CHARLESTON, S.C. — In her closing argument of former South Carolina banker Russell Laffitte’s federal bank fraud trial Monday, prosecutor Emily Limehouse said, “Absolute power corrupts absolutely.”
It was absolute power, the prosecutor said, that allowed Laffitte and disgraced former attorney Alex Murdaugh, a friend and high-profile client of Laffitte’s, “the opportunity to exploit the vulnerable.”
Despite the defense’s argument that Murdaugh was the one who devised a scheme to steal money from his own clients, and Laffitte was misled into helping him, Limehouse made the case that a “chaotic” Murdaugh needed someone as “meticulous” as Laffitte to carry out the plan.
