Inside court clerk’s jury interference in notorious attorney’s murder trial

Former personal injury lawmaker Alex Murdaugh was serving two life sentences when, earlier this month, the South Carolina Supreme Court overturned the murder and weapons charges he had been found guilty of and ordered a new trial. Murdaugh, however, remains in prison because of a 40-year sentence related to theft and fraud convictions. The South Carolina Supreme Court ruled that the convictions it overturned were improper because of interference by court clerk Becky Hill, whose actions are detailed by journalist/author James Lasdun in The New Yorker.

Murdaugh, on March 2, 2023, was found guilty of murdering his wife, Maggie Murdaugh, and his son, James Murdaugh. The former personal injury attorney faced other charges as well — some in South Carolina, some at the federal level — and the 40-year sentence is in addition to the two life sentences that the South Carolina Supreme Court overturned.

Lasdun has written about the Murdaugh case extensively, devoting an entire book to the subject: "The Family Man: Blood and Betrayal in the House of Murdaugh," released in early May.

Lasdun, in The New Yorker, explains, "The court's ruling was based, mainly, on a flurry of inappropriate remarks Hill made to jurors as the defense began its case. 'Y'all are going to hear things that will throw you all off,' one juror recalled her saying. 'Don't let this distract you or mislead you.' Other jurors reported warnings by Hill not to be 'fooled' by Murdaugh when he took the stand, along with admonitions to 'watch his body language,' 'look at his actions,' and 'look at his movements.' Juror Z, an anonymized member of the jury who declared Murdaugh guilty, wrote, in an affidavit, that 'I had questions about Mr. Murdaugh's guilt,' and stated that Hill 'made it seem like he was already guilty.'"

Lasdun adds, "These allegations are not new. They first came up at a post-trial hearing two years ago, where Hill denied them."

Hill, Lasdun notes, avoided a jury tampering charge and "was let off with probation and some community service, while Mudaugh's guilty verdict was preserved."

"What drove Hill to apparently go to such lengths to tip the scale?" Lasdun writes. "The ruling vacating Murdaugh's murder charges supports the general view that she was driven by a desire to sell books…. That may be true. It may also be true that she saw herself as a player in some Biblical battle between good and evil: 'I think God had been preparing me all along for the 'Trial of the Century,' she wrote in her book. But, whatever her motive, Hill had good reason to be worried about the prosecution securing a guilty verdict."

Lasdun continues, "I've spent more than four years reporting on the Murdaugh case, and the fact is, there were gaps in the prosecution's case: unexplained tire tracks at the murder scene; evidence deep in the weeds of the phone metadata that arguably tilted more in Murdaugh's favor than against him; the deeply unusual nature of his seeming filicide, even among so-called family annihilators."