← Criminally Obsessed
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- [00:02]
A
Welcome to Criminally Obsessed. I'm Ann Emerson. During the double murder trial of Alec Murdoch Back in 2023, I sat so close to Alec Murdoch at times I could have almost reached out and touched him. The same thing with the prosecution team. And I can still feel how hard those benches were in the courtroom. And you know who else was there? Wall Street Journal reporter Valerie Baraline. She wrote a best selling book about the Murdoch saga. I've got it right here for my viewers on YouTube. It's called the Devil at His El Alec Murdoch and the Fall of a Southern Dynasty. And today we're hashing out all things Murdoch, including all those unanswered questions and the things that Blanca told me, the theories and what Valerie thinks is going to happen next and happen soon with Alex Appeal. Whenever you think there can't possibly be anything more to the Murdoch story, surprise. You've had a very busy few years as.
- [01:03]
B
As have you. But vice versa. It's great to see you. It's funny, those of us that were in the courtroom every day for six weeks, it was our own little community and subculture there for a while in Walterboro. So it's great to get to see you.
- [01:14]
A
I know. It was like our own little ecosystem, wasn't it? It was like we.
- [01:18]
B
Or Stockholm syndrome, however you want to think about it.
- [01:22]
A
I can't actually. Sometimes I have to be honest. Like, I can't believe we sat on those hard benches for, for that long. Like, I. There's a part of me that doesn't know how my body handled it.
- [01:32]
B
For that long was such a. It was such a privilege to be there and so surreal at times because you, you're very aware of the world that was watching too. But I can remember in my notes, you know, we couldn't have phones and everything. And I can remember in my notebook many times just writing, is this really happening? Like when Alec got. Alec Murdoch got up to take the stand and things of that nature. So it really was a surreal experience. Three years on entertains that way. Our friends from. From Dateline had made laminated placards so we would sit in our seats.
- [02:04]
A
I know I still have mine somewhere. I should have pulled it out.
- [02:07]
B
Well, I took it. I've got mine right here. I took it to the, I went to the, you know, it's, you know, the Supreme Court hearing about the Murdoch case a couple weeks ago, and I had my placard with me.
- [02:15]
A
So you're like, I can come in now.
- [02:17]
B
It was, it was a serious. Obviously it was A very serious trial and the stakes were so high. But it was a fascinating, you know, cultural moment to be a part of for sure.
- [02:25]
A
Absolutely.
- [02:26]
B
Yeah.
- [02:26]
A
Well, and first off, like, you're a Carolina girl. I mean, Carolina, Carolina born and bred.
- [02:32]
B
Yeah, I've, I've, I've been, I grew up in Wilmington, North Carolina, just north of the South Carolina line. And I've either worked in north and South Carolina my whole career. So I'm a, I'm a parachuted into South Carolina from, you know, Raleigh for this story.
- [02:47]
A
Absolutely. Well, you know, you just wrote. I mean, I've got it next to me. And for those listening, as I told you, I've got Valerie's best selling book with me here. The Devil at His Elbow, Alec Murdoch and the Fall of a Southern Dynasty. Valerie, your writing is so beautiful. I know. I always knew you were an incredibly talented writer. But I have to say, like reading this, like it took me, took me straight back into it and into the whole story and the, and the brutality of it as, as we're going to talk about and the tragedy, it's just. Do you feel like after writing this, you know, sort of it's masterpiece. I mean, it's just.
- [03:29]
B
Thank you.
- [03:29]
A
It's masterfully written. If you haven't read it, it's, it's mast. Do you feel like you've gotten Murdoch out of your system?
- [03:38]
B
Oh, no. I mean people are so fascinated by this story and, and I think you experience if we're here talking about a related case three years after the verdict and 11 years after Stephen Smith was, was killed.
- [03:51]
A
If you missed our last episode, we talked with Valerie all about the unsolved homicide of Stephen Smith back in 2015. We'll make sure it's linked below.
- [04:00]
B
There's something endlessly fascinating about the Murdoch case and it's not Alec Murdoch. It's not the human being of Alec Murdoch. It is the sprawling dynasty and the way that power worked for them and for Alec in particular and how he used it and what he was willing to sacrifice to keep it, namely his wife and son. And I think it just is so illustrative of the rural South. So, you know, it's not out of my system at all. I've been continuing to cover, not as deeply as you by any means, but there's another true crime case in South Carolina that I've been working on, the Scott Spivey case. Because I think it's all of a piece the way that, that, that law and order works in certain parts of the world.
