Murdaugh’s lawyers ask SC Supreme Court to kick Judge Newman off the case

Attorneys for convicted murderer and disbarred attorney Alex Murdaugh on Wednesday asked the S.C. Supreme Court to remove Judge Clifton Newman from handling all future appeals, hearings and trials in the Murdaugh case.

The attorneys’ unusual motion — called a writ of prohibition — alleged that since Newman was a participant in various matters that will be in dispute at an upcoming hearing involving alleged jury tampering at Murdaugh’s trial, he should not be allow to preside over that or other hearings.

Also, the motion contended, Newman has made numerous statements in and out of court expressing his personal opinion about Murdaugh’s guilt, legal issues and trial strategy. Those statements, including one aired on national television, violate the Code of Judicial Conduct, which requires impartiality, the motion said.

“Mr. Murdaugh’s right to have his appeal heard by an impartial judge will be violated if Judge Newman proceeds to hear his motion for a new trial,” Wednesday’s motion asserted.

It is the latest and most aggressive of a series of filings — including several that have alleged unlawful jury tampering by Colleton County clerk of court Becky Hill — made by Murdaugh’s defense team in the wake of one of South Carolina’s most sensational criminal trials in the modern era. Defense lawyers include Columbia attorneys Jim Griffin and State Sen. Dick Harpootlian, D-Richland.

The filing throws a spotlight on a request last week by Murdaugh attorneys for a hearing in Colleton County on the jury tampering allegations. The S.C. Court of Appeals approved such a hearing last week, but Murdaugh’s attorneys had to make a formal request in the county where the trial was held. No judge has been announced for that hearing, but it would ordinarily be Newman — as the judge at Murdaugh’s trial — who would preside.

If the Supreme Court grants the motion, it would also stop Newman from presiding over a financial crimes case in Beaufort County state court that is scheduled to start Nov. 27.

Last March, A Colleton County jury convicted Murdaugh, 55, a disbarred attorney, of murdering his wife, Maggie, 52, and son, Paul, 22, in 2021 at the family’s rural estate in the western part of the country. The jury, which heard more than 60 witnesses and saw hundreds of exhibits introduced during the six-week trial, deliberated less than three hours. A day after the verdict, on March 3, Judge Newman sentenced Murdaugh to two consecutive life sentences.

Newman, 71, a soft-spoken, unflappable but occasionally blunt judge, gained national recognition and broad popularity last winter for his patience and handling of the Murdaugh trial. He had been appointed to the Murdaugh case by the S.C. Supreme Court, the same high court that the Murdaugh attorneys are asking to remove him from presiding at further proceedings in the case.

After the Murdaugh trial, Newman came in for wide praise.

Within weeks of the verdict, Newman spoke at his law school alma mater, Cleveland State University College of Law, where he was described as “the best known judge in the world right now.” After the verdict, former South Carolina U.S. Attorney Pete Strom, a Columbia lawyer, tweeted in a widely shared post, “Please join me in raising a glass in honor of Judge Clifton Newman. Does anyone disagree that he sets the gold standard for how a judge conducts a trial?”

In August, Newman spoke about the trial at an American Bar Association panel in the group’s annual meeting in Denver.

Newman, who will turn 72 later in November, is expected to retire at year’s end. South Carolina judges and justices must retire by the end of the year they turn 72. However, some judges are allowed by the high court to stay on in limited capacities after their retirement date.

Murdaugh, the fourth-generation member of a wealthy Lowcountry political and legal family, has also pled guilty in federal court to more than a decade’s worth of embezzlements from his law firm, his clients, his friends and others.

Mystery surrounded killings after his wife and son were shot to death on June 7, 2021, on the family’s deserted estate, and Murdaugh — in testimony when he took the witness stand at his trial — said that he found the bodies and called law enforcement.

There were no eyewitnesses. The killer used two different weapons, which have never been found. Murdaugh has continued to insist he is innocent.

Prosecutors with State Attorney General’s office displayed numerous kinds of evidence to the jury, including a crucial video that showed Murdaugh at the site of the killings minutes before they were alleged to have taken place, cell phone geolocation data and ballistics.

The prosecution’s version of events was that hidden behind a facade of power and respectability, Murdaugh lived a secret life of lies and betrayal, nursing a decades-long painkiller addiction and embezzling millions of dollars. Prosecutors contended that pressure created by the imminent exposure of his secret world in June 2021 that drove him to slaughter his wife and son and plan an elaborate coverup.

Numerous true crime “documentaries” and news shows have been aired on various cable channels and television networks about the Murdaugh case. National newspapers such as the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and The Washington Post have written about the case. And already, several books — including one in French by a Paris-based journalist who attended the trial — have been published and another half-dozen are in the works.

This story will be updated.