Three months after unsolved murders of his wife and son, South Carolina prosecutor’s office bans attorney Alex Murdaugh, suspends his lawyer’s license indefinitely – as he’s being investigated for stealing more than $1million from his law firm
South Carolina prosecutor’s office has banned embattled scion of legal dynasty, Alex Murdaugh. His lawyer’s license is indefinitely suspended, also
Murdaugh, 53, who was forced to resign Friday from the high profile law firm founded by his grandfather, after he was accused of stealing more than one million dollars by the partners
The 14th Circuit Solicitor’s Office which had been allowing Murdaugh to work as a volunteer for years, intends to now formally terminate that arrangement in light of allegations of misappropriating funds
After Alex Murdaugh stepped down from his law firm PMPED on Friday he issued a statement announcing that he has now checked himself into rehab to battle oxycodone addiction
Later that Friday he called 911 claiming he’d been shot in the head in a drive-by shooting on a rural South Carolina road
No one has been arrested for the shooting, and no arrests have been made either in the shooting deaths of his wife and son, at their rural property, which happened three months earlier
No Three days after the double-homicide his father Randolph Murdaugh III, died ‘peacefully’ at home
Randolph Murdaugh III, 81, was the 14th Circuit Solicitor for 20 years

South Carolina legal heir Alex Murdaugh has been banned from volunteering at the prosecutor’s office his family has run for decades after being accused of misappropriating over $1million from his private law firm and checking himself into rehab for oxycodone addiction.
Alex Murdaugh has been accused of taking money from his family law firm, the firm said Monday night.
Murdaugh has also entered a drug treatment center to care for his substance abuse, attorney Jim Griffin said Monday night.
Murdaugh, 53, will no longer be allowed to prosecute cases for the 14th Circuit Solicitor’s Office in South Carolina, which his father worked for 20 years before his death earlier this year, and where he too has also tried cases.Â
The office said on Tuesday that Alex has not worked on any cases since 2019 but that they wanted to now formalize the end of his tenure there.
The South Carolina bar has also indefinitely suspended his attorney’s license. Â
Alex’s father Randolph Murdaugh III was the third generation to serve as 14th Circuit Solicitor, having held the position from 1985 to 2005.Â
As part of the state imposed sanctions, Alex Murdaugh will no longer be allowed to volunteer at the the 14th Circuit Solicitor’s Office in South Carolina. Last week, he was pushed out of his private law firm after being accused of misappropriating over $1million in company funds.


Confronted by members of his law firm on Friday over the missing money, Murdaugh informed the partners he intended to resign, his attorney said. I
In a statement the PMPED law firm confirmed that Murdaugh resigned on Friday after the firm discovered he had “misappropriated funds.” The firm’s website is currently shutdown, according to a pasted notice
Alex has not denied the claims. In a statement on Monday that was issued through his attorney, State Senator Dick  Harpootlian, he said he had made decisions he regrets and was now seeking treatment in rehab after a ‘long battle’ with addiction that was exasperated by the murders of his wife and son in June.Â
His statement adds that he’d made ‘a lot of decisions’ he regrets since the murders of his wife Maggie and son Paul in June.
Margaret ‘Maggie’ Murdaugh and the couple’s son Paul were found dead at their home on June 7. They’d been shot and left by the family dog’s kennels. Alex found them and called 911, sobbing down the phone.Â
Three months on, no one has been arrested for their killings and police are yet to name any suspects or persons of interest.Â
Three days after they were found shot dead, Alex’s father Randolph Murdaugh III died ‘peacefully’ at home at the age of 81.Â
For three months, the case went quiet while police worked on leads then on Saturday September 4, Alex called police claiming he’d been shot in the head while trying to change a tire on his car while driving to Charleston. Â

