Millions of dollars go missing. Multiple murders are unsolved. And investigators have only scratched the surface of the Murdaugh family’s Dark Dynasty.
Millions of dollars go missing. Multiple murders are unsolved. And investigators have only scratched the surface of the Murdaugh family’s Dark Dynasty.
This podcast contains sensitive information about violence, sexual assault, and domestic abuse.
Find episode transcripts here: https://dark-dynasties.simplecast.com/episodes/the-murdaughs-the-mysteries-that-remain-unsolved-part-4
SYD: 0:00
This podcast is intended for mature audiences episodes discuss emotional, physical and sexual violence listener discretion is advised.
SYD: 0:13
Welcome to Dark Dynasties, the podcast where we focus on different rich and powerful families who have ultimately expose themselves to be corrupt, messed up, and you know, very dark.
OLIVIA: 0:25
We've been talking about the Murdoch family and
SYD: 0:27
allegedly I am said
OLIVIA: 0:27
I am allegedly Olivia,
SYD: 0:31
and welcome to dark dynasties.
OLIVIA: 0:38
If you're just joining us now and you don't remember exactly where we left off the last episode in 2018, the Murdaughs' housekeeper of 20 years Gloria Satterfield died of a head injury after falling down stairs at the Murtaugh estate at her funeral, Alex Murdaugh came up to her two sons who she raised as a single mother and who considered him you know, sort of a member of their family. Yeah, came up to the sons and said, This is all my bad. This is my fault. It's on me. I'll fix this because my dogs did this, which is interesting, because there's no real proof of that. Yeah,
SYD: 1:17
we have a recording of the 911 call when Gloria fell and you don't hear any dog,
OLIVIA: 1:22
there's no dogs. There's no mention of dogs. So he says to Gloria's sons, I will help you. Why don't we team up to sue me?
SYD: 1:31
Yeah, he recommends that they sue him.
OLIVIA: 1:35
So that's interesting. Is that allowed?
SYD: 1:38
No, it's not a thing that ever happened. Right? To my knowledge. Gotcha. Gotcha. And it's not a normal thing. Right. Okay. So this is not just like a thing people do.
OLIVIA: 1:47
So this is though not out of his good heart. He's not going oh, please sue me so I can give you all my money. Now, let's go back in time a little bit. Yeah. Before we really dive into this. Let's go back to 2015. Sure. So in 2015, Alex Murdaugh. Right. opened up a bank account with Bank of America for himself, called Forge LLC.
SYD: 2:13
Now this is kind of strange. Yeah. Because there's a real legit firm called Forge headquartered in Atlanta. That handles settlement payments, right. So if you practice law in the south, yeah, you've definitely seen the word Forge.
OLIVIA: 2:30
Forge is like a common company that everyone knows like, oh, you pay to this company, the insurance can pay to this company and then the company will pay the people suing you know, however,
SYD: 2:41
Alex Murdaugh takes advantage of people knowing this name and then opens his own account just called Forge LLC, so it's not the legit fund so it's just
OLIVIA: 2:52
it's just a name for his bank account but if people see it on a check, they would not think like oh, this is going to Alex Murdaugh and think this is going to the actual real company Forge which it is not right so that's first off just crazy
SYD: 3:05
and here's another yeah here is is interesting here
SYD: 3:08
if you're going to play dries and already existing company name to launder money and scam innocent civilians, maybe don't pick the name Forge
OLIVIA: 3:18
forge sounds like you forged something like that. So it has a bad connotation the very obvious scam name right he could have picked a different one but
OLIVIA: 3:27
he didn't
SYD: 3:28
here's a segment called
OLIVIA: 3:30
other company names that are clearly scams.
SYD: 3:38
Olivia and I have made a bunch of names of companies so you don't have to Yeah, so
OLIVIA: 3:43
if you are trying to trick a bunch of innocent civilians and launder money don't name your company after any of these following names Okay, so
SYD: 3:53
first very similar to Forge LLC, we've got Fraud LLC,
OLIVIA: 3:57
right we've got a Hoax Incorporated. Yeah, Blackmail Inc. Counterfeit, LLC.
SYD: 4:03
Oh, how about the Extortion Emporium?
OLIVIA: 4:05
Oh, that's good. I like Emporium Yeah, yeah, Phony Inc. I think all of these things are other company names that are clearly scams.
SYD: 4:20
If you see any of those names come up on a caller ID maybe don't answer that phone call.
