Latest / The Epstein Chronicles / Murder In Moselle: A New Judge, A New Trial, And A Strict New Schedule (7/6/26)

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Murder In Moselle: A New Judge, A New Trial, And A Strict New Schedule (7/6/26) · The Epstein Chronicles

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: What's up, everyone, and welcome to another episode of Murder
• 0:04
  and Moselle the retrial of Alec Murdaugh. Things are moving
• 0:11
  pretty quickly down in South Carolina as the State and
• 0:14
  Alec Murdach prepared to face off once again, and the
• 0:19
  new judge who's overseeing the proceedings wants everything to run
• 0:22
  smoothly and on a pretty strict timeline. And I think
• 0:27
  that in a matter such as this, where we've already
• 0:30
  had one trial and we had all the nonsense in
• 0:33
  the wake of that trial, that's a good idea. The
• 0:37
  quicker we get this retrial going, the better, and I
• 0:41
  think that all the parties involved agree with that, right.
• 0:45
  Alec Murdoch certainly wants to get things going, and when
• 0:48
  it comes to the State, they definitely want to get
• 0:50
  back into the courtroom and slam the door shut on
• 0:54
  Alec Murdoch once and for all. So it's going to
• 0:57
  be up to the judge to manage all of this
• 1:00
  and make sure that everything is moving in a manner
• 1:04
  that is acceptable and that flows correctly, because you know
• 1:09
  that things can get gummed up real quick, especially when
• 1:12
  you're dealing with a case that has as much publicity
• 1:15
  as this one. So that's the judge's plan. Is it
• 1:19
  going to work out? Well, We'll have to see. Today
• 1:24
  we have an article from k Fox fourteen and the
• 1:27
  headline new judge vows strict schedule as Murdoch case returns
• 1:31
  amid Jerry tampering fallout. This article was authored by Taylor Fishman.
• 1:37
  More than four years after the killing of Maggie and
• 1:40
  Paul Murdoch, Alec Murdoch is preparing to stand trial once again.
• 1:45
  And look, I think that there's enough evidence to convict him,
• 1:51
  but I think that what went down with Becky Hill
• 1:53
  is completely unacceptable and you can't have a situation where
• 1:59
  you have the county clerk trying to shade the jury
• 2:04
  in the favor of the prosecution. If that doesn't warrant
• 2:07
  a retrial, I don't know what would. But with all
• 2:09
  that said, I think that if the prosecution keeps their
• 2:12
  shit together and presents the case in the manner they
• 2:15
  presented it last time, then I think they're going to
• 2:18
  end up with the conviction once again, because considering the
• 2:22
  evidence that we've seen already, I believe that Alec Murdoch
• 2:27
  did the deed. Now I am willing to look at
• 2:30
  new evidence that's provided by his team. That's why we're here,
• 2:33
  that's what the retrial's about. And if the prosecution didn't
• 2:37
  want to open that door, they should have reined in
• 2:39
  Becky Hill. But now that we're here, I'm willing to
• 2:44
  look at whatever evidence that Murdoch and his team are
• 2:47
  going to provide. Did we miss something the first time around,
• 2:50
  did we have it wrong? I'm more than willing to reevaluate,
• 2:54
  especially considering that there's a retrial. A South Carolina judge
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  has scheduled Murdoch's retrial to begin on April fifth, twenty
• 3:03
  twenty seven, after his murder convictions were overturned because of
• 3:07
  jury tampering involving the former call Itton County Clerk of Court.
• 3:12
  So we're talking about April of twenty twenty seven, less
• 3:16
  than a year, and there's going to be a whole
• 3:19
  lot of stuff happening leading up to this court filings, arguments, motions,
• 3:25
  you name it, and we're going to follow along every
• 3:28
  step of the way. And look, the prosecution's case was
• 3:32
  built on a lot of circumstantial evidence. That is a fact.
