Stephen Smith homicide probe makes ‘substantial progress’

The homicide investigation into the mysterious death of a South Carolina teen with possible ties to the infamous Murdaugh family includes a wealth of new evidence, lawyers for the alleged victim’s loved ones said this week.

“Substantial progress is being made in the homicide investigation of Stephen Smith,” attorney Eric Bland told local news service WIS.

Smith, 19, was found dead in the early hours of July 8, 2015, on Sandy Run Road in Hampton County — not far from the 1,700-acre Moselle estate where lawyer Alex Murdaugh later gunned down his wife, Maggie, and younger son, Paul.

Although the nursing student’s death was initially attributed to a hit-and-run accident, the case was reopened in 2021 after police discovered new information while investigating Maggie and Paul’s killings.

The South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED) reclassified the incident as a homicide in March, and Smith’s body was exhumed for re-examination in April.

Bland, who represents Smith’s family with his law partner, Ronnie Richter, told WIS he received the promising update in the case during a recent call with SLED Chief Mark Keel.

“He said, ‘Look, Eric, I am optimistic in a positive way, I see progress being made, real progress,’” Bland explained.

“‘We think we’ve talked to a number of people, and we think that there’s five or six people that have information. We’ve learned some things we didn’t know already,’ he told me.”

The reported progress comes seven years after Smith’s mother, Sandy Smith, accused Alex Murdaugh’s older son, Buster, of playing a role in her son’s death in a scathing 2016 letter to the FBI.

In the missive, Sandy accuses the powerful Murdaughs of reaching out very soon after her son’s death offering to represent the grieving family, only to drop them a few weeks later.

Stephen’s twin sister, Stephanie, has also claimed other teens said Buster, now 26, killed her brother “with a baseball bat.”

Unfounded rumors have circulated for years that Smith, who was openly gay, was in a secret relationship with Buster.

Earlier this year, a South Carolina Highway Patrol trooper with ties to the original investigation confirmed that Buster was “on [our] radar” at the time.

Buster Murdaugh vehemently denied the “vicious rumors” about any involvement in the teen’s death in March, just a few weeks after his father was sentenced to two consecutive life terms for killing his mother and brother.

Bland confirmed this week SLED already received the results of Smith’s second autopsy. 

The attorneys will be receiving the results in a written report sometime this week.

“Sandy Smith is not looking for somebody to be charged with Stephen’s murder, she’s looking for an explanation,” Bland said of Smith’s mother.

 “She isn’t going to be upset if there’s not a Murdaugh connection to what happened to her son.

“I think she’s going to get answers.”

In an interview last month, Sandy Smith told WIS that SLED’s decision to re-examine her son’s death as a homicide was “the best information that I’ve had in a long time.”

“I’ve waited so long to hear that because I knew it was a homicide and I just had to get people to believe Stephen’s story. That was a great day,” she continued.

Bland told the outlet this week he believes the state will release an outline of what happened to Smith by Labor Day.