- [04:40]
A
Your Career has taken you through lots of different kinds of investigations, right. How did you kind of end up going harder into this true crime world of how did. How did your sort of investigatory, like, spirit get you here?
- [04:57]
B
When I was a little younger, I worked at the state. I did not imagine I'd take a pivot after 20 years at the Wall Street Journal and dip into true crime. But I wrote my first story about Dick Harpootlian in the year 2000, when he was head of the Democratic party and Henry McMaster was head of the Republican Party. And so those, you know, those, the. The personalities, the way that, that, that things get done, that, you know, kind of the brass knuckle, you know, the raw nature of politics there. I've always been involved with it. So I followed the. The boat wreck case in 2019 just out of interest. And then when we started to learn more and more about what Alec Murdoch was up to, it just became an irresistible way to talk about what. I've been observing this out my whole career.
- [05:39]
A
Well, I mean, you say it beautifully. I was investigating a lot of things besides true crime as a general assignment reporter. And, you know, my. My path was always, you know, going hard and fast into whatever the breaking news was. I know it was almost like when. And I've said it before, like when the Alec Murdoch story hit, it was like it sucked all the air out of the room. I have to ask you, did you read Blanca's book? Did you get a chance? You did? Okay, yes, yes, yes. And I've done some really interesting interviews with Blanca as well.
- [06:13]
B
I saw that one of them had like a million views or something.
- [06:17]
A
She's right. This interview with Blanca has more than a million views. Definitely give it a listen if you haven't already. We'll link it below. And it's been nominated for a Shorty Award.
- [06:28]
B
I did read Blanca's book, and I've interviewed Blanca many times. We were in touch frequently. It has been. And she expressed this to you? It has been validating for her to have her story out in the world and to feel heard. I think she's felt in a vice in Hampton county where the people that were still loyal to the Murdochs felt like she was betraying that legacy somehow. But then I felt like, you know, other people, she felt like they judged her for being too close to them. And so she felt sort of in a rock and a hard place. And so it has been validating to have the wider. You know, it was a New York Times bestseller the week it came out. And to have to be able to tell her story and for it to be received as, as a human story about a woman she knew, I think has been. Been helpful. Helpful for her.
- [07:13]
A
Yeah, I think so too. I think so too. And it really gave me a. An interesting look at what she was seeing, you know, that she felt had not been completely investigated. And I wanted to ask you, because I asked Kenny about this too, and he said, I think people should be listening to Blanca, you know that. But that was basically where he took it. Where do you take it? As, as someone who's gone so deep,
- [07:39]
B
I think we should. I think it's my opinion that, that Blanca has some really relevant perspective on this. And, and as you know, as we know and I wrote about in the book, they almost didn't call her. They weren't going to call her to the stand. And she was one of the most, when you talk to the jurors, one of the most effective witnesses. Just so real up there. But I try to put forth some of the evidence that she's offering, such as, you know, there's a, in the, in. In Daniel Green. You interviewed Daniel Green, the first officer on the scene in his body Cam, as he looks at Alex, the open door of Alex, big Suburban, as he looks at it, there's a wadded up beach towel kind of between the seat and the console. And Blanca saw it and she's like, he did it, he did it. There's that towel she had fold. It was a beach towel that was going to go back with Maggie to Edistow. She had folded it that day. There would have been a reason. He would have needed to dry himself with that towel and put it in the console. And so for her, that was one of the pieces of evidence. There were more. She has some theories about the presence of empty baggies where Alec had his pill. Did Maggie. His pills, Did Maggie find those when she walked in the door that night? Is that why they had the shortest dinner in the history of all dinners?
- [08:52]
A
So I.
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B
There are things that Blanca witness as a person you think about, think about somebody that's in your home every day. And always. I always remember when Plaquen was testifying and I had not. I did not know her yet at that time, but she was talking from muscle memory. Well, his shirt would have been in that drawer and he would have had to reach up here to get that. And that is someone who knows how you live, who knows you intimately. And so I think for many reasons, but that reason in particular, and she's a Former federal law enforcement agent. Right. I mean, she was, she was a federal corrections officer and a veteran. She's, she's trained and a very. To me, she was very credible.
- [09:29]
A
Yeah, me too. And I. The part about the cleaners, you know, I was going back in and, and looking at, you know, when I was reading through that whole section with your book as well. You know, she has this theory that, that whoever, whatever happened after the murders was not. That she doesn't believe Alec cleaned up whatever happened by himself, which is really disturbing to think about after all of the evidence, you know, and I asked, I've asked everybody, I mean, I think I've asked Creighton Waters, the lead prosecutor about this and he said, if there's evidence out there, I'm going to come and investigate. Like, absolutely. If evidence is presented to me that there was somebody else there, of course we've got to follow that up. But it just hasn't come to light. You'll remember these quote cleaners from our interview with Blanca.
