The jury spent six weeks listening to evidence and arguments in the double-murder trial of Alex Murdaugh but just hours to return their guilty verdict.
Murdaugh, the disbarred personal injury lawyer, was convicted on 2 March of brutally murdering his wife Maggie, 52, and his son, Paul, 22, at the family home in Colleton County, South Carolina, on 7 June 2021.
The 12 jurors considered four charges against Murdaugh: Two counts of murder and two counts of possession of a weapon during the commission of a violent crime — one for each murder.
To be found guilty of possession of a weapon charge, he had to be first found guilty of the violent crime in which the weapon was used.
The murder charges each carry a sentence of 30 years to life for the murder conviction.
Jurors were taken for a site visit of the crime scene on Wednesday morning after the defence and prosecution had rested their cases.
They toured the dog kennels and feed room at the Murdaugh family’s 1,700-acre Moselle estate, where Murdaugh is accused of the heinous slaying of his wife and younger son.
Paul was shot twice with a shotgun as he stood in the feed room of the kennels, with the second bullet blowing his brain from its skull.
Maggie was shot four to five times with an AR-15-style rifle a few yards from her son, as she backed into an ATV parked under a hangar.
Mr Murdaugh pleaded not guilty when charged in the summer of 2022.
Once they had inspected the site, jurors were brought back to Colleton County Courthouse in Walterboro, and the State of South Carolina‘s lead prosecutor on the case Creighton Waters, and his team, including the state’s Attorney General Alan Wilson, presented their closing argument outlining why Mr Murdaugh should be found guilty of the murders.
Mr Murdaugh’s defence team then outlined their grounds for why the defendant should be found not guilty based on reasonable doubt that he committed the murders on Thursday morning. Attorney Jim Griffin presented their closing argument. The team was led by attorney Dick Harpootlian.
Prosecutor John Meadors then gave the prosecution’s rebuttal before Judge Clifton Newman instructed the jury of the charges and sent them to deliberate.
As with any trial, there are few clues as to how the jury has absorbed testimony from 61 prosecution witnesses, 14 defence witnesses, and six rebuttal witnesses.
Reporters in the court have described them as attentive throughout the trial.
A unanimous guilty verdict was required for a murder trial, so only one juror needed to believe that the state has not proven its case beyond a reasonable doubt.
