SC - Paul Murdaugh & mom Margaret Found Shot To Death - Alex Murdaugh Accused - Islandton #21

[Flurries]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1624079438265610240

So Alex wasn’t worried about someone coming back and harming Blanca and family??? Hmm

 

[arielilane]

Jury has been excused. Jury will get tired of this, imo.

 

[sunshineray]

But neatly folded and clean?

Yeah he never gave thought to what kind of knowledge Blanca had about the household...about MM, her friend, IMO

 

[Derph]

DH is disrespectful to the court. moo

He's all flustered. He gets snippity when he's flustered!

 

[sunshineray]

Not everyone wears a wedding ring, sure! But if you’re MM I’m sure you have a big fat diamond engagement ring that goes with your nice diamond encrusted wedding bad! It’s a symbol of status! You’re definitely wearing that if you’re a happily married or unhappily married wife. Unless things are so bad and you’re po’d at your husband….

And goodness you're not going to normally keep it under the seat of your car!

 

[BUF]

My, my, DH is in a bad mood today

 

[lonetraveler]

So, the interruptions are getting DH a little eschewed. However, he doesn't mind at all interrupting the prosecution during testimony.

 

[Derph]

Wait what???!!! The judged just bailed on the kids arguing!!!!!????? Just walked out on the court!! " Ya'll figure it out, I'm done!" HAHAHA!! Drama Alert Code Red Again!!!!!

 

[sunshineray]

Wow the judge just peaced out Dang

 

[Aquarian]

My, my, DH is in a bad mood today

Worried over Blanca’s testimony imo.

 

[Cindizzi]

My, my, DH is in a bad mood today

The constant interruptions are making him “ askew “ he said.
Lol

 

[lonetraveler]

Worried over Blanca’s testimony imo.

Yep, things are getting 'real' for him and his client.

 

[Ceska]

Wow, AM tells Blanca where to go in to the house (to clean the day after the murders) so she can avoid the SLED agents.
That looks so bad for AM.

 

[Cindizzi]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1624090277454524433

 

[Cindizzi]

Jury has been excused. Jury will get tired of this, imo.

I’ve never seen a trial where they excuse the Jury instead of having a sidebar at the bench!

Although I am glad we get to hear everything.

JMO

 

[arielilane]

https://twitter.com/AveryGWilks

The state will continue to question its 43rd witness, Beach family attorney Mark Tinsley, when court resumes at 9:30 a.m.

Court is back in session.

Defense attorney Phillip Barber treats Mark Tinsley like a well-cooked grenade on cross, getting in and out in just a couple of minutes. Barber asked just two questions and fumbled over the second one a number of times as Tinsley repeatedly said he couldn't understand him.

Barber tries to get Tinsley to answer "yes or no" about his prior testimony that "there wouldn't have been an explosion" at the 6/10/21 hearing on Murdaugh's finances. Tinsley: “You’re trying to turn it into something it’s not, but I probably said something to that effect.”

The defense truly wants no part of Mark Tinsley, and I do not blame them.

Barber has no further questions after a brief redirect. Tinsley steps down. The state calls its 44th witness, Murdaugh family housekeeper Blanca Simpson.

Prosecutor John Meadors is questioning Simpson. Meadors: “Is this difficult for you to be here today?” Simpson: “Yes it is.”

Mark Tinsley just texted me: "Phil is smarter than I first thought.”

(I asked if I could quote him. He said yes).

Blanca Simpson testifies she cleaned and ran errands for the Murdaughs. She said she was close with Maggie. Even during a spell when she wasn't working for the Murdaughs after having a stroke in 2015, she would see Maggie in town and they would stop and catch up.

Simpson testifies that on 6/7/21, Maggie texted her and asked her to stop at the grocery store on her way to Moselle to get some orange Capri Suns for Alex. Simpson tried at Food Lion. Meadors: "Were you successful in your search for orange Capri Suns?"
Simpson testifies Maggie told her Alex wanted her to come home to Moselle on the evening of 6/7/21. She said Maggie sounded disappointed. “She kind of sounded like she didn’t want to come home because she really liked being in Edisto because they had a lot of work going on” …

... to prepare for a Fourth of July party there at the family's Edisto house. Simpson testifies Maggie told her Alex wanted Paul home as well that evening “to fix the mess” that groundskeeper C.B. Rowe had done with the sunflowers at Moselle.

