Alex Murdaugh alibi ‘unraveling’ in courtroom: source

Alex Murdaugh’s dead son, Paul, caused him no end of trouble when he was alive — and may help convict him of double murder from beyond the grave.

As the sensational Murdaugh trial wraps up its third week at the Colleton County courthouse in Walterboro, SC, the 54-year-old lawyer, accused of murdering his wife and troubled son in June 2021, has appeared much less sure of himself than he did when he was all smug smiles as the trial began on Jan. 23.

Murdaugh, who has since been disbarred, has sobbed openly at times.

Part of his courtroom consternation could stem from a crucial bit of evidence: a video extracted from Paul’s cellphone that may upend a key tenet of Murdaugh’s alibi.

Murdaugh initially told officers who arrived at the scene of the double homicide — the family’s 1,700-acre rural estate, Moselle — that he had not been at the dog kennels where the bodies of his wife, Maggie, 52, and Paul, 22, were found. He said he only discovered their bodies after visiting his elderly mother in a nearby town.

Paul — who had been awaiting trial on a charge of boating under the influence after a crash that led to the death of 19-year-old Mallory Beach, and who had an alleged sinister alter ego dubbed “Timmy” — had been shot twice with a shotgun, blowing his brains out of his head. Maggie was shot multiple times with an AR-style rifle and received a single, execution-style shot to the back of her head while she was face-down on the ground.

But prosecutors played a video clip taken by Paul minutes before he and Maggie were killed near the family’s dog kennel that revealed three voices — which a longtime friend of the Murdaughs testified were Paul, Maggie and Alex.

That revelation has been among the most stunning in a trial replete with grisly details of the gangland-style murders as well as the spectacle of longtime Murdaugh associates and friends breaking the omerta of the Deep South and testifying against the once-powerful attorney.

“There have been some Perry Mason moments, no doubt about it,” Eric Bland, the lawyer for the Murdaughs’ now-dead housekeeper Gloria Satterfield, told The Post. “Alex’s timeline is unraveling, especially him saying he was not at the kennels. Still, the question is whether the jury buys the financial motive. Alex is a complicated man. Money was very important to him.”

Ronnie Crosby, who is an attorney with Murdaugh’s former firm, now rebranded as the Parker Law Group, told jurors Tuesday that he could hear Murdaugh talking to his wife in the background of the video.

The video clip is just under a minute long and begins at 8:44 p.m. Police said they believe Paul was trying to take a video of one of the dogs, as he had been texting with a friend who was worried about its health.

“The three voices on that video are the voices of Paul Murdaugh, Maggie Murdaugh, and Alex Murdaugh,” Crosby said.

“How sure are you?” asked prosecutor Creighton Waters.

“I’m 100% sure that those voices are on the audio there,” Crosby said.

Murdaugh, however, initially told police that the last time he saw his wife and son was when they ate dinner together around 8:15 p.m. He said he was napping on the couch when they were killed, and left around 9:06 p.m. to visit his mother, who is suffering from late-stage Alzheimer’s.

The caregiver for Murdaugh’s mother also testified in court that Murdaugh had lied about how long he had been at his mom’s house on the night of the murders.

Shelley Smith said Murdaugh had been at the house for about 20 minutes but he later came to her and claimed he had been there for 30 to 40 minutes.

Murdaugh, who has pleaded not guilty to the murders, faces life in prison without parole if found guilty. The trial was supposed to end Friday, but the testimony about Murdaugh’s many alleged financial crimes has slowed things down considerably, as did a bomb threat on Wednesday.

The chief financial officer of Murdaugh’s former law firm testified on Feb. 2 that she confronted him about hundreds of thousands of dollars in missing funds the very morning before Maggie and Paul were murdered.

Jeanne Seckinger testified in Colleton County court on Thursday without the jury present, as Judge Clifton Newman was considering allowing the prosecution to present evidence of Murdaugh’s alleged financial crimes — for which he is separately facing 99 charges.

On June 7, 2021, the day of the murders, Seckinger confronted Alex Murdaugh about  $792,000 in missing client settlement money.

The money should have been paid to the firm, Peters Murdaugh Parker Eltzroth & Detrick, rather than an individual attorney, she said.

“I find that the jury is entitled to consider whether the apparent desperation of Mr. Murdaugh because of his dire financial situation and threat of being exposed for committing the crimes of which he was later charged with resulted in the commission of the alleged crimes,” Newman said. “While motive is not a necessary element, the state must prove malice, and evidence of motive may be used to prove it.”

A longtime family friend from Hampton, SC, said the revelations about what Murdaugh’s law firm knew about his alleged financial shenanigans were among the most shocking moments of the trial.

“Any real law firm conducts regular audits,” the friend told The Post. “The fact that they knew he was up to this and didn’t really do anything speaks volumes about how much they indulged and enabled Alex.”

Defense attorney Dick Harpootlian claims Murdaugh is innocent and was the patriarch of a close and loving family. He has cited another Snapchat video from Paul’s phone showing father and son happily tooling around Moselle about two hours before the murders. He also said the cellphone records placed into evidence by the prosecution tell only part of the story and are “incomplete.”

“Paul, the apple of his eye,” Harpootlian told jurors. “You are going to see a video from the night of the murders of Paul and Alex riding around looking at trees they planted, a Snapchat sent to other people. They were laughing, having a good time.”

Prosecutor Creighton Waters has said from the outset that Murdaugh killed his family because he was afraid that his years of swindling and embezzling from his clients and those around him were going to come to light.

Jurors have also heard how Murdaugh, while sometimes weeping in court, was dry-eyed when officers got to Moselle after his 911 call telling dispatchers his wife and son were dead.

“He was upset, but I didn’t see any visible tears,” Colleton County Sgt. Daniel Greene told the courtroom.

Jurors also heard how Murdaugh mentioned his son’s boat crash to the 911 dispatcher, as well as to cops who arrived after the call, implying that his son had enemies because of the crash.

“This is a long story,” Murdaugh told the first officer on the scene. “My son was in a boat wreck. I know that’s what this is.”

The once-untouchable family ran the prosecutor’s offices in the five counties that make up South Carolina’s Low Country while also operating a powerhouse litigation firm, Peters Murdaugh Parker Eltzroth & Detrick, with tentacles in the highest echelons of the red state — despite being Democrats.

Waters has to prove, in a case that is largely circumstantial, that Murdaugh murdered his family to distract from his rapidly unraveling financial schemes that allegedly involved tax evasion, forgery, money laundering and fraud.

He also has to prove that Murdaugh used two different guns.

But attorney Bland pointed out that it just takes one or two jurors to upend the state’s case.

“Those are the jurors Harpootlian is speaking to,” Bland said. “Or at least he hopes he is.”