where they add
some creativity and you know where you see like Rafael's
family or conversations he might have had with his sister
or his dad, and they're trying to make it deeper,
They're trying to add more to the characters. I don't
mind that level of creativity as long as you're sticking
to the facts.

Speaker 2 (08:05):
Sometimes you watch these things and there's conversation, you're like,
how do they know that conversation took place? But they're
probably doing the best they can to interpret it and
kind of get the vibe and tone and some of
the things that might have been discussed.

Speaker 1 (08:17):
All right, let's talk about Alex Murdach. He was a
once prominent South Carolina attorney, a member of a powerful
legal family, and he became the center of a massive
criminal scandal after the June twenty twenty one murders of
his wife Maggie and son Paul on his family's oney
seven hundred and seventy acre hunting estate, which is called
Mozelle Cow eighteen acres Acres YEA. The investigation into those

(08:43):
two murders unraveled a web of financial crimes, corruption, and deceit.
Prosecutors alleged that Murdoch killed his family members to distract
from and delay exposure of his own extensive financial misconduct.
He had been stealing millions from his law firm and
clients for years.

Speaker 2 (09:02):
And this last firm goes back generations.

Speaker 1 (09:05):
Yeah so yeah, it's like his great great grandfather was
a prosecutor, and then that, then his great grandfather was
a prosecutor. Then his grandfather was a prosecutor. So this
is a well established legal dynasty in this low country I.

Speaker 2 (09:17):
Know everyone, everyone knows them.

Speaker 1 (09:21):
So this case drew national attention not just for the
brutality of the murders, but for the exposure of the
deep rooted influence of the Murdoff family in South Carolina's
low country justice system. All right, let's start with the Murdals.
Who they are, why they're so powerful. So the Murdof
family is a once prominent and influential legal dynasty from
Hampton County, South Carolina. Their prominence began back in nineteen

(09:44):
ten when Randolph Murdal Senior founded this is called the
PMPED Law Firm. Obviously, PMPED stands for all the last
names of the partners. Oh it's not pimped.

Speaker 2 (09:55):
I know what I saw. They need to add like
a there.

Speaker 1 (10:00):
Something they could have an eye. It's a personal entry,
A pimp law fer. I mean he kind of ran
it like that a personal jury in civil litigation powerhouse.
From nineteen twenty to two thousand and six, three generations
of murder men. Randolph Senior, Randolph Junior, and Randolph the
third served as solicitor for the Fourteenth Circuit. And solicitor

(10:23):
is another way to say prosecutor. This meant the Murdoffs
prosecuted every major criminal case in their region for over
eighty six years, giving them deep ties to local law enforcement,
judges and politicians. All right, so let's get into how
all this starts to unravel. We might have to jump
around just a little bit just to try to make

(10:44):
this flow and make sense. But we're going to start
in twenty nineteen because I feel like that's where all
the documentaries start as well, because you have to start
with the boat crash. I feel like that's the catalyst
for really the downfall of this family and and everything
being exposed. So we're going to start there. Ebruary twenty fourth,
twenty nineteen, was the Murdall boating accident. This is when
the youngest son, Paul Murdall, was driving friends out on

(11:08):
a boat late at night.

Speaker 2 (11:10):
He's like twenty right or something.

Speaker 1 (11:11):
Or he's nineteen at the time when he strivers. Okay,
so there were six longtime friends that were on a
seventeen foot sea hunt boat owned by Alex Murdall. Now
it was three couples. So you have Paul Murdall and
then his girlfriend who was Morgan Dody. They're nineteen. Then
there's Mallory Beach and her boyfriend Anthony, they're both nineteen.

(11:34):
And then there's Connor Cook who is Anthony's cousin, and
then his girlfriend Miley, who was also twenty and the
three girls were friends and the three guys were friends.
You've got six couples out on a boat late at night. Now,
the group drove the boat to an oyster shrucking party
and drank heavily at the event, and there's all these
snapchat videos. If you watch any of these documentaries, there's
so much real footage of that night, the party, on

(11:56):
them partying, and there's so much snapchat videos and just
social media type videos because you've got six young kids
on a boat and they're all taking videos, they're all posting,
so you get a real life idea of what's going on.
They're all heavily drinking. We later learned that Paul insisted
on taking the boat that night because he knew there

(12:17):
would be routine traffic stops on the road, so he
wanted to steer clear of that. So it's interesting that
he wants to avoid a dui so they take the
boat out instead. Despite being underage, Paul was able to
buy alcohol at a local convenience store. This is prior
to taking the boat out using his older brother's ID.
His older brother's name is Buster. That night, witnesses described

(12:40):
Paul as acting belligerent and drunk, and alternating between aggressive
and erratic behavior. Paul was known to be a heavy drinker.
His friends also had a name for his drunk alter ego.
They called him Timmy. Now, I'm sorry, but you know
that when you drink, like if your friends give you
an entire different name and entirely different identity, because you

(13:01):
become a totally different person when.

Speaker 2 (13:04):
You're drinking, and it's not for good. It's not like
it becomes a gentleman.

Speaker 1 (13:08):
No, he does not become a gentleman. YEA, his name
isn't like Bernard. His alter ego is Demmy, and Timmy
is a menace. Friends testified that Paul refused to let
anyone else drive the boat, even though they repeatedly asked
him to stop operating it. So you see them all
go to this oyster shuck which is pretty far down
the river. They're all partying, they're all drinking. There's all

(13:29):
kinds of social media videos of them drinking. They get
back in the boat. I'm sorry, this cat is driving
me insane. I can't with the animals. It's just there's
so many of them.

Speaker 2 (13:38):
We should do a zoo podcast.

Speaker 1 (13:41):
So they leave the oyster shucking party and they're coming
back and then Paul insists that they stop at a
bar on their way back, so they dock the boat.
On their way back, they go to a bar. It's
him and I think like another one of the guys,
and you can see the girls and you know their
surveillance video of it. They're waiting on him and he
comes back out of the bar and he looks like

(14:01):
he's acting kind of beligerably.

Speaker 2 (14:02):
He's using his brother's ID to get the alcohol.

Speaker 1 (14:05):
Well, he used his brother's ID to buy alcohol before
they took the boat out. So it shows him like
pulling in in a big truck and he goes in
the convenience story buy his alcohol. He gets back in
the truck. He's got the boat hooked up.

Speaker 2 (14:16):
To it, So I mean, he's a criminal from the beginning.

Speaker 1 (14:20):
It frights So they stop at a bar, they drink,
They get back into the boat, and I know that
they kept saying that they were asking, like repeatedly, that
they did not want him to drive the boat. The
other guys tried to drive the boat. Here's the thing
that bothers me though. The other two guys are big guys.
I mean, at the end of the day, if you're
that concerned with him, like, I don't understand why they
don't physically just hold him down.

Speaker 2 (14:43):
Okay, if I'm driving the car and I'm drunk.

