The day after South Carolina jurors convicted Alex Murdaugh of murdering his wife and child in a twisted attempt to hide his financial crimes, a prosecution witness said the group took the time to meet and thank him for his time on the stand.
Kenneth Kinsey, chief deputy of the Orangeburg County Sheriff’s Office and a crime scene expert, told The Daily Beast that as soon as he got to the Colleton County courthouse on Friday for Murdaugh’s sentencing, he was informed by security personnel that “the jury requested to meet” with him.
“It was a room full of them,” Kinsey said on Friday. “They thanked me for explaining the evidence and putting it in terms they understood. It was one of the male and female jurors who did most of the talking, but the others were nodding their heads as they spoke. It was so incredibly touching.”
Kinsey testified twice during the six-week trial as he explained how his bullet trajectory analysis showed that Maggie and Paul were murdered near the dog kennels of the Murdaugh family estate on June 7, 2021. He was also the final witness to be called by the prosecution before they rested their rebuttal case, in which he poked holes in the defense’s theory there were two shooters.
Kinsey said he praised the jurors—who convicted Murdaugh after just three hours of deliberation—for putting “their lives on hold for six weeks” to serve.
“I told them, ‘You’re the heroes here, not me.’ It was just wonderful. I don’t know who these folks are or what their backgrounds are, but it was one heck of a contribution,” he added.
After the meeting, Kinsey said, he left the jurors to attend Murdaugh’s sentencing, where Judge Clifton Newman delivered a scalding speech in which he called the 54-year-old defendant a “monster” who may have been spared the harsher sentence he deserved.
“I don’t question at all the decision of the state not to pursue the death penalty,” Newman said. “But as I sit here in this courtroom and look around the many portraits of judges and other court officials, and reflect on the fact that over the past century, your family, including you, have been prosecuting people here in this courtroom, and many have received the death penalty, probably for lesser conduct.”
Murdaugh also spoke during his sentencing, maintaining his innocence while admitting that he had lied to investigators about his whereabouts the night of the murders. While Murdaugh previously said that he never went down to the dog kennels the night of the murders, he admitted after a video was played in court that he had been with Paul and Maggie just minutes before they were fatally shot. Murdaugh, however, insists that he was asleep when they were fatally shot.
“I’ll tell you again: I respect this court, but I am innocent, and I would never under any circumstances hurt my wife Maggie, and I would never under any circumstances hurt my son Paul,” Murdaugh said.
Craig Moyer, a carpenter who was one of the jurors in the case, told Good Morning America on Friday that the video placing Murdaugh at the scene sealed his fate. Once the jury got the case on Thursday afternoon, it only took them 45 minutes to persuade three fence-sitters that Murdaugh was guilty and reach a unanimous verdict. The juror added Murdaugh came off as a “big liar” when he took the stand.
“He knew what he wanted to say. I mean, he is a lawyer,” Moyer said.
While Kinsey did not want to comment on the verdict or sentencing, he stressed that his participation in the case was not as stressful as some might have thought. He had never worked on a case with Murdaugh, but he had testified for his late father, former county solicitor Randolph Murdaugh.
“I’ve done this 75 to 80 times in my career,” Kinsey stressed. “I was super comfortable on that stand. I had so much support and I could feel it. This case, from the lawyers on both sides to the evidence, was incredible.”
