COLUMBIA, S.C. — A federal grand jury has been convened to look into Alex Mudaugh's financial affairs, including Murdaugh's most sensational alleged theft — the looting of his deceased housekeeper's $4 million estate.
Although news outlets including The State have quoted unnamed sources citing federal involvement into Murdaugh matters, the federal grand jury's existence and mission was only officially confirmed recently in a lawsuit filed in federal court in Columbia.
That lawsuit quoted a subpoena — "Grand Jury Subpoena Number 2022-0064" — issued to Nautilus Insurance Company seeking its records about a $5 million umbrella insurance coverage for Murdaugh that was used to pay claims in the 2018 death of former Murdaugh housekeeper Gloria Satterfield, who died after a fall at Murdaugh's estate in Colleton County.
The subpoena means there are now officially two grand juries — one state and one federal — diving into the morass of complex alleged financial crimes involving millions of dollars and easily more than a dozen victims in what has become South Carolina's most sensational true-crime saga this century.
Although the federal grand jury's subpoena is about the Satterfield insurance payout, federal grand juries traditionally have latitude to delve into related subjects.
In addition to probing financial crimes, the state grand jury is also said to be investigating the unsolved killings last June of his wife, Maggie, and son, Paul, at the family's Colleton County estate.
While the state grand jury has been publicly aggressive, issuing more than a dozen indictments against Murdaugh since last fall, accusing him of defrauding clients, colleagues and others of more than $8 million, the federal grand jury has been operating without fanfare. Grand juries usually work in secret, gathering information that prosecutors can use to file formal, public charges against a defendant.
Sources say the federal grand jury, however, also has been active for months, even though it has not yet issued any indictments. It is investigating how Murdaugh and others may have interacted with Palmetto State Bank in Hampton, a bank where Murdaugh and his former law firm had millions of dollars in various accounts. Murdaugh used Palmetto State Bank to launder money he allegedly stole from his former law firm's client trust account and funnel it to his own accounts, according to state grand jury indictments.
Dick Harpootlian, one of Murdaugh's attorneys, said he had no comment on the federal grand jury's involvement.
The last time there were two grand jury investigations into a high profile South Carolina financial crime was when both federal authorities and state authorities were investigating the now-defunct SCANA and that company's multi-million dollar failure of the V.C. Summer nuclear plant in Fairfield County.
In that investigation, a federal grand jury, federal prosecutors and the FBI assumed the more aggressive role, eventually getting guilty pleas of fraud from two top former SCANA officials and a former official from Westinghouse, the company hired by SCANA to build the plant. The fraud charges involved top officials' efforts to hide the extent of construction delays and cost overruns at the nuclear plant, problems that, had they been made public, would have likely deflated SCANA's stock price.
Brook Andrews, the chief assistant U.S. attorney over white collar crimes, had no comment Tuesday when asked about the now-public existence of the federal grand jury probe into Murdaugh-related matters.
The Nautilus lawsuit also named assistant U.S. Attorney Emily Limehouse as one of the federal prosecutors involved in seeking information about Murdaugh's involvement with Nautilus. Limehouse, who prosecutes financial crimes, was part of the prosecution team investigating SCANA's crimes.
The Nautilus lawsuit, which seeks to have a federal judge determine whether Murdaugh can keep all his Satterfield-related insurance records secret, said the federal grand jury is investigating how "Murdaugh and others coordinated efforts to improperly obtain insurance money."
A spokesman for Attorney General Alan Wilson, whose office is overseeing the state's Murdaugh investigation, had no comment Tuesday when asked about the federal involvement.
"We cannot comment on anything grand jury-related, whether state or federal," Attorney General spokesman Robert Kittle said. "However, as a general matter, while this Office always retains leadership in our cases, we also always look to cooperate and coordinate with our federal partners."
State Law Enforcement Division Chief Mark Keel declined to comment about the federal involvement.
Murdaugh eventually wound up with more $3 million in insurance money — much of it apparently from Nautilus — from Satterfield's estate that should have gone to Satterfield's two heirs, according to lawsuits and state criminal indictments in the case.
Federal Judge Richard Gergel has been assigned to the case. No hearing date has been set.