Speaker 1 (14:47):
I can't know. I can't even picture that.

Speaker 2 (14:49):
But okay, and you're trying to take the wheel from me,
is it just a matter of you just taking the
wheel from me?

Speaker 1 (14:54):
No? Yeah, but I can't overpa Well maybe I can,
but I can't overpower your power.

Speaker 2 (14:59):
For words.

Speaker 1 (14:59):
I'm talking thinking about the other two guys in the
boat because it might take a.

Speaker 2 (15:04):
Minute to do it. Guys, I've ever seen cops try
to take down someone. It sometime takes four or five cops. Yeah,
so had him some slack, is what I'm saying. What
the other guys, Yeah, you don't know what was going
on in that boat.

Speaker 1 (15:15):
Well there's some video of it. It looks pretty.

Speaker 2 (15:17):
Chaotic there you go. That's why they couldn't take it
over because it.

Speaker 1 (15:19):
Was chaotic at around two twenty am while speeding through
the dark, foggy waters near Archer's Creek Bridge.

Speaker 2 (15:25):
Oh and keep in mind they were drunk too, so
if they were drunk to it, they weren't, so you know,
they're a low empede too.

Speaker 1 (15:32):
So the way I understood it is that they're close
to Archer's Creek Bridge and Paul was driving erratic and
they were trying to get him to stop driving, and
it seems like there's a scuffle and there's chaos going on.
It looks like the boat like circles a little bit
and then the boat stops. Then I believe the way

(15:53):
I understand it is that Paul grabs the throttle and
just pushes it forward at full speed, so the ball
so the boat lurches forward, goes full speed and slams
into a piling, which are those thick pillars that support
a peer or a doc. The impact threw multiple passengers
into the water. Connor, one of the other guys, had
a huge gash near his mouth and left a permanent scar,

(16:16):
and Morgan needed to get surgery on her badly injured hand.
So Morgan is Paul's girlfriend. Also, they claim that he
slapped Morgan that night and spit on her like while
they were all in the boat. So despite these concerning injuries,
every passenger besides Mallory Beach surfaced. So everyone starts screaming

(16:37):
out for Mallory because she's the only one out of
all six people that they can't find. Everyone was screaming
out for her while nine one one was being called.
Nine arrives and they take all these kids to the hospital,
right except for Anthony Cook. Anthony refuses to leave because
it's his girlfriend. Mallory is the one that's missing. So, right,
all of the remaining passengers go to the hospital besides Anthony,

(17:00):
and there's a lot of bodycam footage from the police
of that night. When the police arrive, you can see
Anthony's sitting there. He's yelling for Mallory. He's distraught, He's
like screaming at Paul, like you did this, you know
she's missing. He won't leave. Paul's belligerent. Here's why I
don't understand. They tell the cops Paul's the one driving.

(17:23):
They don't give him a breathalyzer at that time. Yeah,
and he's belligerent. He's acting drunk. I mean, he's obnoxious.
They take him to the hospital and then once he
gets to the hospital, he's completely obnoxious. He's like saying
horrible things to the nurses, and he's belligerent. So all

(17:43):
the kids are at the hospital, Paul calls his grandfather Randolph,
as he notoriously did, for help because he gets in
trouble a lot. He was a known troublemaker, but he
would always call his grandfather. Randolph and Alex Murdoch quickly
appear at the hospital and attempt to manage the narrative.
You can also see this in surveillance footage. You can
see the grandfather and Alex Murda arrive. You can see

(18:03):
them at the hospital. You can see them going from
room to room. Yeah. Well you can't hear what they're.

Speaker 2 (18:09):
Saying, but you can see that, see them.

Speaker 1 (18:11):
Yeah, and they're going into the kid's rooms. And they're,
you know, trying to control the narrative, and they're saying,
don't worry about anything. We're going to represent you in this.
And I are trying.

Speaker 2 (18:19):
To you got some crooked lawyers here, take care of it.

Speaker 1 (18:22):
We're going to do this. So they try to intervene
when the kids were asked for their witness statements, and
Alex repeatedly inferred that Connor was actually the one driving
the boat. So already the dads, they are trying to
change the narrative and trying to blame it on the
other kid, Connor. Connor did try to drive the boat,
but at the end of the day, all the kids
testified that it was Paul was the one that, you know,

(18:43):
put his hand on the throttle and was the one
driving the boat. Several witnesses also stated that the officers
did not immediately administer sobriety tests to Paul, which we
talked about. There were also allegations that Paul's name was
kept off of the official reports, which I'm sure I
had to do with the influence of his dad and grandfather.
They didn't want them to give witness statements. They were
going into the rooms. They were trying to, you know,

(19:04):
change the narrative that it was Connor driving.

Speaker 2 (19:05):
A totally different outcome because they were effectively represented right
away by lawyers who knew this could go criminal, right,
so they were in their crooked So they're hardcore protecting
their kids, right, A totally different outcome. If if their
parents were like social workers and school teachers right and
just worried for their children and Mallory, it'd be a

(19:27):
totally different outcome. We'd probably get more of the truth
right away.

Speaker 1 (19:30):
Meanwhile, there was an ongoing search for Mallory Beach going on.
A massive eight day search followed the crash, involving dive teams, helicopters,
and volunteers. On March third, twenty nineteen, Mallory's body was
finally found about five miles downstream. It was wedged among
reeds in the river. Her cause of death was blunt
force trauma and drowning. On April eighteenth of twenty nineteen,

(19:53):
Paul was indicted, and I think a lot of people were,
I mean hopeful, but probably skeptical that they would actually
indict Paul Murdal just based upon the fact of who
he was, who his grandfather was, who his father was right.
You know, they're just wondering, like why this kid and mose.

Speaker 2 (20:09):
People are gonna hear the simple fact of a Murdoch
kid was riding a boat. They probably know they have
a reputation for drinking and partying and being drunk or have,
you know, going along those lines. And now Mallory's missing,
and I'm sure they spread, you know, talk about how
the dad's you know, doing this and that interfering, and
so yeah, they want him to go down.

Speaker 1 (20:30):
So Paul Murdall was indicted on three felony counts.

Speaker 2 (20:34):
Was he indicted before Mallory anything was determined on Mallory?

Speaker 1 (20:38):
He was indicted after she was found. Paul Murdau was
indicted on three felony counts boating under the influence causing
death and two counts of boating under the influence causing
great bodily injury. He pleaded not guilty and was released
on his own recognizance. Despite the severity of the charges,
Paul was never disciplined, and his family's influences over local

(21:00):
law enforcement became a major point of controversy. You know,
I know they did say he was supposed to when
he was released. I think part of his release, part
of his terms where he wasn't supposed to drink, and
then they show he was so stupid he would just
post things on social media that showed him out partying,
drinking right after being indicted for these for these crimes.