Simpson testifies that when Alex Murdaugh left for work on 6/7/21, he was wearing brown leather shoes, khaki pants, a seafoam polo shirt and a blue sport coat.

Simpson testifies Alex Murdaugh called her with a shaky voice the morning of 6/8/21 and said: “B, they’re gone. They’re gone.” She thought he meant that they had gone to Edisto. “He said: ‘No, B, they’re dead.’”

Simpson testifies Murdaugh asked her to straighten up the Moselle house on 6/8/21 like Maggie liked it because people were going to come by.

Simpson gets emotional as she testifies about returning to the Moselle house on 6/8/21. She said she got a weird feeling. “It felt cold.” She said it was strange to walk through the kitchen and see no pots and pans in the stove or sink. .

Simpson: The Murdaughs typically didn’t clean up for themselves after dinner. They would leave things out overnight. She found the pots sitting in the fridge with lids on them. “That was not normal.” Simpson also testifies Maggie’s clean pajamas and underwear were laid out ..

.. on the ground in the doorway of the laundry room. That was very strange, she says. Maggie didn’t usually lay out her clothes like that, especially in the middle of a doorway. She also didn’t wear underwear with her pajamas, Simpson says.

Simpson testifies she found a pair of khaki pants by the shower at the Moselle main house on 6/8/21. She took them to the laundry room and washed them.

So, we've got the Murdaugh family housekeeper walking around the Moselle main house and doing laundry with potential evidence on the morning after the slayings, all before SLED goes up to the house to conduct a search.

SLED already testified their investigation began with a very small circle - the three people at the crime scene. And the only one alive was Alex Murdaugh. Perhaps searching his home should have been a priority.

Edited to add additional tweets.

Continued tweets

https://twitter.com/AveryGWilks

Meadors seems to be landing some blows here. He shows Simpson the 7:38 p.m. 6/7/21 Snapchat video Paul took of his father. In it, Alex is wearing loafers, khaki pants and a seafoam Columbia shirt. …

Simpson has testified she washed a pair of khaki pants the next morning. But she testifies she never saw the loafers or Columbia shirt ever again.

Simpson testifies she and her husband lived at Moselle for a bit after the slayings. Murdaugh paid her $1,500 a week to make sure that anything needed for the farm was taken care of. They would cut the grass on that property, which is a lot of grass. It would take two days to cut.

Simpson testifies she and her husband also took care of the Murdaugh dogs, Grady and Bubba. She still has Bubba at her home now. Bubba had a history of taking off running and catching chickens in his mouth. It was hard to get the birds out of his mouth. "He's stubborn.”

Simpson testifies she also never saw a pair of Sperry boat shoes ever again either. Shelley Smith, the caregiver for Murdaugh's mother, previously testified Murdaugh was wearing Sperry's when he came to visit her on the night of the slayings.

... Simpson testifies that confused her. She had fixed Murdaugh’s collar that day before he walked out the door. It wasn’t a Vineyard Vines shirt. “I didn’t say anything, but I was kind of thrown back because I didn’t remember that.”

Simpson: … “I felt confused at first. I know what he was wearing the day he left the house. I was basically confused. I didn’t know whether he was trying to get me to say - if I was to be asked - that that was the shirt he was wearing that day.”

This is another witness, in addition to Shelley Smith, testifying to Alex Murdaugh seemingly trying to get a story straight with other witnesses for homicide investigators.

Simpson testifies she was cleaning Maggie’s SUV a week after the murders and found Maggie’s wedding band there as she tried to vacuum the driver’s side seat.

Meadors questions Simpson about whether Maggie was anxious in the months before the slayings. Meadors asks whether Maggie was anxious about money issues. Harpootlian objects. The jury is excused. Harpootlian is now moving for a mistrial. He says this is hearsay.

Harpootlian: “I don’t think even if you give this jury an instruction, you can’t unring the bell. You can’t correct that.” Meadors apologizes. Newman doesn't seem interested in an apology. Now we're hearing Simpson testify about what she would have said, with the jury excused.

With jury gone, Simpson testifies Maggie was worried about a boat crash lawsuit demanding $30 million. Maggie was crying. “We don’t have that kind of money, Blanca.” She said she would give everything away to make the lawsuit go away.

Harpootlian says this testimony is irrelevant because it's about Maggie's state of mind - not Alex's. It's also hearsay, he says. Newman overrules the objection.

Newman rules Murdaugh's legal team opened the door for this when it asked Paul's friend Rogan Gibson about how happy and loving a family the Murdaughs were and whether there is any conceivable reason Alex would kill his wife and son.