• 3:36
  So if Murdoch and his team can challenge some of
• 3:41
  those circumstances, then maybe, just maybe they'll be able to
• 3:44
  convince a juror too that Murdoch's not the guy. But
• 3:48
  keep in mind, even if this idiot gets off on
• 3:52
  the murder charges, he's still serving what thirty years or
• 3:55
  whatever for the financial crimes. So there's one thing to
• 4:00
  get off here, right. Obviously he wants to who wants
• 4:03
  to be known as somebody who murdered their family, But
• 4:07
  even if he does, he's still going to be in prison.
• 4:09
  The new trial will revisit one of the country's most
• 4:12
  closely watched murder cases, in which prosecutors alleged Murdoch fatally
• 4:17
  shot his wife and son at the family's hunting estate
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  in June of twenty twenty one to divert attention from
• 4:24
  mounting financial crimes. Imagine being that big of a dirt bag.
• 4:28
  You get in trouble financially, and instead of just dealing
• 4:31
  with it, you kill your wife and your kid because
• 4:36
  that's what the evidence showed us, right, that sure is
• 4:38
  what it looked like. And then you add on top
• 4:41
  of that the drug problem that he had, and what
• 4:44
  you have is a recipe for disaster. Murdoch has maintained
• 4:47
  his innocence, and his defense team argues someone else committed
• 4:51
  the killings. Speaking with the National newsdesk, Ann Emerson, host
• 4:55
  to Sinclaire's true crime podcast Criminally Obsessed, who covered the
• 4:59
  original trial from the courtroom, said the retrials already taking
• 5:03
  on a different tone, and I think that's true. I
• 5:06
  think that there's a lot that's going to be different,
• 5:09
  a lot that's going to be the same, but a
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  lot that's going to be different. And with his team
• 5:13
  already having a chance to know the kind of narrative
• 5:17
  that the prosecution's going to use, they should be able
• 5:20
  to formulate a plan to try and blunt that a bit.
• 5:23
  Now are they going to be successful. I don't know, maybe,
• 5:28
  but that's what they're going to try and do. She
• 5:30
  pointed to newly appoint the judge, Deborah McCaslin, saying the
• 5:34
  judge has made it clear she intends to keep the
• 5:36
  case moving on schedule. She's a firecracker, Emerson said, she
• 5:41
  is so in charge of that courtroom. Well, that's good.
• 5:45
  You definitely need a judge that's not going to brook
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  any bullshit because with all of the interest in this case,
• 5:52
  it's going to be a zoo it's going to be
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  an absolute zoo, so it's important that we have a
• 5:57
  judge that can handle that. According to Emerson, the judge
• 6:01
  emphasized that she expects the trial to begin on April fifth,
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  and signaled that she is unlikely to grant unnecessary delays.
• 6:10
  Emerson believes courtroom management will receive heightened attention following the
• 6:14
  Jerry tampering allegations that led South Carolina's appellate court to
• 6:19
  order a new trial. As far as the Clerk of court,
• 6:22
  that's why we're here. We're going to have to really
• 6:24
  see how the back end of this works. The re
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  trial is also expected to feature new evidence and new
• 6:31
  legal strategies, and the scrutiny is going to be unreal.
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  So the prosecution, they better be on point all Brady Jillio,
• 6:40
  discovery better be turned over, and everything better be locked
• 6:44
  in because the judge isn't going to deal with any
• 6:47
  bullshit this time around. And considering that the prosecution already
• 6:51
  shit the bed, now they're under the microscope. Emerson said
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  she recently interviewed Murdoch defense attorney Dick Harpulian, who indicated
• 7:02
  the defense intends to present additional evidence, not introduced during
• 7:06
  the original proceeding. Well, great, I'd love to see it.