Speaker 2 (21:24):
Really, yeah, that's all documented. They have all that. Yeah,
that's funny because it's like, Okay, I'll let you go,
but you have to follow the law. It's like, well,
he didn't do it in the first place, that's why
he's in the courtroom. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (21:36):
But I mean even when you're going through something like
that and you've got three major charges against you, you've
been indicted, and you're gonna have to go. He pleaded
not guilty, so he's going to go to trial, right
unless he takes some plea deal at some point.

Speaker 2 (21:46):
Well the parents are stupid for they fuel these their kid.

Speaker 1 (21:51):
Oh yeah, yeah, I.

Speaker 2 (21:52):
Mean, Daddy probably brought him a new boat right away.

Speaker 1 (21:55):
Later on, Mallory's family filed a wrongful death lawsuit against
Buster Murdof for allegedly allowing his brother to use his
ID to buy alcohol and the Parker's Kitchen convenience store
that sold alcohol to Paul. The lawsuit placed major financial
pressure on Alex Murdall. All right, here's my thoughts because
two years later, this is in June of twenty twenty one,

(22:18):
and he hasn't gone to trial yet. So clearly the
system is slow. But not only the system is slow,
but I'm sure that they are influence on the system
being slow. So on June seventh of twenty twenty one,
so this is two years later, because the boat crash
happened in twenty nineteen, Maggie and Paul Murdall are murdered.

(22:40):
The morning of June seventh. Is the mom, this is
the mom, and the boat driver, Paul Murdall, the youngest
son driving the boat. So on the morning of June seventh,
twenty twenty one, the chief financial officer at Alex Murdall's
namesake law firm confronts him this is the morning of
the murder, confronts him about seven hundred and ninety two

(23:00):
thousand dollars and missing funds from the law firm.

Speaker 2 (23:03):
Did you take it straight from their bank account or
he took it from settlements? I think right, settlements. Well,
the way that he being paid out.

Speaker 1 (23:11):
Yeah, I mean, and the documentaries, and I mean he's
he's charged with like eventually after the murders, he's charged
with like twenty one financial crimes or something. So he's
he has a ongoing long pattern of being able to
defraud the system. And basically because he's an attorney and
they do personal injury, he has, you know, invaluable knowledge
of the inner workings of insurance and personal injury and

(23:33):
all those things. However, he uses it for evil, right,
instead of good.

Speaker 2 (23:37):
Yeah, he's too much to the inside, right.

Speaker 1 (23:40):
So, the way I understand it is there is a
a company called Forge, which is one of those financial
settlement companies, you know what I'm talking about, where you know,
you come into money, but instead of taking it as
a lump sum, those companies manage the money for you
and then pay out payments so that you don't end
up spending all your.

Speaker 2 (23:58):
Money, allows the money and it's very safe, right.

Speaker 1 (24:02):
So there was a company like that called Forge. So
the way I understand it as Alex Murdau opened a
personal banking account but called it Forge. Then he would
get his clients when they got these settlements, to deposit
the money into this account called Forge. However, it wasn't
a legitimate business that was going to pay them out
their money. It was his own, it was his own

(24:23):
personal banking account is a little druggy fund, right, And
then I don't know how he manages, but I guess,
like you said when we talked about this before, where
he would just constantly keep his clients at Bay saying
there's no settlement.

Speaker 2 (24:33):
That's almost like a pyramid scheme. So you get like,
you know, a two million dollars settlement or whatever, and
then he would be like, Okay, you're going to get like,
you know, thirty thousand a year. So he gives them
thirty thousand a year, but that's nothing. He's probably robbing
from Paul to pay Peter and doing all kinds of things.
And these people if as so long as they get
a little bit of money at a time his promise,
they think it's all legit.

Speaker 1 (24:53):
I don't know if he's paying them anything. I don't
know either, But I mean, I think for the majority
of his clients who receive settlement money and he was
depositing into his own bank account, I think he was
just telling them that they're no settlement had come in yet,
which I don't understand that thinking, because at some point
people are going to start asking.

Speaker 2 (25:11):
At some point, it's going to catch up, but he's
not thinking like that. He's a criminal. They never they
always think they're never going to get caught. Otherwise he
wouldn't commit a crime. So he's not worried about.

Speaker 1 (25:20):
That all right. Then the evening of June seventh, twenty
twenty one, this is around seven to eight thirty pm,
Maggie and Paul are at Mozelle together. Also, a lot
of people thought it was strange that Maggie the mom
was at Mozelle because a lot of people were saying
that she didn't like to be there. That's their hunting Mozell.
Mozelle's their hunting property. So they have a house.

Speaker 2 (25:40):
This is all on the same huge piece of properties.

Speaker 1 (25:43):
Well they have they have another home. Jeez, that she
would always be at, but then Mozelle was the hunting property.
The seventeen hundred acres with the dog.

Speaker 2 (25:51):
Wasn't normal for it. She wouldn't like casually go there
all the time.

Speaker 1 (25:54):
No, So she apparently he had called her that morning
or something and asked her to be there.

Speaker 2 (25:59):
The record show right, so.

Speaker 1 (26:00):
Phone records show there, So that was suspicious. Around eight
forty five this is this is the damn the most
damning piece of evidence against him. He claims that he
wasn't there, that he was at his parents' house having dinner.

Speaker 2 (26:12):
When did he make that statement to police?

Speaker 1 (26:14):
So he calls NA the crime right, So he calls
nine one one right and says, you know, I found
my son and wife murdered. And then he's like and
then when they ask him, you know, where were you
were all those questions, He's like, I wasn't here. I
was at my parents. I just came you know later
and found them like this, And he claims that he
wasn't at Mozelle all day, all evening at all until

(26:35):
he arrived to find them murdered. However, at eight forty
four pm, Paul was making a Snapchat video of himself
and the kennels with the dogs, and you can and
you can hear Alex Murdall the dad in the background of.

Speaker 2 (26:51):
The video talking inaudible or do we know what he's saying.

Speaker 1 (26:54):
I listened to it. I don't remember what he was saying, but.

Speaker 2 (26:57):
Nothing significant, just shows nothing.

Speaker 1 (26:58):
Significant, but it's clear that it's him, and it's clear
that it's his voice. Okay, the investigators claim that the
murders took place approximately between eight fifty and eight fifty
five PM. That's a very small window. That's five minutes.
I don't know how they figure figure out a five
minute timeframe, but that's.

Speaker 2 (27:14):
I don't know either. Well, the phone calls and there
might have been a lot of things that narrowed it
down the time of death, and they limited it to
so five minutes.

Speaker 1 (27:22):
So Paul was shot twice with a twelve gage shotgun.
The first shot hit his chest and shoulder. The second
fatal shot entered his head at close range, blowing off
part of his skull and brain matters.

Speaker 2 (27:36):
Dad just blew him up, yeah, like to.

