Alex Murdaugh granted change of venue for murder retrial, past testimony allowed

U.S. newsAlex Murdaugh granted change of venue for murder retrial, past testimony allowedMurdaugh was indicted by a grand jury in July 2022 on double-murder charges in the 2021 deaths of his wife, Margaret, 52, and the couple’s younger son, Paul, 22. Listen to this article with a free profile00:0000:00Alex Murdaugh enters the courtroom for a hearing on Friday, at the Marc H. Westbrook Judicial Center in Lexington, S.C. Tracy Glantz / The State Newspaper via AP poolShareAdd to GoogleAug. 14, 2026, 3:10 PM EDTBy Minyvonne Burke and Juliette ArcodiaA judge ruled Friday that testimony Alex Murdaugh gave at his first murder trial can be heard by jurors in his retrial. “When you testify in a case, there are consequences,” South Carolina Circuit Court Judge Debra McCaslin said at a status hearing. “I’m going to allow it in, subject to what is being testified to in the trial.”McCaslin also ruled to move Murdaugh’s double-murder retrial out of Colleton County. Defense attorney Dick Harpootlian, noted that people have been stopped on the street for interviews about the case, arguing the county has become “poison” and that “the courthouse is the scene of the crime.” Prosecutor Creighton Waters countered that the issue is “not pretrial publicity,” but whether potential jurors will need to “honor their oath to be fair and impartial.” The judge sided with the defense on venue, saying she does not believe “the defendant can get a fair and impartial trial” in Colleton County. She noted that during the 2023 trial — later overturned by the state Supreme Court — “fewer than 1 in 7 prospective jurors were qualified to serve.”McCaslin said she will wait to decide which county will host the retrial. “I will issue an order, a formal order, on the transfer of venue and will also designate the county,” she said. Murdaugh was indicted by a grand jury in July 2022 on double-murder charges in the 2021 deaths of his wife, Margaret, 52, and the couple’s younger son, Paul, 22. Murdaugh found thei...