Alex Murdaugh's lawyer suggests his wife and son were killed in '$165k drug deal gone bad' as sensational theory takes center stage at retrial hearing
Disgraced legal dynasty heir Alex Murdaugh has dropped a stunning hint about the defense plans for his second murder trial, revealing an explosive claim about his ties to a violent street gang.
The 58-year-old returned to Lexington County courthouse in South Carolina on Friday morning for the latest hearing ahead of his retrial for the 2021 shootings of his wife Maggie, 52, and son Paul, 22.
The towering former attorney cut a relaxed figure as he strolled into the courtroom, smiling and giving a slight wave to a row of people seated behind the defense table.
Unshackled and dressed in a dark suit jacket, white shirt, blue tie and beige pants - after Judge Debra McCaslin granted his request to wear civilian clothes rather than a prison jumpsuit at court hearings - Murdaugh sat down with his attorneys, put on a pair of dark-rimmed glasses and began to leaf through a binder of documents.
Throughout the two-hour hearing, he fidgeted in his chair as the defense and prosecution came to blows over several pieces of evidence that could play a key part in his retrial from DNA testing, to ballistics evidence and 3D crime scene scans.
Murdaugh continues to claim his innocence of the murders and, in a flurry of recent court filings, his lawyers requested evidence and information they believe could point away from him - to another killer.
This includes DNA found on Maggie’s fingernails and phone, ballistics evidence from other local shootings and even stunning allegations about local police officers disposing of the murder weapons and bloody clothing as part of a crime scene cover-up.
In a partial legal victory on Friday, Judge McCaslin granted Murdaugh’s request to test the DNA evidence. She then sided with the state when it came to the cover-up allegations, agreeing they are protected by grand jury secrecy, as well as the ballistics evidence.
But an unexpected moment came when Murdaugh’s legal team unearthed stunning allegations that the murders could be tied to an $165,000 debt owed to a local drug gang.
Defense attorney Dick Harpootlian was arguing that the state has a history of dragging its feet in handing over evidence, alleging prosecutors dumped an unwieldy trove of information three days before the first trial.
Within that information, he claimed, was a shocking statement from a defendant in a federal drug deal case connecting Murdaugh and his infamous distant cousin Curtis Eddie Smith to the ‘Cowboys’ drug gang at the time of Maggie and Paul’s murders.
According to Harpootlian, Ryan Spencer North alleged in a September 2021 interview that he was making $15,000 to $20,000 a week selling prescription pills to the Murdaugh family. ‘It wasn't the Murdaugh family. It was the Murdaugh law firm. He never met with a Murdaugh. He met a guy named Eddie Smith,’ he said.
Smith, representing Murdaugh, was $165,000 in debt to the drug gang, Harpootlian claimed North said.
Harpootlian argued that this information could suggest the murders were the result of a ‘drug deal gone bad’ or that ‘Alex owed money and a violent drug gang decided to collect it by intimidation.’
While Harpootlian framed this as an example of the way the prosecution has shared discovery, the defense attorney appeared to be hinting what Murdaugh’s defense might argue at trial. Later in the hearing, he confirmed plans to pursue all leads around that tip.
Maggie and Paul were shot dead at the dog kennels on the family's sprawling 1,700-acre Moselle estate in Islandton on the night of June 7, 2021.
The double murders went on to expose an unraveling web of crimes and scandals circling Murdaugh, including multi-million-dollar fraud schemes, a botched hitman plot and links to several other mysterious deaths.