Speaker 1 (27:39):
His like right up close to his head. Okay, And
I tell you this this is a little side story.
But when I posted on my Instagram a couple days
ago that we were going to talk about the murder murders,
and I posted that, a fan, someone that follows me
reached out and sent me a message and said that
they were really interested in this case and they'd followed
it the whole time, and that they actually went to

(27:59):
the Mozelle property. I don't know how they did. Yeah,
she sent me a bunch of photos of it, like
up close photos of her just like and the dog
canoles and like she posted one I don't maybe, but
she sent the photos to me and she said that
there's still brain matter like in the feeding room is
where the Paul was shot, untouched. And first of all,

(28:21):
I was thinking, is this just is this not a
crime scene anymore? It's just seventeen hundred acres out in
the middle of the low country of South Carolina where
you can just pull up and park and walk around.
And apparently, well, now I want to take a field trip.
I've already been to the Meninda's house. Now I'd like
to go to South Carolina. I want to walk on
the Mozelle property. All right. Then Maggie was shot after Paul,

(28:53):
and Maggie was shot five times with a three hundred
blackout semi automatic rifle.

Speaker 2 (28:59):
Five times in the head.

Speaker 1 (29:01):
No from behind, because she was struck while trying to flee.
She was hitting the back and the back of the head.

Speaker 2 (29:07):
So yeah, so that's probably how they determined the order too.
It's because she's running right, and Paul probably was the
position where he wasn't running right.

Speaker 1 (29:16):
I have a feeling Paul, well, Paul was probably caught
off guard. Right, he's in the kennels. He's probably like
feeding the dogs on snapchat. Right, he's not paying attention.
His dad comes up close range and shoots him right
there in the dog kennels. My, I mean, I'm just speculating.
This is all alleged, but I have a feeling that
Maggie heard the gun shot, the gunshot, came out, saw

(29:38):
what happened, and then took off and he grabbed He
used two different guns, So I can't tell if he
used two different guns.

Speaker 2 (29:46):
Because you mentioned this the other day. And he's a hunter.
Now I learned he has a hunting property, right and
a house for hunting or whatever.

Speaker 1 (29:54):
He was on tons of guns, right, Okay, But here's
my question. Do you think that the intent was to
kill the mom and the son or your son and
the mom happened to come upon.

Speaker 2 (30:06):
I think you're right. Maybe he considered it as a
possibility because Paul was in the boating accident. Paul committed
a murder by way of a boating accident. It was
going to tear the family apart in terms of the reputation,
at least as far as the dad saw it. In
what mattered to him. And so Paul was a loose cannon.
He was a loose end. He was a drunk, he

(30:29):
was a snapping all the time. He was doing all
kinds of stuff.

Speaker 1 (30:33):
Do you mean social media or do you mean like psychologically, Well, so.

Speaker 2 (30:37):
He's posting that he's drinking when he's just a mess.
They probably can't keep it under control. And also you
didn't mention it. But the older son was in law
school at the time, at the same law school that
the prior generations went, so he was carrying on the
family tradition. He was like the quote unquote smart one.
He was the one that was doing what was probably

(30:58):
expected and hoped of the parents. Paul was a drinker,
he was a menace, a partier, was always whatever whatever
was going on. And I know it sounded like they
were enabling him, right, They weren't caring for him. They
were just letting him do whatever. So he probably saw
him as less and thought, I'll kill him off. He'll
be he won't be a loose end, he won't be
convicted of murder.

Speaker 1 (31:18):
But see, but he called the mom and asked her
to come to the hunting properties, so he must have
intended to kill the kids. So now I'm changing myself.

Speaker 2 (31:25):
Because originally I thought he was going to eliminate both
of them.

Speaker 1 (31:28):
Yeah, so he and the reason she ran is because
he's only one person, so he can only shoot one
at a time, so.

Speaker 2 (31:34):
He shoots all two guns. Yeah. Yeah, So I think he.

Speaker 1 (31:39):
Had the guns positioned somewhere in the kennel hidden.

Speaker 2 (31:42):
Well, then that might be why he had two guns. Maybe,
depending on where they were, he planted two different guns.

Speaker 1 (31:47):
Yeah, and then maybe he planted the two different guns
because he was hoping it could be some type of
like story that it was a couple of people that.

Speaker 2 (31:54):
Write different people.

Speaker 1 (31:55):
Okay, the guns were never found, so that's interesting to me.
How he got rid of them so fast.

Speaker 2 (32:01):
Well, he's got a big piece of property. This is
not his first rodeo he does.

Speaker 1 (32:04):
I don't know how he did it. They did show
on the cell phone data that his phone was like
either turned off or like completely inactive for hours and
hours and hours, and then right after the murders happened,
then it showed like two hundred and eighty six like
steps like all of a sudden on his on his
cell phone.

Speaker 2 (32:21):
He turned it while he was running or something.

Speaker 1 (32:22):
I don't know either, He was like either, I don't know,
but it showed like a huge amount of activity.

Speaker 2 (32:28):
All we've turned your phone off.

Speaker 1 (32:31):
I don't turn my phone off. Nobody turns their phone off.

Speaker 2 (32:34):
At the most you reboot it. Yeah right, and you
don't even do that, but if you, you would reboot
it so it'd be off for like a minute.

Speaker 1 (32:40):
Okay. What people need to do is they need to
not turn their phone off. You just have to leave
it somewhere. You just can't have a cell phone on it.

Speaker 2 (32:46):
And put it in an uber and let it drive
around for a while, create an alibi, and then get back.
That's brilliant. Just put it.

Speaker 1 (32:52):
Put it in an uber.

Speaker 2 (32:54):
I don't know, all right, to a squirrel, let it
run around.

Speaker 1 (33:00):
Okay. Both weapons were family owned firearms, though neither gun
was ever recovered. They did during the investigation, they did
find the shell casings. They and then they claimed that
they found other shell casings on the same property that
matched those shell casings. So that was more evidence against
Alex during his trial.

Speaker 2 (33:17):
Evidence.

Speaker 1 (33:18):
So during this time period, his alibi was he claimed
that he had gone to his mother's house, who suffers
from dementia, so that's what his alibi was.

Speaker 2 (33:26):
He claimed that he was his is my mother that
doesn't remember anything, right, Trust trust me? Right.

Speaker 1 (33:30):
So then Alex calls nine to one one, sounding distraught,
while reporting that he had just returned home to find
Maggie and Paul shot near the kennel's. Deputies arrive and
find Paul well that I just arrived, ye, she says,
I just arrived right. Deputies arrive and find Paul's body
inside the feed room at the kennels, and Maggie's body

(33:51):
is about thirty feet away. Both were obviously deceased. Alex
tells the officers that he had been visiting his mother
when the murders happened. He immediately speculates that they were
tarted over Paul's boat crash case, saying, my son has
been getting threats and then they began investigating. So the
boat is really a catalyst of like the boat crash

(34:11):
of the murders. I believe because I think you're right.
I think I think Paul going on trial is a
bad thing because I think Paul knows things about his dad.
Not only does he know his drug habit.