OLIVIA: 4:24
So now that we know that Alex Murdaugh has a bank account called Forge let's go back to 2018 and Gloria Satterfield funeral, he tells Brian and Tony Satterfield her son's, hey, I will help you I will represent you and we can sue my estate to get money from my insurance to pay you for a wrongful death lawsuit. But
SYD: 4:47
Alex of course, was like let me bring on another lawyer right to help me sue me as a co counsel he brings on Corey Fleming who's a friend of his he also gets the boys a personal representative right
OLIVIA: 5:00
under the guise of, hey, there's some really complicated business stuff that you guys are not going to understand here in this lawsuit. So why don't we get you a representative to represent your mother's
estate. So you could just sign everything over to him because he'll represent you. And then he'll take care, we'll take care of all the paperwork that you don't have
SYD: 5:21
to this guy's name is Chad Westendorf. And this is like one of those scary nightmare stories that you hear about of why to read every contract. Like make sure you read everything you sign. Yeah, chat
OLIVIA: 5:32
and transgender ups like the vice president at Palmetto State Bank. He's like a big money guy, very well connected, and also a friend of a friend.
SYD: 5:40
And he comes in to represent the two boys and he, you know, doesn't have to tell them anything.
OLIVIA: 5:45
By the time he comes in and signs on as their representative legally, he does not tell that he doesn't need to tell them anything. He doesn't need to share anything with them because he's now their representative. So that's totally totally fucked.
SYD: 5:58
So here's the thing. There are two claims filed
OLIVIA: 6:02
like less than 24 hours after Chad takes over as Brian and Tony's quote unquote, representative, they immediately file a claim against Alex Murdaugh, right, Corey, the other lawyer files a claim against Alex Murdaugh for over $500,000
SYD: 6:18
for Alex Murdaugh insurance. And then they file another claim for $3.8 million. The boys don't know about them.
OLIVIA: 6:27
No, no, they haven't been told about the 3.8 million dollars no one knows what that's for. That's a secret claim they file against themselves. So
SYD: 6:33
in the end, Murdaugh's insurance companies pay out $4.3 million to Gloria's estate. Yeah, and the money
OLIVIA: 6:42
just goes to Chad. Chad is Gloria's estate now, because SYD: 6:45
the state was signed over to Chad and Chad gives it to Corey, allegedly who gives it to Alex
OLIVIA: 6:52
puts it in the Forge account. So it's like all of that money says it's going to Forge anyone who was looking at those documents would go like, Oh, it's going to Forge the real company to pay out these brothers like Forge is just Alex. So he literally got his own insurance to pay him $4.3 million by suing himself for the death of his housekeeper that may or may not been an accident.
SYD: 7:15
This is so convoluted and so twisted. And the thought it takes
OLIVIA: 7:20
years to figure out all of these oh my god, it's like mental gymnastics. It's mental gymnastics. So luckily, they do find out about this, but let's talk about how they
SYD: 7:29
find out right. Because of the Mallory Beech situation because of the boating accident, reporters start poking around, right. And one of them finds a court report of the $505,000 settlement. And they put a write about it in a newspaper and put it in a newspaper. It's in an article. It's just another detail of the story. The Satterfield brothers see this article, and they're like, what, what we're owed $505,000, because
OLIVIA: 7:56
the whole time they've been calling Alex Murdaugh and Corey and saying, Hey, where's the money? And they're saying, Oh, it's tied up in litigation right now. Just give us a second. It's tied up. It's legal. It's complicated. You're not going to understand it. Just wait and wait and wait. So they've been waiting.
SYD: 8:10
They've been waiting and finally they see this article and they lawyer up. Yeah, and this is good. This time. The lawyers they hire. Are you ready? Yeah. Different people from the guy they're trying to sue
OLIVIA: 8:21
now. That is what I call learning from a mistake you're strong armed into and that is they didn't they didn't make that mistake, because they're stupid. They made that mistake because they were strong armed into it by someone they trusted who they considered to be like a part of their family who said he would take care of them. They were receiving bad advice. Exactly. They were tricked. They were so this time they went Oh, no, not again. We're gonna have a lawyer who's different from the guy We're suing and and we're gonna fuck this guy up. So then,
SYD: 8:51
you know forensic accountants and lawyers start digging around being like, Wait a second. We know how this goes. Yeah, a scam. That's this well planned out anything like this. There's going to be more victims Absolutely. Will definitely this is not something you just come up with overnight, and I've never done anything. No, it's like you must have done this to many people. So word gets out and more people start coming forward.
OLIVIA: 9:11
Yeah, one of them is a lieutenant Lieutenant Tommy Moore in 2018. Backing up, there was something called Snowmageddon. Sure, in South Carolina and it was like they rarely snows there. It was like a big crazy snowstorm that messed everything up and made all this chaos on the roads. Trooper Moore was pulled over to help a car that had crashed during Snowmageddon and he was hit by another car that spun out of control. And he ended up fracturing his neck in several places, which is shitty,
SYD: 9:45
that sucks. So who does he go to ALEC Mirta. Right.
