US lawyer Alex Murdaugh appeals murder conviction and life sentence
- Murdaugh, head of an elite family of judges and lawyers in South Carolina, was convicted and sentenced last week for killing his wife and son
- Murdaugh’s trial has raised questions about two other deaths possibly tied to the lawyer’s family
Despite the lack of concrete evidence such as a murder weapon or DNA showing he shot his son Paul and wife Maggie at their hunting estate on June 7, 2021, it took a jury only a few hours to convict him.
Evidence from his son’s mobile phone indicated Murdaugh, 54, was the only person with them at the estate’s hunting dog kennels several minutes before Maggie was killed with an assault rifle and Paul with a shotgun.
One day after the jury ruled, the judge sentenced Murdaugh to two consecutive life sentences, without parole.
Just ahead of the sentencing, the lawyer who made a fortune suing companies but also stole millions from his law firm to feed an opioid habit, denied he had killed his wife and son.
“I’m innocent. I would never hurt my wife Maggie. And I would never hurt my son Paw Paw,” he said, using his son’s nickname.
“It might not have been you,” the judge responded. “It might have been the monster you become when you take 15, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60 opioid pills.”
The twists and turns of the case focused on a family which the judge said “controlled justice” in the South Carolina coastal lowlands for generations.
The trial delved deeply into the culture of hunting wild pigs and other wildlife in the area, Murdaugh’s admitted theft of huge sums from clients including poor families, and raised questions about two other deaths possibly tied to the Murdaugh family.
One such death in question is that of the family’s former housekeeper, Gloria Satterfield.
Satterfield’s son, Tony Satterfield, is calling for his mother’s body to be exhumed. She died in 2018 what the Murdaughs said was a “trip and fall” accident.
In a recent interview on NewsNation, Tony Satterfield said that he does not think his mother was killed, but wants to “see if there’s any foul play.”
Gloria Satterfield worked for the family for more than 20 years before she died in February 2018. She was 57.
Maggie Murdaugh was the one who reported Satterfield’s fall to police, according to Seattle, Washington television station KIRO 7. Maggie Murdaugh and her son Paul were the only witnesses at the scene.
Savannah, Georgia television station WJCL-22 reported that Gloria Satterfield’s death was not reported to the coroner, nor did it undergo an autopsy. Last June, South Carolina officials said they would exhume the body.
Authorities first opened a criminal investigation into Gloria Satterfield’s death in 2021, three years after her death.
During the NewsNation interview, Tony Satterfield said he was “shocked” to learn that Alex Murdaugh failed to give his family millions of dollars worth of insurance money following his mother’s death.
Satterfield’s lawyer, Eric Bland, said Alex Murdaugh “capitalised on Gloria’s death financially and used it as an opportunity to enrich himself.”
Bland told NewsNation: “Everything around Alex is danger, lies, deception.”