Speaker 2 (34:25):
I talk about you, right, that Paul was probably aware
of because he was the one that was always home.
The other one's out living a normal life, right, and
he's a drunk and he's at home, right, so he
knows things.

Speaker 1 (34:36):
So we're going to get into the what happened to
Gloria Sadderfield, who is the housekeeper who had died back
in twenty eighteen, So we're gonna have to take a
little trip back in time. But Paul was there that
day when she fell, and my I'm just speculating, but
I think Paul knows what happened to Gloria Sadderfield, and
the dad knows that if Paul goes on trial, he

(34:56):
might have loose lips and start talking about things.

Speaker 2 (35:00):
And then so keep in mind, because we talked about
the boating murder, which was Mallory, and then the housekeeper
murder was.

Speaker 1 (35:08):
Well, we don't know if that's a murder. That was
never that was never breaking news. It was a murder,
it was well, it was never confirmed a murder, but
we can talk.

Speaker 2 (35:15):
About it, Okay. It was a murder like scene that
was one year before the boating accident. Yes, I mean,
that's that's right. There. You have a family that within
one year less than one year, there's two deaths, right,
one in their home and one on their boat. Right, right,

(35:36):
Let's leave it at that.

Speaker 1 (35:37):
Let's talk about Gloria Saderfield since we got into that
for a little bit. First of all, when we were
talking about the Hulu dramatization earlier, this is what I
don't like about it. And you and I were watching it,
and you picked up on it before I did. The
Hulu dramatization shows the boat crash of twenty nineteen.

Speaker 2 (35:55):
How it starts.

Speaker 1 (35:56):
That's how it starts. Then it shows several scenes in
conversations after the fact of Paul with Gloria.

Speaker 2 (36:03):
Sadderfields throughout She's a series.

Speaker 1 (36:06):
Throughout the entire thing. The problem is Gloria Sadderfield fell
down the stairs a year prior, a year prior in
twenty eighteen. So this is why I don't like this dramatization,
because it's not just like conversations where people are using
creativity to say. They put her into a into a
scenario that she wasn't around for. They have her talking

(36:27):
to Paul about the boat crash. I believe Paul takes
her car to drive to the boat crash scene. He
calls her there's all these conversations.

Speaker 2 (36:36):
She's heavily involved in this in two thousand and nine,
helping the family along during this time.

Speaker 1 (36:40):
Right, this is completely inaccurate. She was.

Speaker 2 (36:45):
There.

Speaker 1 (36:45):
I don't know why they did that either, but to me,
it illegitimizes it.

Speaker 2 (36:48):
It's like if it's like, what else is inaccurate? Right?

Speaker 1 (36:51):
If you're taking someone who died in twenty eighteen and
inserting them in scenes that took place in twenty nineteen,
then I don't find this credible anyway. That really bothers
a lot. So just warning you, I'm not a fan
of the dramatization because of that. That's just too left
field for me, that you're inserting someone into scenes that
wasn't even alive at the time. All right, let's just

(37:13):
talk about what happened with Gloria a little bit.

Speaker 2 (37:15):
So we're just going so we're going back in time.
Are you're prior to the boating murder.

Speaker 1 (37:18):
We're going to go back to twenty eighteen because I
think that makes the most sense. So Gloria Sadderfield was
the wait.

Speaker 2 (37:24):
Can I say this? Yeah, there's the boating accident, which
we talked about first. Yes, subsequent to that, there was
the mother and the son who was the boating under
the influenced kid then prior to that, so now we
have some other everything else is being highlighted like people
are going back in time highlighting the boat murder and
highlighting the housekeeper's death right and say murder, right, and

(37:47):
then the other one too.

Speaker 1 (37:49):
Right, So we're going to go back to twenty eighteen.
So Gloria Sadderfield was the Murdaw's longtime housekeeper. She allegedly
fell on the steps of the family's Mozella estate and
I remember that's their hunting law and later died from
her injuries. The Murdaws claimed she tripped over the family
dogs while walking up the steps. Gloria did not die
at the scene, but she was unable to tell anyone

(38:11):
exactly what happened before she passed due to her injuries.
I believe she spent like a week in the hospital
and was never able to fully communicate. Alex Murdau encouraged
Gloria's sons to sue him for wrongful death, claiming that
he would ensure that they received the insurance settlement. This
is really interesting to me because this is a very

(38:32):
elaborate scheme. And this is why I do not think
that this was an accident. First of all, he took
out an umbrella policy on the hunting lodge on that
property one month before her.

Speaker 2 (38:43):
Oh really, one month before he'd had another policy.

Speaker 1 (38:46):
And I'm well, I'm saying it legally it has not
been confirmed a murder, but I'm saying he took out
an insurance policy one month before she fell down the stairs. Also,
when he told investigators what happened, he made sure to

(39:07):
tell investigators that she was not there that day working
in the scope of being a housekeeper.

Speaker 2 (39:13):
Oh yeah, so that way it falls within the in policy, right,
otherwise it'd be a work comp claim exactly, doesn't pay
much at all.

Speaker 1 (39:21):
Right, He said that she was only there to pick
something up or to drop something off, not working as
a housekeeper. Also, it was found out later that the
dogs had nothing to do with her fall. That he
inserted the dogs into this whole scenario so that it
would be a property claim because it's like his dogs

(39:42):
that lived on the property caused the injury. Therefore it
would fall under these umbrella policies. So then he goes
to her sons and says, hey, I want to help
you out. Why don't you sue my estate and I'll
represent you and.

Speaker 2 (39:59):
Then you'll get you know, insurance consulting.

Speaker 1 (40:02):
Right, So then he brings on like another attorney. He's
sending letters, and some financial advisor guy too, they're in
on it as well. And then he's he's constantly on
the insurance company. He's sending them letters demanding payment with
his name on it, his own letterhead. Yes, he's representing

(40:23):
them against himself, which I don't even understand ethics.

Speaker 2 (40:26):
Against his Well, he's the policy holder. He's not suing himself.
He's suing the insurance company. But he's the policy holder, right.

Speaker 1 (40:33):
But I'm just saying that's a conflict of interest. I
don't understand how ethically you can even represent.

Speaker 2 (40:38):
You're wondering about ethics this, I no, not at all.

Speaker 1 (40:42):
The man has no ethics. I mean he's a monster,
there's no doubt about that. I'm just saying, like, why
the bar wasn't I mean, I guess this guy just
does whatever he wants, and you know, he's so used
to it. It doesn't no one's anyway. So he represents
them against himself and in his insurance policies and then
he ends up collecting over four million dollars from these

(41:03):
different I think it was four point I saw four
point and four point three, but over four tax free
takes the money again, I think he deposits it into
that account he calls like the Forge account and then
continues to tell the brother the sons that they haven't
received settlement payments.

Speaker 2 (41:21):
Yeah, like still I'm hounding them. I'm waiting, right, So
there you go.

