Alex Murdaugh defense says murder weapon may be tied to separate killing as judge seeks answers
Alex Murdaugh’s defense attorneys on Friday raised an unverified claim that a recent Allendale County homicide could be connected to the Murdaugh murders, surprising prosecutors and the judge overseeing his retrial.
Murdaugh returned to court after the South Carolina Supreme Court unanimously overturned his 2023 convictions and two life sentences earlier this year for the killings of his wife, Maggie Murdaugh, and son, Paul Murdaugh.
The court found that former Colleton County Clerk of Court Becky Hill improperly influenced jurors, depriving Murdaugh of an impartial jury, and ordered a new trial. Murdaugh remains imprisoned on separate state and federal financial-crime sentences.
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On Friday, defense attorney Jim Griffin told South Carolina Circuit Court Judge Debra McCaslin that the defense learned through FITSNews reporting that a recent Allendale County murder may have involved weapons connected to the Murdaugh case.
Griffin said the defense wanted the state to investigate and turn over any related records.
FITSNews told Fox News Digital that Griffin’s reference was to its Aug. 8 "Week in Review" YouTube episode. According to a transcript reviewed by Fox News Digital, FITS founding editor Will Folks and research director Jenn Wood discussed what they described as an unverified report involving a possible third gun at the Moselle crime scene.
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"We’re hearing reports that a Murdaugh gun was used in a subsequent crime," Folks said. "We’re not going to say where at this point. We’re not going to get into the details."
Folks said the outlet was investigating whether the firearm was tied to the Murdaugh family and perhaps one of the guns that has never been recovered.
Wood cautioned that the information had not been confirmed.
"It’s a pretty consistent rumor and, you know, I’m hearing it from very good sources," Wood said. "We have not been able to validate a lot of it, and I’m not sure if it’s even the gun. It just said that it was tied to the murder of Maggie and Paul Murdaugh."
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Neither speaker identified Allendale County, described a ballistics comparison or said investigators had established that a weapon used in the Murdaugh killings was used in a subsequent crime.
At Friday’s hearing, Griffin did not identify the victim, the alleged weapon or any testing that supported the purported connection. He said the defense wanted related records as potential Brady material — evidence that could be favorable to the defense.
Griffin told McCaslin that a South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED) firearms examiner testified at Murdaugh’s first trial that shell casings from the .300 Blackout rifle used to kill Maggie Murdaugh bore extraction marks matching casings recovered from the Murdaugh family’s shooting range.
Griffin said that if shell casings from the Allendale County case matched casings tied to the Murdaugh murders, the defense wanted the underlying testing and investigative records.
Such a finding, he argued, could raise questions about the original ballistics analysis or suggest that a firearm associated with the Murdaugh case was later used in another killing.
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Lead prosecutor Creighton Waters told the court the allegation was entirely new to him.
"I have never heard the first thing about that," Waters said, adding that he communicates with SLED daily and had not been told of any such development.
"I will certainly look into that, but I would be flabbergasted to find out that actually had happened and no one had advised this office of that," Waters said.
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McCaslin also appeared struck by the allegation.
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"As far as the murder in Allendale with the murder weapons, you certainly raised my eyebrows on that," McCaslin told Griffin.
Griffin said FITSNews had broken other Murdaugh-related stories before the defense learned of them. He also told the court that a podcast included a reference to the alleged connection.
McCaslin directed Griffin to send the material to Waters for review.
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Waters said he does not follow podcasts or blogs covering the case.
"I don’t watch the podcast and I don’t read the blogs because I try to base what I’m doing on the evidence and not on speculation that’s out there in the media," Waters said. "It would blow my mind if something like that had happened in SLED and not call me."
No evidence establishing a connection between an Allendale County homicide and weapons used in the Murdaugh killings has been presented.
Waters later said during Friday's hearing that SLED then told him there is no known ballistics match linking a .300 Blackout used in an Allendale County shooting to another crime. Waters said the firearm evidence from the Allendale case was entered into a ballistics database but "there have been no leads or no matches on that."
"I’m going to find out more and double check, and we’re going to run this down," Waters said, adding that SLED told him there were "no leads or hits" involving the .300 Blackout used in the Allendale shooting.
Fox News Digital's Sarah Rumpf-Whitten contributed to this report.