First Murdaugh hearing set for retrial: Will he appear? And what will he wear?

The first in what is likely to be many hearings leading up to the retrial of Alex Murdaugh’s double murder charges has been scheduled for late June.

The hearing will take place Monday, June 29, at the Lexington County courthouse, according to a notice tucked away on a section of the Colleton County clerk of court public internet site called “Trial Court Roster.”

Jim Griffin, one of Murdaugh’s lead defense attorneys, gave a few more specifics in a Wednesday interview: The hearing will take place at 10 a.m. Monday, June 29, in the large public courtroom of the courthouse’s fourth floor, he said.

Asked if Murdaugh would attend, Griffin said, “We believe he will be there.”

Griffin said the defense team, which includes veteran attorneys Dick Harpootlian and Phil Barber, is going to request that Murdaugh be allowed to wear civilian clothes, “particularly if there are going to be cameras in the courtroom.”

It will be up to state Judge Debra McCaslin to set any rules for cameras , laptops and other devices in the courtroom. Under Section One of the S.C. Constitution, "all courts shall be public.” State judges normally allow recording devices in trials

Murdaugh, a disbarred lawyer, was convicted in March 2023 of murdering his wife, Maggie, and son Paul, after a six-week trial at the Colleton County courthouse. The jury deliberated less than three hours. Judge Clifton Newman sentenced him to two life sentences for the murders.

The killings took place n June 2021 at the Murdaughs’ 1,700-acre family estate in rural Colleton County.

Murdaugh has contended he is innocent of the killings.

Once Murdaugh’s double murder conviction was overturned in May, he again is “presumed innocent” under the law of the charges against him.

However, due to his convictions for financial crimes, he still is a prison inmate.

At Murdaugh’s first trial, in 2023, he wore civilian clothes — usually a blue blazer, slacks and a dress shirt — every day until immediately after he was found guilty. The day after his conviction, when he appeared for sentencing, he wore a jail jumpsuit for the first time as a convicted killer, which he of course no longer is as of last month.

Murdaugh is now being held in a high security area of McCormick state prison, a men’s maximum security prison in McCormick County housing some 1,124 inmates. The S.C. Department of Corrections doesn’t officially say what prison Murdaugh is in, but his location has been widely reported.

Asked what may come up at the June 29 hearing, Griffin said, “I would expect we will discuss possible trial dates, motions, deadlines for motions, discovery issues, scheduling of pretrial hearings, etc. Those are typical things addressed in pretrial hearings.”

Griffin said, “We do not have any intention of filing substantive motions at this time.” Those “substantive motions” would be about matters such as change of venue or evidence-related, he said.

His trial was widely dubbed “the trial of the century” because of its many sensational elements.

Attracting a worldwide audience on Court TV, the trial featured testimony not only about shockingly brutal murders but also about the naked corruption of a supposedly upstanding lawyer from a powerful legal and political family dynasty who stole millions from his law firm and defenseless clients who had won big settlements in lawsuits.

The case was also a whodunit. Murdaugh denied killing his wife and son. Maggie had been slain with an assault rifle and Paul with a shotgun — fatal shootings that allowed the defense to claim there were two killers, not only one as the prosecution contended.

After the trial, Murdaugh admitted his guilt in state and federal court for numerous financial crimes. He is now serving a 27-year sentence for state financial crimes. When he finishes that, he will report to federal prison to finish out a 40-year sentence for federal financial crimes.