Speaker 1 (41:27):
All I know is I know it wasn't it. It
hasn't been classified as a murder. He wasn't prosecuted for
it as a murder. But the fact that he took
out a numbrella insurance policy a month before, the fact
that she fell down the stairs and had like blunt
force trauma to her head, and that he immediately offered

(41:48):
to represent and sue. But the question is was he
there at the time, because he claims that he wasn't.

Speaker 2 (41:56):
There, It doesn't matter. He said it all up.

Speaker 1 (41:59):
But then who pushed or through her or no? But
he set it up I know anyway, Again, Paul was
definitely there and the mom was definitely there. So again
that leads me to believe that maybe that's why he
ended up murdering the mom and the brother because again
he doesn't want anything to come out about what happened
to Gloria Sadderfield, and maybe they were both loosened in
the Gloria Sadfield situations. Right, So there you go. That

(42:22):
was twenty eighteen. That was one year before the voting accident.
We'll just go back a little bit in January of
twenty twenty three. This is when his trial starts. On
February first, prosecutors play a video taken by Paul Murdall
on the night he was killed. Alex Murdall's voice can
clearly be heard in the background, contradicting his claim that
he was not at the crime scene that night. So
that was at eight forty four pm, which places him there.

(42:44):
In March of twenty twenty three, after weeks of testimony,
jurors deliberated for less than three hours before returning guilty
verdicts on all four charges. Murdall was facing two counts
of murder and two counts of possession of a weapon
and the commission of a violent crime. He is sentenced
the next day to life in prison. Now this has
happened recently in twenty twenty five. In May fourteenth of

(43:06):
twenty twenty five, the former Colton County Clerk of court.
That was a lot of That was a lot of sees.

Speaker 2 (43:12):
Do you hear that?

Speaker 1 (43:13):
Colton County Clerk of court. Her name is Becky Hill.
She is arrested and charged with obstructing justice and two
counts of misconduct and one count of perjury related to
Alex Murdaw's murder trial. She was the clerk of court
at the time, but she was writing a book about
the criminal trial, and she was also making inappropriate comments

(43:37):
to jurors to persuade them to find a guilty verdict.
So the question is, right, what's the legal standard? Was
what she did? Would that have altered the outcome?

Speaker 2 (43:50):
Right?

Speaker 1 (43:51):
The South Carolina Law Enforcement Division they call it SLED.
SLED had been investigating her over allegations of jury tampering
in the trial well and Murdaw's legal team requested a
new trial based on those allegations. The trial court denied
it at the time. However, this is where we're at currently,
This is twenty twenty five. This is where we're at
with his life sentenced and his conviction. His defense attorneys

(44:17):
appealed to the South Carolina Supreme Court. Both sides issued briefs,
and now it is currently they took on the case
and now it's currently with the South Carolina Supreme Court
to decide whether he's entitled to a new trial based
upon her being found guilty of jury tampering and persuading
the jury. So that's in limbo right now. It's with

(44:41):
the South Carolina Supreme Court, and there is no deadline.
They don't have a deadline.

Speaker 2 (44:45):
They can just decide to look at it. Look, they
can look at.

Speaker 1 (44:49):
It when they want to look at it, and they
can schedule the worlds.

Speaker 2 (44:51):
Let him serve twenty years first, then we'll look at it. Right.

Speaker 1 (44:54):
The next step if they move forward at all with
this would be to schedule or oral arguments for both sides.
So basically, either they'll ignore it and let it just
go on and on and on and not do anything
about it, where they will schedule oral arguments. But right
now his case is with the South Carolina Supreme Court.
So that's where we're at with that. All Right, one

(45:22):
last death on going further back, right, going even further
back now we're going to go back to twenty fifteen.
Is the death of Steven Smith, which occurred on July
eighth of two thoy and fifteen. Now, his death was
just immediately ruled a hit and run. He was found
dead in the on the kind of in the middle

(45:44):
of the road actually with like blunt force trauma to
his head. But there were many people that believed it
wasn't a hit and run because I guess there were
no skid marks on the you know, on the road,
and his shoes were still intact.

Speaker 2 (45:57):
Which I hit and run with those skid marks. Yeah, Well,
they were.

Speaker 1 (46:00):
Saying that it didn't look like a typical hit and
run looks like and I guess because he still had
his shoes on. I didn't know this. I'd never heard
this before, but I guess when people are hit with
high velocity impact they take their shoes, but their shoes
come off. I guess that's a common thing. But anyway,
his shoes key boots fell off.

Speaker 2 (46:17):
Once when I got hit by another skier. Oh really,
the same thing, Yeah, yeah, actually skis Yeah yeah, they
hit your out fast, very hard, knocked out of me. Yeah,
and your ski boots flew off. No, I flew out
of the ski boots all the ski boots down the hill. Yes,
they were still they were fine.

Speaker 1 (46:34):
Yeah, you just went out of them, yes, all right.
So Stephen Smith was a nineteen year old nursing student
who was found dead in the middle of a rural
road in Hampton County, South Carolina. This again was back
in twenty fifteen. Steven's body had severe head trauma, but
no vehicular debris was found, and his loose fitting shoes
still remained on his feet. South Carolina Law Enforcement Division

(46:56):
initially declines the case and defers it to the Highway Patrol,
saying that it's a hit and run, even though despite
there being suspicious circumstances, the official determination leans toward hit
and run. Then, for a year or so, the investigation
stalls unfounded. Rumors circulate that Buster Murdall may be connected
to the case, as his name appears multiple times in

(47:18):
investigative notes. So while they're investigating this, they're talking to
like a bunch of kids, right because this guy, this
kid's young. So there, and it shows in the documentary
there's a lot of recorded conversations with these kids in
the area, and they're all bringing up Buster Murdall's name.
I heard it was Buster. I heard it was Buster.
I heard Buster and this kid, Stephen Smith, who was gay.

Speaker 2 (47:42):
Buster was the older son, right right.

Speaker 1 (47:44):
But this is back in twenty fifteen, so he's not
in law school yet. But people were saying that they
had heard rumors that, you know, Buster was allegedly involved
with him romantically, and you know, maybe that was the
intent to you know, I don't know. No one is
charged in the Smith family believe Stephen was murdered and
that the investigation was influenced or mishandled. Now they reopened

(48:06):
the case after the murders of Maggie and Paul because
while they are investigating the murders of Maggie and Paul,
something comes up during this investigation that leads them back
to Steven Smith. I don't know what they've I've never
seen anywhere where they've elaborated on that.

Speaker 2 (48:22):
Well, probably just the fact that there's murders all around
this family. I don't want to look into all of them.

Speaker 1 (48:27):
I don't think that's it. I think that there's specific details.
Something comes up during the investigation that leads them back
because they exoom the body.

Speaker 2 (48:34):
Oh, because at the time of that hit and run
or whatever it was, the murdocks were not well witnesses.
This reference buster. But that's as far as it got.

