Convicted killer Alex Murdaugh is being held in a secure area of prison over fears the notoriety of the case will lead other inmates to try and harm him.
The disgraced lawyer has been sentenced to life in prison after he shot dead his wife and their younger son.
The downfall of this once all-powerful legal scion captivated the country with reporters and true-crime fanatics packing out the courtroom to hear the latest turns in the case.
In a case highlighted in the Netflix documentary Murdaugh Murders: A Southern Scandal, the jury took less than three hours to conclude prominent lawyer Murdaugh was responsible for the deaths of son Paul, 22, and wife Maggie, 52.
His wife was shot four or five times with a rifle and son Paul was shot twice with a shotgun at the kennels near their rural Colleton County home on June 7, 2021 in South Carolina, US.
For now he is behind bars at Kirkland Correctional Institution in Columbia, South Carolina.
He is being held in a single cell and kept away from other inmates, the South Carolina Department of Corrections told TMZ.
The high-profile prisoner is under constant surveillance and he even eats alone with his meals brought directly to his cell.
When he leaves the cell he is escorted by at least one guard.
Murdaugh will be held at Kirkland for a 45 day evaluation period before he's assigned to a new prison. From then he is expected to be treated like a more regular prisoner unless a specific threat is made against him.
In his cell he has a chance to buy a TV and can pay for phone calls to his remaining loved ones.
Prosecutors alleged Murdaugh committed the horrific murders to distract from his financial situation after he was accused of stealing millions of dollars from clients and his law firm.
The killer still faces numerous charges over fraud and even an attempt to fake his own death.
He admitted stealing millions of dollars from the family firm and clients, saying he needed the money to fund his drug habit.
The lawyer blamed his decades long addiction to opioids for making him paranoid, creating a distrust of police.
He said that once he went down that path, he felt trapped in the lie.
“Oh, what a tangled web we weave. Once I told a lie — I told my family — I had to keep lying,” he testified.
He was accused of stealing nearly $800,000 (£666,000) in lawyer fees on the day of the killings.