- [10:20]
C
Some people have misunderstood. When I sit, when I call them the cleaners, I'm not saying that they help commit the crime. What I'm saying is that they help clean up. That's why I call them the cleaners in my book.
- [10:35]
A
What do you think about the cleaners?
- [10:37]
B
Well, you know, it was a huge privilege to me. I had the chance to go out to the site where Paul and Maggie were killed with the jury.
- [10:47]
A
If you're listening on audio, I have the crime scene area up right now.
- [10:50]
B
I was the pool reporter.
- [10:53]
A
You are eyes and ears and, and feet that day. I remember it very well.
- [10:58]
B
I remember calling my talk. I talked to my editor in New York. He saw it on the wire that I was going to be on the one to go. And he called me, he's like, well, Val, with great power comes your great responsibility. Don't screw this up. So it was. It was a privilege. It was also. I wanted to get it right for everyone. But being out there, I'm telling you, Ann, it is, it is. It is bigger than Central Park. Moselle is so enormous. Enormous. Twice as big.
- [11:23]
A
All right. We had to check and see if this right. And yep, Central park is 843 acres. And Moselle is more than 1700 acres. Yeah, I'll just let you sit with that for a second. It's big.
- [11:35]
B
And so just standing out there in the kennels, it's. You're so remote to the road to anything. And Blanca, who lived out there that summer after Maggie and Paul were killed. She told me that, like, even as remote as it is, if somebody pulled in, there were a lot of looky loose. If somebody pulled in the driveway down at the kennels, even just to turn around, the dogs who were a couple hundred yards up the road would start barking. I think in the kennel video, if there was anybody nearby, dogs would have been losing their mind. I really do believe that. I don't think there's any evidence in my mind that supports that anybody was there when it happened except for Alec. I do think there is a possibility, even a likelihood, that there was enough window of time between the time Alec left for Almeida to go see his mother and he gets back and, and calls 911 and then it takes 20 minutes for Daniel Green to get there. So roughly an hour or so unattended. That crime scene, there was an opportunity for someone to come in. And I think that, you know, we'll see any evidence that that actually happened. You remember, you know, Maggie's Mercedes. There was a lot of testimony about Maggie's Mercedes that she pulled up in front of the house from coming in, from getting her nails done. Right. And went up to the main house and had dinner. There was testimony from a lot of people and I interviewed a lot of people who said with, with fresh nails, fresh toenails and flip flops on. She had her. Tory Birch flip flops. Right. She didn't walk 300 yards from the house to the kennel. She didn't walk there. She didn't ride on the golf cart with Alec. He says he went down after her. How did she get there? I think it has always been in my mind, like the, the people I've talked to said she would take the Mercedes down there. She probably would have driven down there and driven back. At that hour, it's pitch black. Kenny Kenzie famously said it's a whole definition of dark to be a Moselle at night. It is so dark. I think there, there's a question in my mind about whether she drove the Mercedes down there and did someone else drive it back up to the house.
- [13:39]
A
Blanca talked about the Mercedes in a previous interview. We're going to link it below.
- [13:43]
C
When I'm pulling up, I'm looking around to see if I see anybody there. There was a police car. The last tree on the right hand side of the driveway, there was a police car or a deputy car. I pulled up to the front and I looked over. Maggie's car was to the right.
- [14:05]
A
Blanca, you said that when you came in, you saw her car parked to the right. Why did that bother you?
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C
Because Maggie used to pull up to the left always. Mm.
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A
And that car was on the road
- [14:18]
C
every once in a while. I can tell you, she tried to change where people. Where everybody parked one time and said, we're all parking to the right and park our vehicles a certain way. It didn't work. Paul would pull up straight to his usual spot. Straight up. Maggie would always pull up to the left. If Buster was there, he would pull up to the right, and then I would either pull up right next to Buster's truck, or I would pull up right next to the kitchen entrance if Alex wasn't there with my truck.
- [14:51]
A
Did anybody explain to you why that car was parked on the right?
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C
Nobody said anything.
- [14:55]
B
There was testimony around that at the trial, but. But Creighton Waters or any of the prosecutors are not allowed to. To lead and to tie pieces of evidence together neatly with the bow. So we have to say. All right, well, you're. You're talking with us about a cooler. For example. There was a cooler. Could you put wet things in a cooler? They had to present evidence that we couldn't necessarily make complete sense of at the time.