His 2023 murder trial - dubbed the Lowcountry's 'trial of the century' - became the capstone to a spectacular fall from grace for the heir to a powerful legal dynasty that dominated South Carolina's 14th Judicial Circuit for almost a century.
Murdaugh was convicted and sentenced to life in prison.
He continues to claim his innocence to this day.
In May, the South Carolina Supreme Court overturned his convictions and ordered a second trial, after finding that his right to a fair trial was violated because then-Colleton County Court Clerk Becky Hill tampered with the jury.
A new trial date was set for April 5, 2027, in Sumter County - after the judge moved the case out of Colleton County, where the first trial took place.
In Friday’s hearing, the judge told both sides that ‘this trial is going ahead April 5 whether you like it or not!’ She also scolded both sides over their 'tit for tat' conduct, telling them ‘I will not allow these proceedings to become a circus,’ following a series of fiery exchanges about DNA evidence, 3D scans and ballistics.
In the hearing, Murdaugh’s attorney Phil Barber revealed that the defense had learned of even more DNA evidence pointing away from the disgraced ex-attorney and toward a mystery alternative suspect in the killings. It was previously revealed that DNA evidence found under Maggie’s left-hand fingernails does not belong to Murdaugh - but to an unknown male - and was not tested by the state.
Barber argued that the defense has since learned there was also DNA from an unknown male under Maggie’s right-hand fingernails as well as on her cell phone, which was found by the side of a road near Moselle.
While prosecutors have called the DNA a ‘red herring,’ Barber argued that this evidence appeared to be growing in significance. ‘As we keep progressing from one hand to two hands to the phone it's starting to look less and less like a red herring,’ Barber said.
He argued that the defense should be able to test it using Othram - the genetic genealogy company which identified Bryan Kohberger as Idaho student killer.
‘We’re talking about the state’s leftovers… the state had the evidence for five years… we want the leftovers to do the same test they said they chose not to do.’
Prosecutor Creighton Waters did not oppose the testing but warned it would use up the remaining genetic material - eliminating any possible future testing.
Judge McCaslin granted the defense’s request saying that Murdaugh must have 'a meaningful opportunity to present a full and complete defense.’
The defense also argued that it should be able to compare .300 Blackout cartridge cases from the murders to cartridge cases from other shootings in nearby counties, including an unsolved murder this April.
Two different guns were used in the killings, with prosecutors alleging that both belonged to the Murdaugh family. Maggie was shot five times with an AR-style rifle using .300 Blackout ammunition, while Paul was shot twice with a shotgun. According to prosecutors, the evidence was run through ballistics databases and no matches were found.

McCaslin sided with the state, calling the defense push a 'fishing expedition' and saying that law enforcement should not have to take an ‘unprecedented manual review’ of all crimes with .300 Blackouts in the Lowcountry when no evidence links the cases.
The murder weapons - which have never been found - were also the focus of bombshell allegations laid out in a defense motion last month, pouring cold water on the state’s long-running theory that Murdaugh acted alone and also make stunning allegations of local police involvement in a cover-up.
The defense claimed that the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED) received information from a Lowcountry official that Greg Alexander, Yemassee police chief and Murdaugh’s close friend, had spoken of arriving early to the murder scene and providing Murdaugh with a change of clothes.

The murder weapons and bloody clothing were also allegedly taken to the Yemassee police station and stored there temporarily, the official allegedly claimed.
A state grand jury heard testimony last month about the allegations of a coverup at the murder scene involving two Yemassee police officers under investigation, FITSNews first reported.
Grand jury witnesses also testified that Alexander was seen with the weapons in the ‘immediate aftermath’ of the murders, the defense claimed, citing local reports.
Alexander was subpoenaed to testify before the grand jury this August - before being told he no longer needed to appear. He has denied all the allegations.
At trial, prosecutors alleged that Murdaugh took the guns to his mother’s home that night, before disposing of them later.
While the explosive allegations do not necessarily support Murdaugh’s innocence, his lawyers argued that it impeaches the state’s theory of a single perpetrator, raises questions about the integrity of all evidence on the scene and 'supports the defense that more than one person was involved in these murders.’
Murdaugh’s defense demanded access to all records, including state grand jury material, about the alleged disposal of the murder weapons and clothing.
The prosecution pushed back in a filing, arguing that grand jury testimony is secret - something Judge McCaslin announced she agreed with on Friday, before swiftly moving on from the matter.

The defense is also arguing that prosecutors should share whether or not they plan to change their theory about the night of the murders - notably, whether or not they will argue Murdaugh had an accomplice or accomplices in the killings or the crime scene clean-up.
While Murdaugh maintains his innocence of the murders, he did confess and plead guilty to a string of state and federal financial crimes - which played a key role in the state's motive for the killings.
The murders also caused other mysterious deaths tied to the prominent family to fall under the spotlight. In 2019, Paul was charged with causing a boat crash that killed his friend, 19-year-old Mallory Beach, and was awaiting trial at the time of his murder.
Prior to this, the family's housekeeper Gloria Satterfield died in a mysterious trip-and-fall accident at Moselle.
The family's name was also linked, without any evidence, to the unsolved 2015 homicide of gay teen Stephen Smith.
Three months after the murders, Murdaugh then allegedly tried to hire a hitman, Curtis 'Cousin Eddie' Smith, to stage his own botched shooting in order to secure a life insurance windfall for his surviving son Buster.
Murdaugh remains behind bars in a maximum security prison in South Carolina where he is serving his 27-year and 40-year sentences for his financial crimes.
He will return to court in Lexington County for a pretrial hearing on November 13.
