The Murdaugh Murders (podcast)

#127

The prosecution cross exam of the defense's first expert witness was a disaster for the prosecution. At one point he gained a MAJOR concession from the expert after getting him to answer over and over and over again "no" to questions designed to ascertain whether he really was the correct kind of expert to be opining in this case. The prosecutor should have immediately sat down after that. He had that expert looking like his testimony was worthless.

But, alas, he decided to show that he knows more about physics than a mechanical engineer with an expertise in materials science. It went about as well as you can imagine.

Even after sitting in the courtroom throughout the entire testimony, Buster seemed to be unable at times to figure out how to answer a question in the way that would best help his father. The cross exam of Buster did not go into questions about his being thrown out of law school due to plagiarism.

#128

Oh my! A defense witness said "the man I THOUGHT I knew" during his answer to the question about how his relationship with Paul and Maggie appeared to me. That is not good for the defense.

He's admitting he knew nothing about the opioids or money issues.

Under cross exam - defense witness admitting that Alex showed no concern for the safety of himself or Buster after his wife and other son were killed. This is the "head" prosecutor, I hope he has better judgement about when to quit than the one yesterday. Yesterday cross exam of the expert starting out so good and turned into a disaster. Any juror that already knows they want to find him "not guilty" will be able to hang their hat on yesterday's expert and not even have to worry about anything else. That is bad.

#129

Holy moly. That same defense witness, when answering questions about how accommodating and respectful the police were during the investigation of Murdaugh answered that "looking back, they were probably TOO much". Wow.

He said one of the investigators offered to take off her gun and identification, etc. These questions as to how "hands off" the investigators were being came after this witness was used to point out to the jury that the Murdaugh family was very powerful in the county. He said Alex kept his "part time solicitor badge" on the dashboard of his car.

The look on the faces of every person at the defense table is something along the lines of "holy fuck, why the hell did we get this guy on the witness stand". OMG he just called Alex "very, very cunning"!!!!

#130

"He wasn't a very good rule follower". This is a defense witness saying these things about Alex. He put his kid's tuition on the company credit card. The kid who was kicked out of law school.

#131

This same witness is telling the jury exactly the story that fits what the prosecutor has been saying all along. The killings stopped all of Alex' other problems as everyone at his law firm rallied around him. This is after the firm already knows that Alex had stolen from them. So, the murders did help buy Alex time that he needed to try to get some money together to keep his deceptions at bay.

#132

I forgot to mention that first thing before the jury was brought in, the defense wanted the prosecution to be limited as to what they could ask Alex if he takes the witness stand. The judge said he would not entertain any such thing, at least at this time.

#133

Oh shit. Now the defense witness is testifying about more than $300,000 from one of his best friends. Ouch.

I should have mentioned - this defense witness is one of the partners in the law firm. This current testimony is coming in as the prosecution is going over some of the money that Alex stole from clients, and the firm is STILL working on paying some of them back. The prosecution is not going over every single one of them, but concentrating on the ones that Alex was actually friends with, including some law enforcement. One had cancer and another was seriously injured in a car accident.

He apparently bought Moselle from stolen money.

I wonder if the defense will think twice about calling any of the other law partners.

Ok, now the prosecution is getting back to asking questions surrounding the killings. Oh wow He's pointing out that after the bodies were taken away, he went out because he was trying to arrange for a company to clean up the scene. And he got blood on himself. This is important because Alex made the same statement on three interviews spanning three months. He claimed that he tried to turn Paul's body over "a couple of times". And he didn't have any blood on himself and the clothing he was wearing when the police arrived also had no blood. And this guy was trying to be careful as he could be and could not even check the area for what needed to be done without getting blood on him.

#134

Re-direct. The witness says they are still working on paying everything off. The law firm is out a lot of money, the partners had to pony money out of their own pockets. All cases are owned by the law firm, the defense is trying to get this witness to say that money was coming in "from Alex".

The defense attorney is pointing out that this witness was subpoenaed to testify in the murder case. Trying to make light of all the financial stuff. I get they need to do that, he's not yet on trial for the financial crimes.

I don't know how the defense is going to turn this guy back into a defense witness. He has helped the prosecution quite a bit.

He is helping the defense in terms of agreeing that Paul left a gun over at his place one time. And that Alex also left one there. The defense is playing heavily on trying to make the jury believe that BOTH of Paul's 300 blackouts were stolen. But one of Paul's friends put that very gun in Paul's hands within a month of the murders. And he said Paul didn't really use that gun because it didn't have the thermal scope. He liked to use the blackout mostly for hunting hogs at night, and used his brother's blackout for that because his brother's blackout had a thermal scope, as did Paul's original blackout.