Newman also denies Harpootlian's motion for a mistrial. The defense has raised and preserved plenty of objections for an appeal if Murdaugh is convicted.

Jury is back. Simpson testifies about Maggie’s anxieties about the $30 million demand in the boat crash lawsuit. “She felt that Alex was not being truthful to her with regard to what was going on with that lawsuit.” Maggie said Alex doesn’t tell her everything.

Now we are again hearing the Paul dog kennel video from 8:44 p.m. on the night of the slayings. Simpson testifies she hears the voices of Paul, Maggie and Alex Murdaugh in the background.

Simpson becomes the latest witness to testify that Alex and Paul Murdaugh were always on their phones. Prosecutors are using phone data to try to establish when Maggie and Paul were killed, as well as to raise questions about the near-hour long span that night in which …

... Alex’s phone doesn't record steps. (Even though the dog kennel video places him at the kennels, away from the house during that span)

Meadors again plays for Simpson the 7:38 p.m. 6/7/21 Paul Snapchat video. M: “Have you ever seen that shirt he’s wearing again?” S: “No, sir. Not to my knowledge.” M: “Have you ever seen those shoes again?” S: “No.”

Harpootlian rises to cross-examine Simpson. He establishes that Murdaugh described Simpson as “his friend” not his housekeeper. Simpson testifies Murdaugh described Maggie as “his all.” “He adored her. He loved her. He adored her,” she says.

Simpson: “I never saw them have arguments. Just some minor disagreements” about the remodeling of the Edisto Beach home, including paint colors. Simpson: Maggie said she wanted Alex to sit still for 10 minutes so she could talk about it.

Harpootlian: “An uncommon complaint between husbands and wives and wives and husbands, is that right?” Simpson acknowledges she and her husband have had that complaint with each other themselves.

just spoke with Colleton County Clerk of Court Becky Hill. She confirms that the Murdaughs - mainly Buster and Lynn - got into trouble with Colleton County law enforcement and Judge Newman for improper contact with Alex, including touching, fist bumping and passing him a …

.. John Grisham novel. They have been warned several times, she said. “It’s called contraband. No one has seen what’s in it.” Hill said Judge Newman ordered them to be moved back in the courtroom. But if their conduct persists, they can be sent out of the courtroom, she said

Colleton County clerk of court Becky Hill just confirmed this to me ON the record, while adding the Murdaughs were also in trouble for fist bumping and physically contacting the defendant.

Harpootlian establishes that cell coverage was sporadic at Moselle, including in the main house. It was touch-and-go at the kennels. Calls dropped a lot. “Once you got a signal, you better stay where you were at because if you move, you were going to lose your signal.”

Meadors is objecting to Harpootlian’s questions every few words, sometimes multiple objections per question. It is really throwing Harpootlian off. He is taking a while to regroup and remember his train of thought.

Harpootlian looked at Judge Newman after the last time. “Do you want me to pose the question or not?” Newman excuses the jury.

Meadors and Harpootlian are both standing, going after each other about how Harpootlian is posing his questions. Newman orders a break.

Reset the counter. Days since the Alex Murdaugh trial has become unnecessarily dramatic: 0

 

[Elley Mae]

So, the interruptions are getting DH a little eschewed. However, he doesn't mind at all interrupting the prosecution during testimony.

I thought that was great, lol like he lost his train of thought and when looking papers still couldn’t get back to what was so important.

 

[sunshineray]

Wow, AM tells Blanca where to go in to the house (to clean the day after the murders) so she can avoid the SLED agents.
That looks so bad for AM.

Then he tells her days later, while pacing and acting like something is not good, to make sure she knows what shirt he wad wearing the night she cooked supper...and it wasn't seafoam, no it wasn't

 

[Megnut]

Wait what???!!! The judged just bailed on the kids arguing!!!!!????? Just walked out on the court!! " Ya'll figure it out, I'm done!" HAHAHA!! Drama Alert Code Red Again!!!!!

I was doubting my own ears!

I do believe the judge just told his petulant officers of the court that they can continue to argue with one another but he was excusing himself and would return with a ruling.

I hope it's to put AM on the stand to speak for himself. Harpootlian opened the door. With his CA (of pork-n-beans) opener.

JMO

 

[Carolina Girl]

I would not want to be them when the Judge comes back! Prosecutor is correct. Harp. is trying to testify for Alex and they can not question him.