Murdaugh Defense Dropping Clues? What You Need to Know

If you’ve fallen behind on the Murdaugh case, this is the catch-up before the retrial. Valerie Bauerlein was in court Friday as Alex Murdaugh walked in to his motions hearing without shackles or an orange jumpsuit — dark sport coat, baby-blue tie. What unfolded played like a preview of the defense's case for next year's retrial. Former South Carolina Attorney General Charlie Condon helps break down what armchair detectives need to know with host Valerie Bauerlein, best-selling author of The Devil at His Elbow: Alex Murdaugh and the Fall of a Southern Dynasty, and the reporter who covered the Murdaugh murder trial alongside Anne Emerson in 2023.

The stunner: defense attorney Jim Griffin said a recent Allendale County murder has been linked in press leaks to the Murdaugh murder weapon — and asked how that can be. Judge Debra McCaslin set the trial for April 5 and said she intends to stick by it. From Cousin Eddie to DNA to a change of venue to an attempt to toss Alex Murdaugh’s testimony from the first trial, this conversation is your roadmap of the Murdaugh retrial stakes — not a docket read, a defense-case preview. Charlie Condon unpacks it all and suggests the defense's theme ahead of Alex Murdaugh's April trial.