After tales of murder, theft and wrongful death, is the Murdaugh reign coming to an end?

Finally, a line has been drawn in the sand in South Carolina’s Lowcountry.

Someone stood up to a Murdaugh, the patriarchs of good-old-boy justice in our five-county area for 86 years during three generations as lead prosecutors.

Oddly enough, the line was drawn by the law firm established by a Murdaugh a century ago in the small town of Hampton.

Alex Murdaugh, 53, was accused last week of “misappropriating” funds at the Peters Murdaugh Parker Eltzroth & Detrich firm founded by his great-grandfather.

The firm announced that Alex Murdaugh is no longer associated with it “in any manner.”

That came hours after Murdaugh announced he had some sort of addiction problem.

Wow.

Next, the 14th Circuit Solicitor’s office finally disassociated itself from Murdaugh, whose father, grandfather and great-grandfather ran that office.

No longer will Alex Murdaugh be allowed be a volunteer prosecutor in the office, something the office says he had not done since 2019 anyway.

Next, Alex Murdaugh was suspended from practicing law by the S.C. Supreme Court.

These are the first inklings that the powerful family long accused of living above the law is losing its political cover.

That’s an important step toward credibility for our criminal justice system.

But it is only a sliver of light in the sordid Lowcountry gloom that has enraptured the world.

The saga began in 2019 when a young woman was killed in the crash of a Murdaugh boat. Then Alex Murdaugh’s wife and son were murdered June 7. A new investigation was launched into a Hampton County death six years ago that reeked of insider interference. A state grand jury is looking into obstruction of justice after the boat crash.

And then came Labor Day weekend.

The legions following the tale’s every move were stunned again on Saturday by Alex Murdaugh’s sickly claim he was shot in the head when he stopped on a rural road to fix a flat tire on a Mercedes he was driving. He was flown by helicopter to Savannah for treatment of what law enforcement officials described as a superficial wound.

Monday afternoon, Alex Murdaugh, out of the hospital, announced he has an addiction problem and was going for in-patient treatment. He apologized for unlisted wrongs to others.

Monday evening, the law firm announced he’s a thief and he has resigned.

A line was finally drawn. But it’s decades overdue.

THE HOSPITAL

It’s not as if the law firm took a courageous step. It had its back to the wall and a gun to its head.

It could not sweep under the rug what has been reported by others as millions — plural — of missing dollars. Besides confronting Alex Murdaugh, it contacted law enforcement and the S.C. Bar Association, and said it would do a forensic audit.

But where were all these people two years ago when Alex Murdaugh showed his stripes — and a glimpse at the Murdaugh family’s modus operandi — in the Emergency Room at Beaufort Memorial Hospital?

That glimpse came on a cold February night when a boat owned by Alex Murdaugh, and allegedly driven by his 20-year-old son Paul, crashed after midnight into a bridge piling near Parris Island. Six underage people in the 17-foot boat had been drinking and were headed to a Murdaugh home in Chechessee. Mallory Beach, 19, was thrown from the boat. Her body was found a week later.

Alex Murdaugh and his father, the late Randolph Murdaugh III, who was this area’s prosecutor for 18 years after taking over for his father, showed up at the hospital.

Nurses and others at work in those early-morning hours said the men first went into Paul’s room and told him not to say anything to law enforcement.

That is probably good legal advice.

But Alex Murdaugh did much more, according to court documents released this July. He “seemed to be trying to orchestrate everyone getting on the same page,” a nurse said.

He obviously wanted them on a page that said no one knew who was driving the boat when it crashed at high speed.

Alex Murdaugh repeatedly asked an investigator if he had reason to believe Paul Murdaugh was driving the boat.

And Alex Murdaugh attempted to intercept other boat passengers before officers interviewed them, nurses said.

They said Alex Murdaugh stopped one of the passengers as he was being wheeled to a CT scan and told him not to say anything and he would take care of it.

He scoured the ER “tracking board” to discover where he could find other boat passengers.

One of the patients didn’t want him in her room, but Alex Murdaugh kept saying she was “with him and he needed to tell (her) what to say,” a nurse said.

Nurses asked security to keep an eye on him and make sure he did not go into patient rooms. His behavior was so troublesome that one ER staffer told him to either go back to his son’s room or leave the ER.

One nurse got the impression that Alex Murdaugh’s concern was staying out of trouble rather than the tragedy that occurred in the dark and foggy Archer’s Creek.

WORLD’S WATCHING

Paul Murdaugh was indicted and charged with three counts of boating under the influence, including boating under the influence resulting in death.

He pleaded not guilty but never spent a minute in jail. And he did not face trial. On June 7, he and his mother were shot to death at a rural family place straddling the Hampton and Colleton county lines.

The state is investigating the murders.

Alex Murdaugh and his other son still face a wrongful death civil suit.

Maybe the state grand jury can answer the question about obstruction of justice after the boat crash.

But for now, finally, a Murdaugh has been told “no.”

It should have happened as soon as the ER nurses had the courage to tell what they saw on the night the dynasty began to crumble.

What they saw was a microcosm of how the Lowcountry got into this mess. What they saw has long been overlooked.

We now have a rare chance with this bizarre saga to put a wooden stake through the heart of the old-boys system that has pulled against justice like pluff mud.

This investigation has only just begun. And for once, the whole world’s watching.

David Lauderdale may be contacted at LauderdaleColumn@gmail.com.

This story was originally published September 10, 2021 at 11:21 AM with the headline "After tales of murder, theft and wrongful death, is the Murdaugh reign coming to an end?."