The South Carolina Supreme Court’s chief justice reassigned a Columbia judge to oversee a swath of charges accusing Alex Murdaugh of financial crimes — the latest unexplained judicial switch from the court.
On Wednesday, Chief Justice Donald Beatty backtracked on a previous order assigning a Greenville judge to oversee 21 indicted charges brought by the state grand jury against suspended lawyer Murdaugh in December.
Now, Judge Clifton Newman will oversee those cases, according to the order.
“The Honorable Clifton Newman be vested with concurrent jurisdiction in all circuits of the state to dispose of all general sessions matters, including trials by jury and civil forfeiture actions, arising from the (December indictments),” Beatty’s order reads.
Judicial jurisdiction and assignments have changed multiple times as Murdaugh, member of a well-known legal family, faces an extraordinary number of criminal charges spanning across the state and multiple civil lawsuits.
Currently, Murdaugh is facing 74 criminal charges, with 71 coming from the state grand jury accusing him of a stealing $8,875,944.45 from clients, associates and his law firm, and three charges from a Hampton County grand jury in his alleged botched murder-for-hire scheme.
—Weeks after Murdaugh told police he was shot on the side of the road in Hampton County, his effort to defraud an insurance company for $10 million for his older son, Judge Newman was assigned by Beatty to handle pretrial matters related to “criminal investigations concerning Richard Alexander Murdaugh.”
—In October, Newman presided over Murdaugh's bond hearing after the S.C. Law Enforcement Division charged Murdaugh with siphoning millions away from the heirs of his former housekeeper, Gloria Satterfield. Murdaugh was taken to the Alvin S. Glenn Detention Center in Columbia while waiting his bond hearing.
—Newman twice denied his bond. Murdaugh’s lawyers fought the decision, appealing to the Supreme Court.
—Before that could be fully considered, Murdaugh was indicted in his first round of grand jury charges in November. He was indicted on 27 counts of financial crimes, alleging he stole $4.8 million across five counties.
—As a result, Beatty ordered that Judge Alison Lee of Columbia oversee Murdaugh's bond hearing on the November charges. Beatty cited a rule that says the presiding judge of the state grand jury must set bond for grand jury charges. The state grand jury is in Richland County, and Lee is Richland County’s presiding judge.
—According to Beatty, jurisdiction would return to Judge Newman after the bond setting.
—Murdaugh was then indicted again in December on 21 new charges of financial crimes.
—On Dec. 13, Lee set Murdaugh’s bond on the November and December charges at $7 million.
—On Jan. 6, Beatty inexplicably assigned the December indictments to be handled by Judge Letitia Verdin of Greenville instead of Newman.
—On Jan. 26, days after Murdaugh was indicted in a third batch of alleged financial crimes, Beatty reversed his decision and assigned the December indictments to Newman.
The dizzying number of assignments speaks to the complicated nature of 74 criminal charges against one man for alleged crimes spanning at least six counties.
A reporter asked spokesperson for the South Carolina Court Administration to comment on Thursday morning.
Jim Griffin, one of Murdaugh’s attorneys, said he couldn’t explain the switch from Verdin to Newman.
“It’s certainly more efficient to have the same judge handle all the cases,” he said.
Lee will need to eventually consider a bond on the set of 23 charges announced last week, Griffin said.
Additionally, Justice Beatty has been under scrutiny in recent days after receiving publicity for reversing another big decision: lawyer-legislators.
Earlier this month, Beatty made waves in the legal community after he reduced protections for lawyers who also serve as state legislators. The rule previously said those lawyer-legislators can’t be compelled to appear in court when the General Assembly is in session, which is more than half the year.
The protection has been used to stall cases indefinitely, according to the Post and Courier newspaper in Charleston.
A day after his order, however, Beatty quietly rolled back his own order, the newspaper reported. One of Beatty’s deputies told state judges not to act on the order Beatty just announced, the newspaper wrote.