He survived with a ‘surface’ wound, went to the hospital then was interviewed by police about the shooting and the deaths of his wife and son again.Â
Hours later, he checked himself into rehab. He has not been heard from since.Â
SLED – the authority investigating Maggie and Paul’s deaths – has not issued any kind of update on the case.  Â
Details of the alleged fraud have not become public but the firm has hired a forensic accounting firm, and that the misuse of funds amounts to millions of dollars being squandered.Â
It is a ton of money. It is over $1 million,’ a legal source told The Raleigh Observer.Â
His attorney Jim Griffin said he was seeking treatment for substance abuse on Monday. Law enforcement sources said he is addicted to oxycodone.  Â
In his statement on Monday, Alex said:Â ‘The murders of my wife and son have caused an incredibly difficult time in my life. I have made a lot of decisions that I truly regret. I’m resigning from my law firm and entering rehab after a long battle that has been exacerbated these murders. ‘I am immensely sorry to everyone I’ve hurt including my family, friends and colleagues.
‘I ask for prayers as I rehabilitate myself and my relationships.’
The law firm issued a statement on Monday night stating: ‘[Murdaugh] is no longer associated with PMPED in any manner.Â
‘His resignation came after the discovery by PMPED that Alex misappropriated funds in violation of PMPED standards and policies.Â
‘A forensic accounting firm will be retained to conduct a thorough investigation. This is disappointing news for all of us. Rest assured that our firm will deal with this in a straightforward manner.’Â Â


2015: Teenager Stephen Smith dies
Smith was found on the side of the road. Police officially rule his death a hit-and-run but he had suffered blunt force trauma to the head.
His mother has since shared her belief that she thinks he was killed in a hate-crime because he was gay.
Case notes revealed Alex Murdaugh’s older son Buster was named multiple times in the investigation.
Police wanted to know more about his relationship with Stephen Stephen’s mother said he had been having a ‘fling’

2018: Murdaugh family housekeeper Gloria Satterfield dies
Murdaugh family housekeeper Gloria Sattlerfield dies
Gloria died after ‘falling’ down the stairs in the family house
The family gave her family $500.000 in a wrongful death settlement but it’s unclear why her death was ruled to be their fault.Â
Alex Murdaugh was listed as the defendant in the lawsuit.Â
Satterfield was 57 when she died. She left behind a husband and children. Â

2019: Mallory Beach dies being thrown from boat driven by Paul Murdaugh
Mallory Beach, 19, died in February 2019
Paul was charged afterwards because he’d been drinking and was behaving ‘belligerently’ that night.Â
He had been released on bond. Â
Other members of the boating party were on the boat but were unharmed.
One young man testified that they were scared to speak about the Murdaugh family because they knew how to ‘cover things up’.Â
The whistle blower mentioned murdered gay teen Stephen Smith and the housekeeper Gloria Satterfield as past victims of Murdaugh coverups.
He claimed Paul pushed Satterfield to her death.
June 7 2021: Paul and Maggie are murdered.
The mom and son were found shot dead at the family hunting lodge in Hampton, South Carolina.Â

June 7, 2021: Margaret ‘Maggie’ Murdaugh and her 22-year-old son Paul Murdaugh were shot dead in a double-homicide
Alex’s son Paul, 22, and wife Margaret, 52, were found dead from multiple gunshot wounds on June 7 at the family hunting lodge in the rural Colleton County community of Islandton on June 7.
Alex called 911 shortly after 10pm claiming he’d found them.  – They had only been dead for an hour at most.
No arrests have been made in the double-homicide

June 10 2021:Â Family patriarch Randolph Murdaugh III, 81, dies
Alex Murdaugh’s father, Randolph Murdaugh III, 81, dies ‘naturally’ and ‘peacefully’ at home
His death comes three days after his daughter-in-law and his grandson were shot to death
September 3: Alex resigns from his law firm amid claims he misused funds
The firm has hired a forensic investigator to go through the accountsÂ
September 4: Alex calls 911 claiming he’s been shot in the head in a drive-by. He only had ‘surface’ wounds and was also able to call 911 and his brother Randy
September 6: Alex releases a statement confirming his resignation from the firm and announcing he has entered rehab Says ‘I’m resigning from my law firm and entering rehab after a long battle that has been exacerbated these murders.’

