Murdaugh Family History || South Carolina Drama

Intro the developing drama gripping south carolina's low country sounds more like a blockbuster movie than real life mysterious murders check drug addiction you got it scandalous love affairs most likely financial dirty dealings absolutely but this is no movie in the middle of a whirlwind of official charges and small town rumors alex murdoch stands out as the key player in a very real mystery that's still unfolding and there are many more secrets yet to be revealed let's get into it [Music] Connections between Boulwares and Murdaughs good to see you i'm chris and this is true crime recaps as i said this story is still developing and by all appearances alex murdoch is in it up to his eyeballs when the walls were closing in at the beginning of september he tried to flee now he has to fight the latest allegation in this unbelievable story comes to you courtesy of local media outlet fits news what's happening now in one word smugglers it seems that the murdahs and alex specifically are closely connected to another notoriously powerful southern family one with a long and shady history reaching far back through the generations but to best explain the connection fits news editor will folks and his team dug up we need to start at the family hunting compound moselle also known as the scene of the murdah double murders on june 7th 2021 alex's 52 year old wife maggie and their 22 year old son paul were gunned down on the 1700 acre property and that sprawling expense of lush carolina countryside was previously owned by the bulwares for two generations that family has gotten rich off commercial fishing ventures but backroom talk across the region alleges that shrimp isn't the only high dollar product coming through the ports on the bouleware family boats and in the generations before their fortunes came from the waters around the carolinas the bulware family tree boasted high-profile lawyers that worked with the late great murdoch solicitors at least one of whom was also accused of dealing in contraband at one time you could say it's a family tradition or at the very least a long-standing public secret but we're not here to whisper to you about rumors and innuendo here's what we know for sure in 1983 the u.s coast guard found more than 800 bales of cannabis on a bull ware family shrimper boat named the janine anne this was part of a massive dea sting codenamed operation jackpot according to fitznews two of the bulwares turned themselves in and faced charges but lo and behold the captain of the janine anne walked into the path of an oncoming car just days before he was scheduled to testify against the bulwares now that's a hell of a tragic coincidence don't you think and try this one on for size at the time operation jackpot was in full swing the murdahs were firmly positioned as the prosecutors in the region now that's a handy friend to have back then families like the bulwares were suspected to be gentlemen smugglers to paraphrase will folks article the term referred to rich people who were bringing hundreds of thousands of pounds of marijuana into south carolina through the backwaters and inlets that flowed through land and islands that they owned and controlled you could say they were one of the more influential families controlling the waters around south carolina and the murdahs were one of the state's most powerful legal dynasties i'll ask you this does that sound like a valuable partnership to you land and sea crime and punishment power and access any novelist worth his paycheck would tell you there's a story there and here's where the bulware family connects to the latest generation of murdahs alex was barrett boulware's business partner and before the man died in 2018 alex was given power of attorney but five years before barrett died his wife sold alex the moselle hunting compound for the rock bottom price of five dollars and the exchange of properties totaling seven hundred and thirty thousand dollars but without all that money exchanged they can get out of paying taxes on it you might also remember that in our last recap of this story we told you alex sold mozelle to his wife maggie for five dollars in 2016 just three years after he bought it from the bull wares for the same price although alex also stipulated love and affection in his closing contract with his now murdered wife but as fitz news discovered murdoch island as moselle was known by the locals is only one of many properties jointly owned or previously owned by the murdahs and bulwares so let's talk land and access nine strategically located properties are owned by one or both of these families on islands or tracts of land that were considered smugglers prime real estate during operation jackpot according to property records researched by fitznews most of them are only accessible by boats and speaking of boats when paul murdoch was gunned down he was days away from facing trial in the boating death Boating accident of 19 year old mallory beach in february 2019 paul and five friends were navigating the backwaters from an oyster roast to the murdoch family river house around 2 am when the boat crashed into the dock pilings and everyone was thrown into the water mallory never made it to shore fishermen found her body a week later and the question looming over the case was who was driving the boat alex murdoch stands accused of trying to manipulate the answer to that question allegedly coercing witnesses and police to encourage them to say the driver was one of the other survivors and not his son paul that guy conor cook is now suing alex for trying to pin the whole thing on him it's yet to be decided either way by a court of law but dash cam footage from the scene very clearly points paul out as the person who is driving way too fast and much too drunk we linked that recap to the pin comment below so you can hear the 911 call and watch that dash cam video for yourself it's pretty compelling stuff and on top of what you can see and hear in that footage hospital staff said it looked like alex was doing his best to spin the story from the very beginning after all the murdoch family name had a lot to lose if paul went down he was a junior at the university of south carolina in colombia if convicted he stood to get 15 to 25 years behind bars and his plans to go into the family law business would be shut down but despite how serious the charges were against him he didn't do one minute in jail he wasn't even wearing an ankle monitor his family's money seemed to be doing a good job of washing away any sins he might have committed but then he Murders of Paul and Maggie and his mother were shot dead was that connected to his boating accident or now that we know about the family's other alleged connections are the murders of paul and maggie linked to some darker doings on the waters around south carolina alex is still a person of interest in that investigation he found their bodies and made the 911 pm on june 7th 2021 the coroner thinks they died around 9 or 9 30. they were each shot but they were killed a little differently a shotgun took paul's