- [15:21]
A
I talked to. To Blanca about her wedding ring. I didn't understand when Creighton was up there, maybe you got caught this. And I just. I just didn't understand it. Of course she has on, like. I mean, she had on beautiful rings, like on her wedding ring. And the ring that was found. You know, the ring that they found in the Mercedes was down in the seat. And yeah, there was, like, big thing that she had taken her diamond ring off because she was mad at Alec, and she's gonna stick it under the seat or she got a manicure or maybe. These are valid things, but not according to Blanca. Why would you have just one ring off? Blanca told us about the ring theory.
- [16:02]
C
To me, it makes sense that whoever it was that took that ring off her finger was possibly trying to put it in, like, a side pocket, cargo pocket or something, and it fell and it fell, and it fell. So to me, the person that drove that Mercedes from the hangar back to the house after the murders, she had three rings.
- [16:26]
B
Nobody would know that.
- [16:27]
A
But a Blanca, you know, well, she
- [16:29]
B
knew, and she knew where took that ring off. Well, I think it's a fantastic question. I mean, Maggie was wearing tens of thousands of dollars worth of jewelry, so it is a question who took the ring off and why? And she did not get a man. So we. We don't know. But I Think Blanca's theories are as credible as anyone's.
- [16:52]
A
I do, too. I just, I always thought that was so interesting because it was just. It didn't support the evidence of the case of what needed to be presented by the prosecution. And with very good reason. As you just said, there was no reason to go deep down into that, you know, rabbit hole. But now we can. So I have a feeling we're gonna be talking about this when we're like, we're gonna be talking about this for another 20 years.
- [17:17]
B
I've, I've, you know, I've.
- [17:18]
C
I've.
- [17:19]
B
I've had the same conversation with Creighton. That, and I think very highly of Creighton that you did. Like, what evidence are y' all looking at? This, that and the other thing. But I do think that, you know, we. I talk about a little bit in the book that, that Maggie, when she pulled the Mercedes up in front of the house, she did not take her bags out, right? She didn't take her, her, her, her bag, her. Any of her little Louis Vuitton bags, even her purse with her phone in it. I mean, I think all that is to say it was still in the Mercedes the next morning when Blanca went and emptied it out. It just doesn't track to me as a person that walks into my house. I don't leave my phone and my purse in, in the car. I think that, that it is possible to me that the Mercedes was taken down to the kennels. Maybe Maggie was going to leave. Maybe she was just. Maybe she's going to leave, go back to Edista with the dogs or at least with Bubba. I don't know. But I think there, as you remember, the beach family, Mallory Beach's family had kind of. They settled with Maggie's estate. And one of the things that they settled was with was Mark Tinsley wanted to take possession of the Mercedes suv. It was relatively new and an auction off for a good cost for malice pals for Mallory's charity.
- [18:28]
A
Mark Tinsley is a lawyer who represented Mallory beach after she died in the 2019 boat crash that we talked about earlier. He filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Alec Murdoch. That really was the unraveling of Alex Financial crimes. As a part of this civil lawsuit, he would have been forced to disclose his financial information and it would have shown he was not only broke, but he was seriously in debt. Eventually, a settlement was reached. As part of the settlement, Maggie's Mercedes would go to the beaches. Tinsley planned to auction it off for an animal rescue. Charity started in Mallory's memory called Mal's Pals. I'll link it in the show notes.
- [19:04]
B
But apparently he still doesn't have that suv. And that case has been settled for almost three years. There's a, there's a, it's still in evidence, you know.
- [19:16]
A
Okay, that's so interesting. Thank you for sharing that. I didn't know that.
- [19:21]
B
No, I think, I think that, you know, Stephen Smith, to me is the core, the core mysteries we still want to solve so badly. But they're all these ancillary cases that are, that are also still fascinating to me and to many other people. To you, for sure.
- [19:36]
A
Yeah, absolutely. Well, thank you for, for doing this and, and talking to me about this. The, the book, the Devil at His Elbow. Just masterful.
- [19:48]
B
Thank you. Have me back. Because I think, Ann, I think in a couple weeks, in a couple weeks, please have me back. I think the Supreme Court is going to rule this spring. Okay. Yeah.
- [19:58]
A
No, you're coming back. Absolutely. We got to talk about that. We're talking about Alec Murdoch's appeal of his double murder conviction. And just a few weeks ago in February, the state Supreme Court justices heard oral arguments in the case. We live streamed it and covered it in a few episodes. We'll link below, highly recommend checking it out to get caught up with this appeal. Now, look, Valerie, you are not telling me that we're going back into this for another.