• 7:10
  Let's see what they have. And this is what I
• 7:12
  was talking about. With it being a new trial, all
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  bets are off. Anything can happen, anything can be introduced,
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  and who knows what kind of evidence they're going to
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  come up with. She expects the defense attorneys to focus
• 7:25
  heavily on what they view as shortcomings in the original
• 7:28
  investigation conducted by the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division commonly
• 7:33
  known as SLED. There are issues with the way that
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  that investigation was run, Emerson said, they're going to do
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  everything they can to obscure this case for the state. Well,
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  that's their job. Their job is to find any weak
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  link in the prosecution's narrative and then to expose it.
• 7:55
  So they're going to be working over time to do that.
• 7:58
  And I think that the public is paying attention and
• 8:02
  more willing to look at what the defense provides considering
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  what the prosecution did the first time around. And look,
• 8:07
  I don't mean the prosecutors themselves, but the county clerk.
• 8:11
  She's part of it, right, the state. And if you
• 8:14
  can't control your county clerk, well, whose fault is that?
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  The defense has repeatedly argued investigators failed to fully pursue
• 8:23
  other possible suspects, and has suggested errors in evidence collection
• 8:27
  and crime scene processing. Another issue likely to receive significant
• 8:32
  attention involves claims that the crime scene may have been altered. Again,
• 8:37
  needs to be looked at. Was it is Alec Murda
• 8:42
  being framed. Not likely, but something that has to be
• 8:45
  looked at. And if hard Putlian and company have some evidence,
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  let's see it. Emerson noted that shortly after the original
• 8:54
  guilty verdict, she conducted exclusive interviews with some of the
• 8:57
  first responding investigators. I was told this was a clean scene,
• 9:02
  this was a stage scene, she said. She clarified that
• 9:06
  investigators were not necessarily alleging another shooter participated, but were
• 9:11
  examining whether someone may have assisted in cleaning or altering
• 9:15
  portions of the crime scene after the killing. And that
• 9:19
  could have been Alec Murdach himself. Right, we don't know.
• 9:23
  That's the point, another opportunity for the defense to really
• 9:29
  obscure this case. Emerson said. She's not wrong. Remember, you
• 9:33
  only need one juror if you can convince one jur
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  that Alec Murdoch is innocent, you're going to be finding
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  pay dirt. One of the most closely watched evidentiary disputes
• 9:46
  centers on DNA recovered from beneath Maggie Murdav's fingernails. Defense
• 9:51
  attorneys have asked that the material will be analyzed using
• 9:54
  advanced genetic testing that was not available when the murders
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  occurred in twenty twenty one. Why wouldn't they want to
• 10:00
  do that? That is a good thing for everybody involved.
• 10:06
  Don't we want to have the right person in custody?
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  Emerson said their request could become a key component of
• 10:14
  the defense strategy. She pointed to recent advances in forensic
• 10:18
  DNA analysis that have helped solve previously unsolved homicide investigations
• 10:22
  across the country. Whether the court ultimately allows the additional
• 10:27
  DNA testing remains unresolved. I hope they do. I really do,
• 10:32
  because one way or the other, it gives you that
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  definitive or as close to definitive evidence as you can get.
• 10:41
  Let's see what the DNA says. And with authrom being involved,
• 10:45
  I definitely trust the DNA results as both sides prepare
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  for what many observers are calling Alex Murdoch two point zero.
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  Prosecutors are expected to present much of the same circumstantial
• 10:58
  evidence that led to Mourdock's original convictions, while the defense
• 11:02
  will attempt to introduce new forensic testing and challenge the
• 11:06
  investigation that produced the original guilty verdict. With a new judge,
• 11:11
  new evidence, and renewed scrutiny of one of the nation's
• 11:14
  most prominent murder cases, the retrial promises to once again
• 11:18
  place the Murdoch family saga at the center of national attention. Well,
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  we're definitely going to be talking about it. And at
• 11:25
  the end of the last trial, when we heard about
• 11:27
  Becky Hill, we knew this would be a possibility, and
• 11:30
  now that possibility has become a reality, And as the
• 11:34
  case continues to move forward, we'll continue following along every
• 11:38
  step of the way. All the information that goes with
• 11:41
  this episode can be found in the description box.