I forgot to mention, Buster claimed no knowledge of Paul's blackout being replaced. The defense is trying to show it either never was purchased or it was also lost. The man who modified and sold them the gun says he sold them three guns, the third was a replacement for Paul's original lost gun. And Paul's friends knew about the replacement as well.

#135

Now the defense is putting on the attorney who is currently representing him in the boat case. I thought that case went by the wayside after the murders of Paul and Maggie.

He is being asked about his opinion of the merits of the case against Alex. He's saying he doesn't think "bad parenting" or letting him use the boat could hold him liable any more than any of the parents of any of the other kids in the boat. In the Low Country HBO special the kids said that Alex came to each of their hospital rooms and advised them all to say they did not know who was driving the boat when it hit the bridge pilings. He pretended to be looking out for their best interests, but it soon became apparent that he was trying to clear Paul and trying to pin the blame on Conner. Conner's father had been Alex' personal friend for a number of years.

#136

I think I see the point if this defense witness. He was called to help defend Alex on the boat case. He's basically painting a picture that there really wasn't any reason that Alex should be concerned about that case. But....I think the prosecutor will have one big question - What date were you hired on the defense team? Because all fo the testimony so far was that Alex was pretty concerned about the boat case. He was trying to hide money and his partners were very concerned about that.

The prosecutor asked when this attorney filed his notice of appearance. It was just a couple weeks prior to the shooting of Paul and Maggie. He wasn't really fully on the team at that point. They are arguing about the motion to compel and that he would not have had to produce all his financials on that day. But it would have started the process of Alex having to produce all the documentation of his finances.

Also, he had found out that morning that the law firm was starting to catch on to his financial shenanigans. I would think he was under a lot of pressure at that point.

#137

Next witness Kenneth Xerci. He lives in Connecticut, he is a forensic scientist. He's on staff as an adjunct professor of forensic science at some college, I missed the name.

He's super old, seems to have good background, not nearly as impressive as the prosecution's forensic expert though. Ah, he is here to talk about tire tracks, I suspect.

#138

This witness also is being asked about footwear. The defense is trying to say that whoever shot Maggie also stepped on her. But the prosecution put on a witness that was quite convincing about the small piece of mud that was briefly on Maggie's calf was from the ATV which was behind her. She deposited blood on the ATV and she picked up a small amount of mud from the tire. he was able to show the print on the mud matched the tire tread pattern.

This witness is here to basically say that SLED did not do a good job of taking photos at the scene. That is a fair point. The defense is throwing lots of spaghetti at wall, including that SLED did a lousy investigation.

I don't think they did a "lousy" investigation. But, I do think that very early in the investigation they were far too deferential to Alex, I believe based on the relationship he had with local authorities who took way too long to recuse themselves from the investigation. And that is going to help the defense for sure.

pjhimself · #139

Does he testify ? (Curious conversation with the judge)

pjhimself · #140

This is a news report on a supposed Netflix report to air soon.
It’s not evidence so the jury can’t consider it but it’s rather revealing about the accused.

#141

pjhimself wrote: ↑Wed Feb 22, 2023 1:47 pm Does he testify ? (Curious conversation with the judge)

yeah, this is what I mentioned in one of my posts. The defense wants the judge to limit what Alex can be asked by the prosecution. I don't think they are going to get their way. I will be stunned if he really does testify. I think the prosecutor will eat his lunch if he does.

#142

pjhimself wrote: ↑Wed Feb 22, 2023 3:43 pm This is a news report on a supposed Netflix report to air soon.
It’s not evidence so the jury can’t consider it but it’s rather revealing about the accused.

I think they are talking about the Netflix documentary, which drops today. There is already an HBO Max documentary, in three parts. I have watched that one. The Murdaughs are basically like the freaking mafai and apparently have been for 100 years. According to many residents of Hampton, that is.

#143

The defense is putting on another "digital photography" forensic investigator to say the photos taken at the scene were "adequate" but not great. OK, the jury has already heard that.

I forgot to mention one of the things that his former law partner said. He told the jury that Alex story of what he did when he arrived at the crime scene was different than the eventual story he went with when he gave three statements to investigators. Oops.

#144

Why in the hell did Murdaugh's law partner drive to Moselle? Nosy! Nosy! Lawyers are NOSY!

I did like his remarks that Murdaugh was"cunning" in his theft of property.