- [20:24]
B
That I don't know. And I, and I've talked to, I have talked to Dick, her and I talked to Dick that afternoon and he said, look, if you, the body language may have said one thing in terms of the questions that the, the judges were asking, the justices were asking. Their body language may have been one thing, which seemed like a pretty bad day for the state's case. Maybe. But if you think you know what they're going to do based on what they're asking. He's like, I've been mistaken so many times. Don't. Who knows? So we'll see. But I do think they're going to rule. I do think they're going to rule the spring.
- [20:54]
A
Yeah. And you know, I put it at. I was thinking it was kind of be closer to the summer, but I think you're probably right. Of course they did it at. You know, Charlie Condon are our legal analysts and fantastic former South Carolina Attorney General. He said basically there is like no reason why they would not have done taken this case. There's absolutely no reason. This is a fascinating big case that they needed to hear at The South Carolina Supreme Court. He was surprised at how hard they pressed Creighton. He was very surprised that it went that hard. He did not expect that actually because of Justice Toll and her standing. And they did not even really, they really didn't even go there. They didn't even press the defense that hard. They pressed Creighton. It could be because they wanted to cross their T's and dot their eyes. But Condon was like, yeah, he was surprised. When Condon says he's surprised, that's what we don't know.
- [21:51]
B
Because the justice, the justice that asked the first question comes out with the trial transcript. That's thousands, tens of thousands of pages highlighted. You can see the post it notes, first question out of the box. What about the egg lady juror?
- [22:05]
A
You heard that, right?
- [22:06]
B
Egg lady.
- [22:07]
A
That was a nickname for a juror in Alex double murder trial who was removed from the jury for allegedly talking about the case with people outside of court. She was known as the Egg lady because when the judge dismissed her, he asked if she had anything she needed to retrieve from the jury room. And she said her carton of eggs. Another juror had brought fresh eggs in to share with fellow jurors.
- [22:29]
B
And then the questions were remarkably consistent about how the juror's testimony was treated, who was, who was deemed credible and who wasn't. How did Justice Toll handle that? And I was surprised by that. There was very little testimony, as you recall, about the financials and the other issues. But it was pretty, and the fact that, and, and Charlie, Charlie was ag. When I covered politics, we used to, you know, and his, his chief foil as attorney general was Dick Harpootlian, who was head of the Democratic Party. And I can remember my seat mate in the state newspaper, Aaron Shine. And call him one time, he picked up the phone, he goes, dick, Charlie Condon, go. Because those two. Because Charlie, you know, Charlie was always trying to, he was always, he was very aware of, of how to, to get attention to an issue, you remember. But anyway, so, but I was, I was surprised by the, the tenor of their questions. And it's been pointed out to me by many lawyers who watched the idea that they're, they're, they're using the phrase structural error as opposed to harmless error. If it's structural, you can't remedy it. And it has to be, it has to be a do over. Which is. Which, I don't know. But, you know, I think my eye
- [23:34]
A
just started twitching when you said that. Okay, well, I mean, and it, and
- [23:39]
B
like I said at the Jump. It is a serious case. The stakes are life. And. But it also was this fascinating public event and the idea that we might, at Alec Murdoch might have another time in the spotlight is sort of hard to fathom, you know?
- [23:55]
A
Yeah, right back at it, man. Well, thank you so much, Valerie.
- [23:58]
B
Thank you.
- [24:00]
A
Such a pleasure to talk to you and see you again and yes, absolutely. Let's circle back when this appeal comes through and we're gonna, we gotta, we gotta hash it all out.
- [24:10]
B
I'm just gonna.
- [24:12]
A
We're gonna build two war rooms.
- [24:16]
B
Your timing, right?
- [24:17]
A
We're gonna have our two war rooms and just have at it and figure out how this is going to work.
- [24:21]
B
Well, keep. Keep at it. I think like I mentioned to you, but your listeners, your interviews early on with the key players in this case, particularly the detectives from Kol county, are such important. I mean, a couple hours of historical in the moment testimony from them, that's really important. So keep at better.
- [24:42]
A
Well, thank you.
- [24:43]
C
I will.
- [24:43]
A
Yeah, I absolutely will. Y' all heard it here. We will most certainly be back here with Valerie, maybe even sooner than later when we get an update on Alec Bardock's appeal. It just never ends, does it? Let us know in the comments below what you think is going to happen with Alex appeal and make sure you're subscribed so you never missed.