Transcript
Good afternoon Premium Members. here happy Thursday, another blockbuster week in the Murdaugh matters. You know, just when we’re trying to, you know, let things calm down. We just have an absolute nuclear bomb dropped on our laps the day after Labor Day on Tuesday. You know, when this Murdaugh case started off, obviously, you knew it was going to be famous because it was, you know, as ski on a very famous family in South Carolina. You know, the fact that his father, grandfather, great grandfather were solicitors, you knew it was going to be an unusual case, one that was going to be notorious. And just when we were feeling really good about our justice system last week, late last week, there was a rumor that Dick Harpootlian and Jim Griffin were going to have a press conference the day after Labor Day, and they were going to make an announcement about a shocking new revelation that was going to lead to a retrial of the murder charges against Alex Murdaugh and everybody was a little bit suspect. And Tuesday afternoon at 230. Dick and Jim Griffin and Phil Barber got in front of the microphones and I was troubled with the location of the press conference. Clearly Dick was using his office as senator to have it on the Statehouse grounds and almost in a threatening manner, and Dick Harpootlian and read from estate and Jim Griffin and Dick answered questions and gave some of their opinions but essentially what they said is an elected official, a clerk of court in the murder trial, Becky Hill had overstepped her rights and invaded the jury room and the juries province, and so Dick Harpootlian and Jim Griffin said that there was an invasion of the jury province that the bedrock principle which is true in our constitution is that under the Sixth Amendment, you have a right to a free and impartial jury trial, and that Miss Hill, who is an elected official violated the constitutional rights of Alex Murdaugh by suggesting to the jury that he should not be believed, even before he testified. And Jim Griffin said, that is enough in and of itself to grant a new trial. Well, part of the problem is once the trial ended, and they filed their notice of appeal with the South Carolina Court of Appeals jurisdiction is taken away from the lower court and vested with the Court of Appeals. So right now the case is in front of the Court of Appeals. And so in order for them to make a motion for a new trial based upon Miss Hills conduct, they have to petition the court of appeals, according to Dick Harpootlian, to stay the appeal and then get permission to make this motion before the lower court, I think for a safety reason he’s doing that, but you technically can make this motion even while the appeal is still pending. So what does this mean? Jim Griffin says the very act of invading the jury is enough. I find it hard to believe that 12 Jurors would find somebody guilty of murder, knowing they’re going to get a life sentence simply because some suggestions were made if they were made by the clerk of court after having sat and listened to the evidence for seven weeks. Now, I also do have some problem with jurors changing their minds remember, this jury deliberated, rendered their decision. And they were individually polled, at the end of the verdict. When they said guilty, each one had to stand up and say, this was a my own free will and volition, this verdict. I was not pressured. And I was not coerced. And three months later, supposedly, according to Dick Harpootlian the well broke open because Miss Hill wrote her book and released it in August. Now, I don’t think Miss Hill should have written the book until the appeal was over with. I also question whether it was appropriate for Judge Newman, to give an interview to the today’s show, knowing that this case was up on appeal and could come back for him to have to retry. You heard Dick Harpootlian say that he’s going to make a motion to recuse Judge Newman because he’s in witness according to Harpootlian of some of the conversations that Miss Hill may have had with the jury. And I think the goal is to get a new trial to get this before a judge other than Judge Newman. And that judge would not let in the 404 B character evidence of all the financial crimes and then try this case based solely on the evidence of the murder. Well, that’s a tall order, because what if the other eight or nine or 10 Jurors come in at the hearing? I think it’s serious enough that it should be an investigation. Dick Harpootlian wants full discovery rights wants to be able to subpoena all the jurors phone records and depose all the jurors. So I think Dick wants to stretch this out. Dick Harpootlian is in the legislature. So from January to June every year he has immunity from being called to trial. So now we’re in September, it’s going to be probably two or three months there has to be an investigation by either SLED or the FBI. And you heard Dick say that he doesn’t trust SLED that he thinks they’re corrupt, and that it should be investigated by the US Attorney and the FBI and Dick had sent them a letter requesting it. At lunch, I found out that Becky Hill should send a residual check to Dick Harpootlian because her book now I’m told is 92 on the bestseller list. So Becky’s got thick to thank for that, but I’m sure she’s upset, and she has to lawyer up and pay for that. So she’s represented by Justin Bamberg and Will Lewis, and that’s interesting because Will Lewis, his mother is a federal judge in Spartanburg, South Carolina and Will Lewis, his father Ken Lewis was Dick Harpootlian’s best friend, and Dick Harpootlian was responsible for getting Will’s mother on the federal bench, and then Dick Harpootlian made some threatening remarks to the jurors and said all jurors need to get lawyers think Dick is trying to create the smoke screens that he’s good at doing at taking the eye off the ball trying to get some sympathy for Alex. But again, if she did this, this is serious. If she did this, it may be that Alex is entitled to a new trial. And like I said, in a press release earlier this week with my partner, Ronnie, the system has to work for the worst of us, so that it can work for the rest of us. Certainly Alex is the worst of us. Additionally, we heard that there’s going to be another Murdaugh type series on Lifetime TV, one of my favorite actors, Bill Pullman who was in The Center, which I really liked that series by the way, you should watch it I think it was on USA. He will star as Alex Murdaugh in this series. And from what I understand the whole idea germinated in the spring and they were able to film it and release it pretty soon. So that’s just another Murdaugh related movie. And we will be recording COJ episode number 46 on Saturday. It’ll come out on Tuesday. You will have Mandy back with Liz in the States next week and we’re really excited about where we’re going. And thank you very much. EB out.
Please sign into your Premium account then refresh this page to view this content.