Speaker 1 (48:43):
Yeah, there were just kids saying they heard rumors. Right,
So they're talking and this is back in twenty fifteen.
This is prior to all these other killings.

Speaker 2 (48:51):
So for whatever reason that connection was made, whether it
was those witness statements.

Speaker 1 (48:55):
Right. So then in twenty twenty one, when they are
investigating the murders of Maggie and Paul, there is evidence
that comes forward that leads them back to the Stephen
Smith hit and run or murder, whatever you want to
call it, and they reopen the case and they actually
exhume his body.

Speaker 2 (49:12):
Is that for a job title body bodies? I can't.

Speaker 1 (49:17):
I you know what, every time I read something that
a body was exhumed, like years later, I'm like, who
is the person that opens the casket? That's what I
want to know? Who does that?

Speaker 2 (49:24):
I don't know?

Speaker 1 (49:24):
Would you ever want to be that person?

Speaker 2 (49:26):
No?

Speaker 1 (49:27):
Me neither, because first of all, I don't even know,
Like what are you gonna find? I don't like you
open it? What's in there?

Speaker 2 (49:34):
I know?

Speaker 1 (49:35):
But I mean, what's it gonna look like? Like?

Speaker 2 (49:39):
How much botox and fillery.

Speaker 1 (49:40):
Out if anybody wants to exhume my body, I'm just
gonna look just like this. So Sled releases a statement
confirming Steven Smith's death is being investigated as a homicide,
not a hit and run. This comes after forensic review
and pressure from Smith's family and their legal team. The
Smith family raises money to exzoom Steven's body for an

(50:01):
independent autopsy. Doctor Aaron Presnell. Original autopsy from twenty fifteen
is heavily scrutinized for ruling blunt force head trauma as
caused by the vehicle impact. So Then, in April of
twenty twenty three, after the body was exhumed, a second
autopsy is performed. The findings are not publicly publicly released,

(50:23):
but reinforce foul play. Then in July of twenty twenty five,
this is the most recent thing I could find. I
don't think that Buster Murdall was involved in this. I
think that this family is so prominent, and everybody knows
their names, and everybody knows Buster Murdall, and everybody knows
Paul Murdall, and these have bad reputations and they get

(50:45):
away with everything. I think it was I think it
was just a rumor mill that spread naming Buster probably
the right something like that, like that was kind of
the five. So now the there's two persons of interest.
They haven't been charged with any but there was a
guy named Patrick Wilson and another guy named Sean Connolly
have been repeatedly discussed in nationwide reporting regarding this murder case.

(51:07):
A confidential source close to Patrick Wilson provided an exclusive
first hand account detailing Wilson's confession the day Steven Smith died.
Patrick reportedly told the source, I think we hit somebody.
I think we killed someone before vomiting multiple times. I
think they were out driving. I think this is just
me speculating. I don't know, but I think they were driving,

(51:27):
probably driving fast, maybe they were driving drunk. And then
I think the mirror on the side of a big
truck maybe hit him in the head and that's what
caused the blunt force trauma. But this interview and all
other interviews pertaining to Steven Smith have been handed over
to SLED and no one has officially been convicted yet.
That was the most recent article I could find. This
is July of twenty twenty five, so we don't know

(51:50):
what's going on. There obviously haven't released any information, and
we'll see what happens with Steven Smith. So we'll just
continue to follow that to see if anything else comes out.

Speaker 2 (52:00):
Okay, so this has never really been tied to it, then, no,
there was just I think that I think.

Speaker 1 (52:05):
The actual investigation was clouded by the rumors that it
was Buster murdaal and I think he I don't think
he had anything to do with that.

Speaker 2 (52:12):
Sum Up, we have the house keeper two thousand and
eight fell down the stairs. Yes, and he helped her
children sue his insurance company and gave them nothing and
kept it all right. And then there's a boating murder
in twenty nineteen. He does everything he can to help
cover it up, including killing his son and wife.

Speaker 1 (52:33):
Well, we don't know if that's the reason. We're just speculating,
but yes, in twenty twenty one, what it was, well
it changed.

Speaker 2 (52:41):
I mean, come on, it's confenced.

Speaker 1 (52:43):
That's why. That's the reason.

Speaker 2 (52:45):
Wait, he had an opioid addiction, that that's where a
lot of the money was.

Speaker 1 (52:49):
Well you know what, yeah, well you know what I
read and I don't even understand this. I read that
he said in an interview that he was spending close
to fifty thousand dollars a week on opioids. How is
that possible?

Speaker 2 (52:59):
Because his joy dealer knows he has money, and he
probably charges him a premium. He was paying whatever it took.
That dealer knew he was hooked and he had money,
but it doesn't matter. It was a lot of drugs
and that guy was burning a lot of money and
taking them. Yeah, he's probably taking him every hour at
that rate.

Speaker 1 (53:17):
I mean, that's insane. Fifty thousand dollars a week, yeah,
I know, on a drug habit. Yeah, I mean his
drug dealer's got to be like driving around in a
he's still trying cases, like he's still like functioning. All right,
There's one more thing that we have to talk about.
This man is so whacked but so good at defrauding

(53:38):
insurance companies that he has another attempt to defraud an
insurance company by coming up with a scheme. This is
in twenty twenty one, where he's going to He is
so his drug dealer, who's also like a distant cousin
of his. They call him cousin Eddie. I guess they
can cock some plan where Alex Murdall is going to

(53:59):
be on the side of the road and has like
a flat tire or something, and then the cousin's supposed
to come along and shoot him in the head, which
would be a murder. So then that Buster Murdoch can
collect ten million dollars in insurance money.

Speaker 2 (54:13):
So this was the way he wanted to kill himself
because of his drug addiction or something.

Speaker 1 (54:16):
Well, I don't I don't know. Did he get shot, yeah,
but we I still don't know if he shot himself
or if Eddie shot him. Because shot in the head, yeah,
but it didn't it didn't go through like a skull
or anything. It was a surface, superficial shot that has
kind of grazed. So and it's still unknown to me.
I don't know. I tried to find it out, but

(54:37):
I can't really tell what exactly happened, whether he shot
himself or whether cousin Eddie shot him. But on September
fourth of twenty twenty one, Alex Murdoch calls nine to
one one and reports that he was shot while on
the side of the road fixing a flat tire. He
was taken to a hospital where he was treated for
a superficial gunshot wound to the head. Court documents alleged

(54:59):
that Murdaw's roadside shooting was part of an arrangement in
which he hired someone to kill him so that his
surviving son, Buster, could collect a life insurance payout of
about ten million dollars. I tell you, that's where you
are so.

Speaker 2 (55:15):
Crazy, Wow, while he was committing suicide, right, well, we
believe one possible scenario was he was trying to commit
suicide but by way of staging it as a murder, Yeah,
to collect insurance.