Paul was awaiting trial for the 2019 boating death of Mallory Beach, who died after being thrown from the boat he was drunk driving.
He had also been tied to the death of his housekeeper (who fell down the stairs in 2018) and the unsolved 2015 death of Stephen Smith, whose mother believes was beaten to death in a hate crime because he was gay.  Â
Paul, 22, and Maggie, 52, were found dead from multiple gunshot wounds just after 10pm on June 7 at the family’s hunting lodge in the rural Colleton County community of Island.
Two different guns were used in the shootings.
The Murdaughs’ housekeeper, Gloria Sattlefield, also died in a ‘trip and fall’ accident in 2018, which resulted in the family settling a wrongful death lawsuit. Â
The time of death was between 9pm and 9.30pm.Â
Murdaugh was interviewed by officers investigating his wife and son’s death on June 10, three days after the murders, and volunteered a sample of DNA to investigators.Â
The bodies were said to be found near a dog kennel on the family’s property on June 7.
Sources close to him have said he has a ‘cast iron alibi’ for the night of the killings but police are yet to confirm that publicly.Â


Alex Murdaugh calls 911 after discovering bodies of wife and son at the families south Carolina estate
A recording of the call he placed to 911 revealed how he sobbed to operators, pleading ‘my wife and child have been shot badly’.Â
He said neither Paul nor wife Maggie were breathing when he found them by the dog kennels of their estate, and that he had not seen anyone else in the area or noticed anything out of place.Â
On the night of the killings, police impounded a 2021 Chevrolet Suburban owned by Murdaugh’s law firm but it’s unclear whether that has any bearing on the case.
The family has been accused of ‘cover ups’ before.Â
In some telling leaks, it was revealed that one of the youths who survived the boat crash that killed Mallory Beach claimed in a deposition that the Murdaugh’s may have been involved in Stephen Smith’s death.
The same whistle blower also claimed that Paul Murdaugh pushed the family’s 57-year-old housekeeper Gloria Satterfield, down the stairs to her death.Â

The whistle blower, Connor Cook, in the January 2020 deposition, admitted that he had lied about the night of the boat accident out of fear of what the Murdaughs would do. Cook is claiming that the family had gotten away with crimes in the past.Â
‘Anything they get in, they get out of. I’ve always been told that,’ Cook said in the deposition.
‘One was said that Paul [Murdaugh] had pushed his housemaid down the stairs, and she died, and nothing ever happened.
‘And another one, there was something that Paul was supposedly involved with a guy, got found beat up in the middle of the road, that they got out of.’Â Â Â Â
Stephen Smith, 19, was found dead in July 2015 in the middle of Sandy Run Road around 15 miles from the Murdaugh family’s hunting lodge.Â
Despite investigators on the scene being convinced of foul play and finding no evidence of any vehicle involvement – the death was written off as a hit-and-run.
Police said he was struck by a vehicle while walking on a two-lane road after his car ran out of gas.Â
Stephen’s mother has always believed it was a hate crime, and that her son was beaten to death, rather than being struck by a vehicle, and his murder covered up.  Â
Investigators aggressively pursued tips questioning the dead boy’s ‘relationship’ with Paul’s older brother Richard ‘Buster’ Murdaugh, whose name came up numerous times in case-notes we obtained.Â

Leading to the alleged drive-by shooting, the law firm’s statement about the alleged misappropriated funds were first reported Monday night by The New York Times.
On Saturday, Alex Murdaugh reported that he was shot by an unknown assailant while changing a tire on old Salkehatchie Road outside the town of Hampton.
Griffin, his lawyer, told The Island Packet Saturday that Murdaugh was on his way to Charleston when he had car trouble and stopped. He said a passing truck stopped and turned around and someone inside shot him.    .Â
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