Photos: Murdaugh filing provides new details about murders
Warning: Graphic content. Read at your discretion.
COLLETON COUNTY, S.C. (WCBD) – The legal team for disbarred attorney and accused murderer Alex Murdaugh is providing more insight into the night that his wife Margaret and youngest son Paul were killed at their Colleton County property.
In a January 18 filing urging Judge Clifton Newman to prohibit blood spatter evidence and testimony from the upcoming trial, Murdaugh’s attorneys included what appears to be a still from a body camera showing Murdaugh in the shirt the night of the murders.
The motion also included a report from Dr. Kenneth Kinsey, Chief Deputy of the Orangeburg County Sheriff’s Office and former State Law Enforcement Division (SLED) agent. He has a Ph.D. in Criminal Justice and has various qualifications as an expert witness in areas like crime scene investigation/reconstruction and blood stain pattern analysis.
Kinsey was requested by state prosecutors to review evidence from the case and answer questions about how he believes the murders took place.
According to the report, Paul was shot twice while standing in the feed room near the dog kennels at the Moselle property. Kinsey said that evidence indicated Paul was shot once, then began “moving slowly towards the door” before he was hit for the second time. The second shot, delivered with a different gun, was fatal.
Margaret was found “a short distance away” at a shed, with no indication that her body had been moved, Kinsey said. She was shot five times, two of which could have been immediately fatal. Kinsey supposed that three of the shots were delivered while she was in an upright position, and the two fatal shots were delivered while she was in a “prone or nearly prone” position. One likely came from behind while the other came from the opposite direction.
Kinsey said that based on the evidence, the person who shot Paul was likely outside the door of the feed room to the west. He said that based on the angle of the shot, “it is unlikely that the shooter was standing with a shouldered weapon at the time of the second discharge.”
Kinsey could not determine “an exact position of the shooter” in relation to Margaret.
Kinsey also said it appeared someone removed Paul’s cell phone from his back pocket after he was shot.
“It is my opinion that the phone was removed from Paul’s rear pocket by someone other than Paul, and after the fatal shot,” Kinsey said. “The blood stain inside of pocket was produced during phone’s retrieval, and prior to phone’s placement on top of the rear pocket.”
The defense indicated that prosecutors will likely call Kinsey as a witness during the murder trial. With less than a week until the trial, it remains unclear what evidence and testimony will be permitted.
