Alex Murdaugh’s lawyers battle with prosecutors over SC Supreme Court deadlines

A legal battle over deadlines to file key documents in the state Supreme Court has broken out between attorneys for convicted killer and disbarred lawyer Alex Murdaugh and the S.C. Attorney General’s Office, which prosecuted Murdaugh in a 2023 state jury trial.

In that trial, Murdaugh was convicted of murdering his wife, Maggie, and son Paul in a 2021 shooting at their rural Colleton County estate. The conviction is now on appeal. Murdaugh, who is serving two consecutive life without parole sentences, contends he is innocent.

Attorneys for the Attorney General’s Office, which prosecuted the murder case, have just requested an additional 120 days — about four months — to complete their reply to Murdaugh’s appeal brief, which was filed in December. The Supreme Court had already given Wilson’s lawyers until April 10 to respond.

The Attorney General’s Office now wants until Aug. 8 to file their reply to Murdaugh’s brief.

The Supreme Court cannot take up the case until both sides have filed full appeal briefs on all the contested issues from the trial.

Murdaugh’s attorneys oppose the prosecutors’ bid. They say Attorney General Alan Wilson’s lawyers have already had ample time to prepare a reply. Plus, the Attorney General’s office has 90 lawyers and should have no problem preparing a reply by April 10, Murdaugh’s lawyers say.

“If those attorneys cannot meet reasonable court deadlines in major cases, they can retain outside counsel to assist,” the Murdaugh lawyers said in a reply filed Thursday in the Supreme Court.

The Murdaugh lawyers — Dick Harpootlian, Jim Griffin, Margaret Fox and Phil Barber — also say Wilson’s lawyers should need less time to work up a brief since they are already familiar with legal issues and arguments in the case.

Murdaugh’s lawyers also said his appeal involves the matter of former Colleton County Clerk of Court Becky Hill, whom Murdaugh attorneys accused in legal filings of tampering with the jury in hopes of getting a guilty verdict to hype a book Hill was writing.

Although state Judge Jean Toal ruled after a hearing in January 2024 that any tampering by Hill did not affect the jury verdict, Murdaugh attorneys still assert that is a key issue in their appeal.

Various state Supreme Court and 4th Circuit Court of Appeals decisions in cases involving jury tampering support their contention that the Murdaugh convictions will be thrown out, Murdaugh attorneys wrote in opposing the Attorney General’s bid for a delay.

“It is likely (Murdaugh’s) murder convictions will be overturned, and the requested briefing delay would serve only to delay the relief to which (Murdaugh) is entitled,” his attorneys wrote.

In their request for additional time, Wilson and his appeal attorneys — Deputy Attorney General Don Zelenka and Senior Assistant Deputy Attorney General Mark Farthing — called attention to the unusually extensive record in the case, a volume of filings necessitating more time for them to respond.

Already, Murdaugh’s attorneys received court permission to file an extra long brief to state their nine appeal issues, attorney general lawyers wrote.

Attorney general lawyers also wrote they have been working on the state’s appeal brief but have been unable to finish it ”due to the extraordinary circumstances involved in this case.”

Those circumstances include that the transcript of the six-week trial contains nearly 6,000 pages, there are multiple transcripts from other Murdaugh-related hearings, “and numerous recordings and other exhibits requiring review,” Wilson and his attorneys wrote. Additionally, they also have “heavy workloads” already, they wrote.

This is a breaking news story and may be updated.

This story was originally published April 4, 2025 at 11:49 AM.