Alex Murdaugh (South Carolina Department of Corrections)
After he was sentenced to two consecutive life terms in prison for killing his wife and son, disgraced lawyer and double murderer Alex Murdaugh appeared, this time with a shaved head in a prison jumpsuit in his booking mugshot.
The 54-year-old was booked into South Carolina’s Kirkland Reception and Evaluation Center. A source told Fox News that the haircuts are standard procedure.
Murdaugh was sentenced to two life terms for killing Margaret “Maggie” Murdaugh, 52, with an AR-style rifle and their youngest son, Paul Murdaugh, 22, with a shotgun in the dog kennels at the family’s expansive hunting lodge known as Moselle on June 7, 2021.
The mugshot capped the end of a busy week and a trial that took up six weeks.
Alex Murdaugh was convicted on two counts each of murder, one for each victim, and two counts each of possession of a weapon during the commission of a violent crime related to each murder. The weapons convictions were not sentenced in light of the life sentences for the murders.
No victim impact statements were made, and the state briefly spoke during the relatively short hearing, expressing their preference for two consecutive life sentences.
“I’m innocent,” the defendant said in a terse address to the court. “I would never hurt my wife, Maggie, and I would never hurt my son Paul Paul.”
The judge called the case “perhaps one of the most troubling cases” for the community in Colleton County, the broader state of South Carolina, the victims, the legal community, and law enforcement. He noted that Maggie and Paul Murdaugh were “savagely murdered” and commented on the long Murdaugh family legacy.
The judge said it was sad to see the defendant go from a lawyer who had practiced before him to a grieving father to the murderer who was indicted, tried, and convicted before him.
The judge also opined that the crimes for which Alex Murdaugh was convicted qualify for the death penalty but said he did not question the state’s judgment not to seek capital punishment.
La&Crime’s Colin Kalmbacher contributed to this report.
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