Greg Parker is asking Judge Daniel Hall, to once again, to sever Parker’s Kitchen from the Murdaugh defendants and move the trial location in the wrongful death suit filed by Renee Beach.
In a motion filed in Hampton County on July 7, Parker’s attorneys offered a two-part argument, saying in part that the Murdaughs have too much notoriety due to Alex Murdaugh’s double homicide conviction and alleged financial crimes and that Parker deserves to have his civil trial heard without the weight of Murdaugh as a codefendant.
Parker and Murdaugh were among seven defendants named in a civil wrongful death suit filed by Renee Beach after her 19-year-old daughter, Mallory, was killed after a boat crash in February 2019. Murdaugh’s youngest son, Paul, was alleged to have been driving the boat while intoxicated before it struck a pylon on Archer’s Creek outside Parris Island, South Carolina.
Beach, who is represented by Mark Tinsley, filed the wrongful death suit later that year.
As the case has slowly worked its way through the court system, two of the original defendants — Paul Murdaugh and Randolph Murdaugh III — have died. Paul Murdaugh was murdered by his father on June 7, 2021. Randolph Murdaugh III died just three days later. Paul’s older brother, Buster Murdaugh, was accused of giving Paul his ID to allegedly purchase alcohol and was removed from the case in early 2023 after he settled out of court.
This is not the first time Parker has asked the court to sever him from the Murdaughs for the wrongful death trial. In August 2022, the judge granted the original motion to sever, writing in part that “if there was ever a case in which a Court may exercise its sound discretion to order separate trials to prevent delays or prejudice,” in an order dated Sept. 13, 2022.
Tinsley fired back in a 21-page motion asking the judge to reconsider the severance, and the judge reversed his decision on Sept. 27, 2022.
Ultimately, the wrongful death trial did not begin in January and is now slated to begin on Aug. 14 in Hampton County.
Severance is not Parker’s only goal in his latest motion. He is also asking for a change of venue because “the media hurricane around the Murdaughs had not reached full strength when this Court last considered venue, and the storm is unlikely to pass anytime soon. Transferring venue out of Hampton County—and out of the Fourteenth Judicial Circuit entirely—would mitigate the damage to Parker’s fair trial rights.”
Parker also included two signed affidavits with the change of venue motion. Those come from Angela Brown and Gerald Brant, both of whom identify as Hampton County residents and who swear in their nearly identical affidavits that a fair trial for Parker would be impossible.
The judge has yet to issue an order on this matter.
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Beth Braden
Beth Braden is an award-winning journalist with experience covering government, education and crime and courts for more than 10 years. In addition to following breaking news and writing feature stories about life in her home state of Tennessee, her by-line appears on several internationally known websites.
Beth is passionate about communicating complex information in an easy-to-understand manner and she loves to pore over public records and court documents as she seeks out patterns and context to share with her audience. In her spare time, she enjoys quilting, strange museums, and good cups of coffee.
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