life his mother maggie was murdered with an automatic rifle and does this mean there are two shooters or or was it one person intending on sending the police on a wild goose chase so where was alex he claims he was at the bedside of his dying father and the man did die just three days later it makes you wonder if the man knew what his son was doing with the legacy left Alex Murdaugh theft allegations to him alex murdoch was a partner in the family law firm a well-known and respected firm that handled civil cases many of them against massive corporations most of which collected large sums of money for the firm's clients today that firm is trying to distance itself from alex faster than a lottery winner and their day job but before the cracks started to show he allegedly used his position to pocket up to 10 million dollars of the firm's money what was the money for well the answer to that question is still unknown could there be a link to the smuggling allegations we mentioned earlier did the money support his opioid drug addiction he's currently in rehab to overcome at this point with new allegations and details being revealed daily the answer could be found anywhere but even more importantly the law firm wasn't his only financial victim and here's where it gets even more convoluted to tell you this part of the Gloria Satterfield Falls story i need to take you back to 2018 when the family's longtime housekeeper gloria satterfield tripped over the family dog and fell down the stairs a quote accident that ultimately led to her death in the hospital a few weeks later but we have to put air quotes around the word accident because alex is the only murdah left standing to tell the story and after her trip and fall gloria was in no position to share the truth of what happened to her with anyone much less her surviving sons so here's how a rich lawyer allegedly took advantage of his housekeeper's family according to the atlanta journal alex wasted no time convincing her sons to hire his good friend corey fleming to represent them in a wrongful death settlement with his insurance company what he didn't tell them was that their brand new high-powered attorney was his old college roommate and godfather to one of his sons conflict of interest only scratches the surface the two cohorts arranged for the boys to get a 505 thousand dollar settlement a year later money gloria's son still hasn't seen a penny of but as it turns out they're owed so much more than that their new lawyer who is not a murder pal discovered a second settlement to the tune of more than four million dollars that money was never disclosed to gloria's family or made public according to the atlanta journal now her sons are adding their own civil suit to the pile to get what they're owed and as for gloria's unfortunate accident with a family dog state investigators are also looking into that did she really die that way or was something more sinister happening as long as we're using sinister and Stephen Smith Suspicious Death strange we have to bring up the very suspicious death of 19 year old steven smith stephen was an openly gay teenager whose death has not been so quietly talked about in the same breath as buster murdoch alex's oldest son the insinuation is that the two were romantically involved stephen was found in the middle of a country highway around 4 a.m on july 8 2015 down the road apiece from the murdah hunting lodge what exactly killed him is at the heart of this mystery officially it's been labeled a hit and run but what kind of car accident leaves a teenager dead with a gaping hole in his forehead a dislocated shoulder and cuts and bruises only on the right side of his body but doesn't leave any car parts glass or debris behind his car was pulled off to the side of the road three miles away the gas cap was open but his wallet was still in the car why would he walk away to get gas without any money so was he walking to buy gas could be but his wallet was still in the car and no he wasn't drunk or on anything his talks report was clean there's no other word for it but bizarre while no official connection between the powerful family and the teenager's death has yet been named investigators did say that they have reopened steven's case and they're taking another harder look at it and as if the suspicious murders and shady backroom dealings weren't omg enough Alex Murdaugh shooting alex himself seemed to have had enough of the drama in mid-september when he tried to flee and i'm not talking about running off to a non-extradition country i'm saying the man tried to leave this mortal coil but in keeping with the many other scandals involving the family he did not keep it simple the problem with the life insurance is that they won't pay out for a suicide so alex dreamed up a plot to get out of the mess he's found himself in while still leaving his surviving son buster with 10 million dollars in life insurance let me walk you through it he says he made a deal with a former client of his curtis smith a real made for tv larger than life character known as fast eddie the plan was for curtis to put a bullet in his head in exchange for cash unfortunately for alex fast eddie missed the bullet grazed his head and he had to spin the story fast claiming a stranger had shot him while he was changing his tire on the side of the road but from the beginning that story had holes in it you could drive his mercedes through for one thing as fitz news pointed out the car had run flat tires on it which literally means he wouldn't have had to change the tire it's doubtful the car even had a spare for another thing the tire was only flat because someone put a knife through it as it turned out that knife belonged to alex it was all just a little too convenient and it didn't take long for his story to start resembling something that sounded a little closer to the truth but is it the truth because fast eddie has a different version he claims his former lawyer called him up asking for help but didn't actually explain what he wanted him to do he said the man had his gun out and was waving it around when he showed up at the pre-arranged meeting spot on the side of the road they wrestled for it the gun went off grazed his head and curtis ran for it he says he's nothing more than a patsy yet another victim of the powerful murdoch clan meanwhile they're both free on a grab bag of charges while the state investigators try to sort out the latest in a long list of charges and investigations and while they do that alex he's 53 years old by the way is in rehab dealing with his opioid addiction somewhere out of state betty ford anyone Outro and there you have it as they say down south if the lord's willing in the creek don't rise the victims in this story will get their day in court and just maybe we'll get a few more answers to the many mysterious questions still out there thanks for spending your time with us today if you like getting all the crime in half the time remember to subscribe and give this a like so you never miss a recap amy and i are here every week with a new story until next time take care [Music] you