Speaker 1 (55:30):
Fun So he stages this suicide attempt or murder or
whatever you want to call it. This is after he
murdered his wife and son and is about to go
on trial, so maybe that was his way of avoiding trial.
He was like, I'm just gonna like, I'm gonna have
this guy shoot me in the head and take me out,
and I'm gonna leave Buster ten million dollars.

Speaker 2 (55:51):
Fifty thousand dollars worth of opioids while I'm in prison.
He can't, Yeah, right, How am I going to scam
people out of their lawsuits? I can't? Right?

Speaker 1 (55:59):
Then, Curtis Edward Smith, who is a cousin of Alex
the guy they call cousin Eddie is the one who
allegedly shot him. Many thought Curtis was Alex's drug dealer
and co conspirator in the shady business deals and money schemes.
So in June, this is a crazy timeline. This guy
is just like busy where he's busy. This man is
a busy man. I wonder he has to take so
many opioids in order to be able to wake up

(56:20):
every day, get defraud everybody that he's defrauding, and kill his.

Speaker 2 (56:24):
Family anyone that is getting in his way.

Speaker 1 (56:27):
He's got to take fifty thousand dollars a week in
opioids to be able to do all of that. So
this is June of twenty twenty two where he's indicted
on the two counts of criminal conspiracy. That's to get
the ten million dollars in life insurance funds for Buster.
Then in July of twenty twenty two, that's when he's
indicted on two counts of murder for his son and
his wife, and the two weapons counts in connection with

(56:48):
those twenty twenty one killings. All right, so let's talk
about where Buster Murda is currently. He's the only remaining
son He's not only is he the only remaining son,
he's the only remaining.

Speaker 2 (57:00):
Bird Dog family, right, the only offspring left.

Speaker 1 (57:03):
So Buster went from being a member of one of
South Carolina's most well known families to living a life
in near isolation, cutting off contact from most of his
social circle following his mother and brother's deaths. He really
withdrew after everything happened, a former college roommate told People
Magazine in twenty twenty two. He has really closed off
and built walls around himself. I mean, I don't blame

(57:23):
the guy. Can you imagine. I mean, oh, your mother's murdered,
your brother's murdered, your dad goes on trial for murdering
your mom and your brother. You're implicated, and this all
this crime against I'm.

Speaker 2 (57:36):
Not going to hire you that you had all these
hopes for you, Like I'm going to work with my
dad's law firm, Pimped And then they don't want to
hire you. They're like, no, thank you.

Speaker 1 (57:44):
So Buster has never returned to Mozelle or his family's
beach house on a Deesto Island, where his mother was
staying before her death. He also avoids his hometown of Hampton.
He claims, I get stopped and yelled at all the time.
I got cussed at in a gas station the other day,
Buster told his father in a taped jailhouse phone call.
To escape, Buster moved into his girlfriend, Brooklyn White, South

(58:06):
Carolina condo. The longtime couple went on to purchase a
home together in bluffed in, South Carolina in May of
twenty twenty three. Does Buster believe his dad?

Speaker 2 (58:16):
He does that.

Speaker 1 (58:17):
I thought that was crazy, but maybe he needs to.
I mean, he believes that his dad's innocent, and the
murders of his.

Speaker 2 (58:22):
Mom, well, if Rouster was familiar with the other murders
and that shady stuff was going in the family, then
maybe he's just, you know, complying and being part of
it to cover up.

Speaker 1 (58:32):
Buster has stood by his father, maintaining his innocence during
and after his trial. In an interview with Fox Nation
in August of twenty twenty three, Buster doubled down on
his stands that his father was innocent and did not
belong in prison. I do not think that he could
be affiliated with endangering my mother and brother. We have
been here for a while now and that's been my stance.
Buster added that he believed his father's trial was not

(58:54):
fair and that pre trial publicity led the jury to
form predetermined opinions about him. I think that I told
a very unique perspective that nobody else in the courtroom
ever held. And I know the love that I have witness,
Buster said, referencing his father's loving relationship with his family.
Buster also told Fox Nation that he believes the killer
is still on the loose and that his safety is

(59:15):
at risk as a result. I think I set myself
up to be safe, but yes, when I go to
bed at night, I have a fear that there is
somebody that is still out there, he shared.

Speaker 2 (59:22):
How could that be? I mean the simple fact that
he the dad calls nine one one and tells the
police I arrived and they were murdered. Yeah, and then
there's snap video, right, which is time stamps of him
talking in a casual tone prior to the him being murdered. Right.

Speaker 1 (59:43):
You know, I don't know. That's why I was saying,
do you think it's a psychological thing? Where because his
mother is now dead and his brother is dead, and
he has no one else in the world, maybe psychologically
he needs to believe that maybe Dad's.

Speaker 2 (59:54):
Silence Dad's still controlling everything, and I mean, really, what
he needs to do is if he could get all
the properties, sell them all and go move to some
other town and start over.

Speaker 1 (01:00:05):
You know. Also, Buster was kicked out of law school,
so he never graduated from law school. I guess he
was kicked out for plagiarizing, so he did not finish
law school. And also I do know that he currently
has lawsuits I believe against Netflix and Hulu and maybe
some other media outlets because he claims that they defamed
him by alleging that he was involved in Steven Smith's

(01:00:29):
murder in twenty fifteen, and that that's ruined his reputation
that he had nothing to do with it, that he
wasn't involved, and so we'll see what happens with that
as well. That's tricky because they did play actual recorded
interviews with people where they say that it was a
rumor and they heard that it was Buster. But they

(01:00:50):
played multiple interviews of people alleging that it was Buster.
And the question is is that considered defamation or is
that an opinion or.

Speaker 2 (01:01:02):
Is that it depends on how they word. Yeah. So
with that said, everything I said earlier was alleged is.

Speaker 1 (01:01:11):
That your caveat at the end.

Speaker 2 (01:01:12):
Sorry buster.

Speaker 1 (01:01:13):
Okay, we have now come to the conclusion of the
twisted and crazy tale of Alex Murda and the murder murders.

Speaker 2 (01:01:22):
So if you have anything to add to that, any
more murders that come up in the South Carolina area
that might be tied to murder, make sure.

Speaker 1 (01:01:32):
You do me and let me know. Also, I feel
like we should plan I llegally Brunette field trip to
the Low Country of South Carolina, because apparently you can
just walk onto the Lozell property and just walk around,
take a look and take photos like it's an amusement park.
So see that you don't want to see that? I would?
I do?

Speaker 2 (01:01:48):
You don't even we go to universities and you won't
go to a fake hanted house and you're gonna go
see like a real place where someone was murdered and
brain manners splattered everywhere.

Speaker 1 (01:01:56):
That I'm fine with. Yeah, I don't like makes you
I'm absolutely fine with. All right. Thanks guys for listening
to legally Brunette. We appreciate it, and as always, we
have moved over to our own feed, so please make
sure that you follow us there and listen to our
episodes there, so thank you so much for listening. We
appreciate it. Bye.
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