Also, to, regarding motive, how many times has drug fueled debt been the motive to murder someone to get the life insurance money? (I have counted all my fingers and toes and started on the hairs on my head.) When a person is a long time druggie, he doesn't solve problems like a rational person would.

This case is simple. Drugged out, debted up to the hilt, lying liar who lies, cunning malignant narcissist Alex Murdaugh killed Maggie and Paul.

#145

I agree, I don't have any doubt that he did it. The more I learn about that family the more I understand that going back several generations the Murdaughs believed they were above the law. There have been five deaths associated with that family within a six year period. Watching the documentaries about them, people who were friendly with them all talk abut them as being very dangerous, they will shove anyone under the bus in order to keep themselves from suffering consequences.

I think at some point Alex had treated so many acquaintances and friends in such a shabby manner, he just became such a narcissist I think it was inevitable that he could turn that same attitude toward his own wife and son. According to the family friends Buster was the favored son and Paul was kind of neglected.

It was clear that Paul and his mother had found a bag full of Alex' drugs. Maggie had done research on Google trying to figure out what they were by entering the description and markings on the pills. Paul was a thorn in his side regarding the drugs, he was always getting into some kind of trouble or other, and the boat case clearly made Alex feel vulnerable enough that people around him described that he was constantly talking about it, trying to figure out how to hide his assets, etc. Addicts are capable of doing anything, I think he killed Paul and Maggie. The circumstantial evidence is just overwhelming and it's a stretch to believe someone else did it, but all these circumstances are still pointing to Alex.

pjhimself · #146

#147

This guy does some nice, relatively short takes on popular cases. Well spoken and gets right to the point, he's good to follow if you like to be informed on the big cases and don't have time to listen to long winded love to hear myself speak kind of yourubers. He's debunking the defense expert opinion that Maggie's shooter had to be 5 ft 2 inch tall.

#148

pjhimself wrote: ↑Thu Feb 23, 2023 12:52 am

Good discussion here. Harpootlian cannot possibly be as dumb as he is sometimes attempting to come across in this case. Most of his fumbling is confined to when the jury is present, ostensibly in order to show the jury he's a poor outmatched David taking on the big bad government Goliath. But for a former prosecutor to ask the judge to limit what questions can be asked of his client if he takes the stand? Oh boy. Either he is under the misapprehension that this is one of the probably dozens of judges who will bend over backward because of who Alex is (like the judge in his son's boat case, for instance_ or he is just using this question so show the wider world that Alex really wants to take the stand, but just can't because the government will be so unfair to him.

#149

I just thought of something I hadn't mentioned.

Mark Ball is the lawyer who was a former partner of Alex. He was one of the first to arrive on the scene getting there before SLED investigators got there. So, the only officials yet on the scene were the police and EMT who first arrived.

He was being questioned on direct exam to show how upset Alex was and describing conversation they had. He said Alex was "falling apart" and nearly suffocated him when he hugged him. And Alex said "look what THEY did". I think that was a major slip of the tongue. So, prior to any actual investigation, Alex had independent knowledge that two guns were used. I hope the prosecution follows up on this and make sure they indicate at what point SLED agents told Alex that two different guns were used.

The reason the defense is so gung ho to get people to say that Alex was always saying 'they" is because it seemed as though later during one of the interviews he made a statement that sounds very much like he said "It's so bad, I did him so bad", when they were talking specifically about Paul. So the defense is trying to get as many witnesses as possible to prove that he is really saying "It's so bad, they did him so bad". I can't remember if that was the first or second interview where he makes that apparent slip, but regardless of whether he slipped and said "I" or said "they" during the interview, it seems he already knew two guns were used before SLED ever had a chance to start collecting evidence and making any determination as to what happened. The defense may end up being sorry they keep following through on "I" and "they".

#150

Murdaugh going to take the stand apparently.

I guess he doesn't have much to lose. The only thing the defense has shown is less than perfect photos and too many people allowed at the scene. One of their experts opined that Maggie's shooter had to be 5'2" tall, the prosecution has an expert that is far more qualified than either of the experts put on by the defense, and he will obliterate that testimony I'm sure.

The only other thing is they had some cell phone expert talking about Maggies' phone. That is the one that Alex picked up and then threw out the window as he was leaving the Moselle property. I cannot for the life of me remember what my thoughts were on why he did that, but at one point during the testimony I had an epiphany about that. But I don't get nearly enough sleep these days and I just can't remember why I thought "no wonder he threw that phone out the window". At any rate, the expert used a phone with a different operating system to try to show slightly different functionality than what SLED expert testified to, and I don't think it's enough to get around the huge amount of evidence pointing to Alex Murdaugh.