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Bodycam Footage Released From Night Alex Murdaugh’s Wife, Son Were Murdered

   DailyWire.com
Alex Murdaugh and defense attorney Dick Harpootlian review evidence during his trial for murder at the Colleton County Courthouse on Tuesday, Jan. 31, 2023, in Walterboro, South Carolina.
Joshua Boucher/Pool/The State/Tribune News Service via Getty Images

Disgraced South Carolina attorney Alex Murdaugh was crying as he stood between the bodies of his wife, Maggie, and son, Paul, on the night they were found murdered, police body camera footage shows.

The 40-minute video was shown at Murdaugh’s trial, where he is accused of killing his wife and son as the walls of his legal empire came crumbling down around him. Colleton County Sheriff’s Corporal Buford “Chad” McDowell was the second first responder to arrive at the Murdaugh’s hunting estate on the night of the murders, and it is his bodycam footage that was shown to the jury, Fox News reported.

McDowell arrived on the property following a tearful 911 call placed by Murdaugh, who said he had found his wife and son “badly shot” at the family’s dog kennels. The footage shows the body of 22-year-old Paul Murdaugh – blurred out for jurors – who was fatally shot with a shotgun. As McDowell moves toward Alex Murdaugh, the footage shows Maggie’s body and the sounds of barking dogs can be heard.

“Her name is Maggie Murdaugh,” a tearful Alex tells Sgt. Daniel Greene as McDowell approaches the family patriarch.

The footage was shown to jurors when McDowell testified on January 26, Fox reported, but was only released to the public on Monday.

At one point in the video, McDowell asked other deputies if they were “familiar with this family?” Greene responded: “I wasn’t until you told me the names.”

McDowell also notices that Paul Murdaugh’s phone was placed on top of his back pocket, which he notes is out of the ordinary. Alex Murdaugh told investigators that he had picked up Paul’s phone and then put it on his son’s back pocket.

The footage captures the brutality of the crime scene, with McDowell and other deputies discussing how Paul may have died.

“His brain matter is on the ceiling in there, so he was shot at an upward angle with a shotgun wad laying on the floor that would point to suicide,” McDowell said. “That doesn’t explain [Maggie].”

On Monday, pathologist Dr. Ellen Riemer further described, in graphic detail, how the family members were killed. She said Paul was killed with two blasts from a shotgun, with one covering his chest with pellets and the other to his head, which left his skull nearly empty, the Associated Press reported.

Maggie was shot four or five times with a rifle.

“She had projectiles, ammunition going through her left kidney, you can imagine that was a very painful wound and could have cause her to fold over in pain,” Riemer said, according to the AP.

At some point Maggie was bent down and facing away from the shooter when she was fatally shot with a bullet that “basically destroyed her brain,” Riemer said.

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