Major Update on Alex Murdaugh’s Juror’s Battle to Make His Firing Public

The state of South Carolina and Alex Murdaugh’s legal team responded Monday to a juror’s ongoing battle to release records of his dismissal.

Murdaugh, a former South Carolina attorney, was convicted of two counts of murder last year. The 56-year-old allegedly shot and killed his 52-year-old wife, Maggie, and 22-year-old son, Paul, at their home in 2021.

He was sentenced to two consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole. He is also serving a 40-year sentence for federal financial crimes to which he pleaded guilty.

Last month, the South Carolina Supreme Court agreed to hear an appeal filed by Murdaugh’s attorneys, who accused the jury of rigging the original trial. The attorneys say 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 motion to release the record of her dismissal from the jury.

Crosby rose to fame during the first trial after being fired just hours before deliberations began, after hearing six weeks of testimony in the case. Hill reportedly told Judge Clifton Newman, who presided over the original trial, that Crosby’s ex-husband had posted a message on Facebook about the trial.

Hill claimed that ex-husband Tim Stone posted that he had been drinking with his ex-wife when she drunkenly expressed her opinion on Murdaugh’s innocence or guilt.

Crosby denied Hill’s allegations and said she had not seen her ex-husband in 10 years.

Hill allegedly told Crosby that she spoke to Stone at his home and he allegedly admitted to posting the message.

Stone later denied making the post in a sworn statement to Murdaugh’s lawyers.

On Monday, the attorney general’s office filed a response opposing Crosby’s motion to release documents related to her firing. The attorney general’s office argued that Crosby’s attorney signed a consent order, which states that she and her attorney cannot “further publish or disseminate” documents related to her firing.

“Although the applicant claims to have changed her mind about the agreement she reached with the court in November 2023, the State has not changed its position,” the attorney general’s office wrote.

Murdaugh’s attorneys did not take a position on the juror’s request in their response, but they commented on “the critical importance of public access to court proceedings.”

“The financial crimes confessed to by appellant Richard Alexander Murdaugh likely could not have occurred in the context of full public access to the relevant court proceedings,” his attorneys wrote. “Appellant himself then became the victim of covert misconduct in a Lowcountry courtroom when the court clerk engaged in covert jury manipulation for personal gain during his murder trial.”

Who is Alex Murdaugh?

Alex Murdaugh is a member of a prominent law family in the Lowcountry region of South Carolina.

His father, grandfather and great-grandfather were all attorneys in the 14th Judicial Circuit. Murdaugh worked as an attorney in the local district attorney’s office and in his own law firm.

Murdaugh allegedly shot his wife and son multiple times in the head, wrists and chest with different weapons on June 7, 2021. He then called authorities and claimed to have found their bodies. He was later identified as a person of interest.

Murdaugh was arrested in July 2022.

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