OLIVIA: 9:49
Alex Murdaugh helps him he says I'm going to help get you the money. He? He does. Yeah, he gets them a check for $100,000 so he can pay towards the surgery
SYD: 9:59
and That's great. But Alex Murdaugh says, Hey, Lieutenant Moore, bring me the check for $100,000.
OLIVIA: 10:06
And why don't you endorse the check for $100,000
SYD: 10:09
over to me, and why don't you just chill out? Just give it to me
OLIVIA: 10:16
and I'll walk out the room. Never call you back.
SYD: 10:20
The money is frozen. He says this. He says the money is frozen until all of the litigation is done. So why don't you just leave and not worry about it and you'll eventually get your money? Yeah, of course more never seen
OLIVIA: 10:32
ever seen it. And no matter how many times he calls, they're like, no, no, no, no, no, they do that all that that's like their pattern. They
go no, this is too complicated for you to understand. You just have to wait. Meanwhile, they just have taken it.
SYD: 10:41
Yeah. And that's why you've got to read everything you sign. So on September 3, not quite two months after the deaths of Paul and Maggie Murdaugh, Alex's partners at the law firm,
OLIVIA: 10:52
his family law firm. Yeah, they confront him and they say, Hey, you know, Trooper Moore has hit us up and said, Where's my $100,000? Many people are asking, Where's money that you took from them?
SYD: 11:05
Unfortunately, the lawyers won't tell us what happened in the confrontation between Alex's partners and him. Right. But we do know that Alex was fired by his own family's law firm
OLIVIA: 11:17
because he embezzled millions of dollars from them.
SYD: 11:21
Right? And you can't hide that. I can't You can't hide it forever. At this point. You're like, Okay, this guy's hidden all time low, right. He's lost his family. He's lost. Basically his career like lost
OLIVIA: 11:32
his legacy. It can't get worse than this.
SYD: 11:33
But oh, wait. Oh, wait. Oh, wait, can So
OLIVIA: 11:37
one, literally one day after he is fired from his firm
SYD: 11:42
on September 4, he calls 911. Now, if you're watching the Murdaugh murders on Discovery plus, there are a lot of really good 911 calls. This one is maybe the best. It is insane. is so crazy. Alex Murdaugh very calmly,
OLIVIA: 11:59
like the calmest I've ever heard anyone says
SYD: 12:01
he's been shot in the head.
OLIVIA: 12:02
He calls he says, hey, hey, I've been shot in the head on this road. I've been shot in the head.
SYD: 12:08
And when they say, Oh, who shot you in the head?
OLIVIA: 12:10
He's like, a guy guy. I guess I just but you know, I think I'm bleeding. I'm on the head or road, dirt road I would never be on and everyone's like, What the fuck is happening? There's all these questions like, who's trying to take this guy out? Is someone getting revenge for money stole or for any of the various murders he's linked to or any of the crimes. And before the news cycle can really even go crazy on it. The Murdaugh family firm makes a public statement where Randy is like, Listen, my brother is no longer involved, period.
SYD: 12:42
Yeah, he's not in the firm. He's he's not with us. So basically just kind of covering their tracks before anything gets out. Like he knows that it's gonna get out that he was shot that all this weird stuff happened. And he's like, we don't want to be associated with that.
OLIVIA: 12:57
Yeah. So Alex says, you know, after he's been shot, he says, I have a problem with drugs. I'm going to go to rehab and within a week of going to rehab he tells the cops actually
SYD: 13:07
that he staged his suicide to look like a murder.
OLIVIA: 13:12
So when he got shot in the head and called the cops he was trying to stage a suicide to look like a murder
SYD: 13:18
and why the reason why is because insurance Yeah, he had all of this insurance money that would go to his other son Buster, right.
OLIVIA: 13:25
And he wouldn't be able to there's a chance in some insurances that you cannot get your insurance money can't get passed on to your kids if you kill yourself.
SYD: 13:34
Correct. So he's trying to get somebody else to kill him. Yeah, make it look like a murder. Now everything is starting to come together. Right?
OLIVIA: 13:43
So enter this guy named cousin Eddie aka Curtis Smith. SYD: 14:04
So Alex and his accomplice Curtis Smith are arrested. Yeah,
OLIVIA: 14:08
they're both arrested. He's like, this is the guy I tried to get to kill me.
SYD: 14:11
Now. Let's talk about this guy Curtis Smith. Yeah. Curtis Smith is kind of like a distant satellite in the Murdaugh family.
OLIVIA: 14:17
It's like they call him like cousin Eddie. But is he a cousin? Or is it just it?
SYD: 14:20
Well Alex's
SYD: 14:21
lawyers say that Eddie is Alex's longtime drug dealer? Okay, cool. So that adds a layer but Eddie is like no, Alex and I are just buds Yeah, just friends. So
OLIVIA: 14:31
no one's telling the same story. Nobody knows. But what's even weirder is that Eddie tells like a very different story too than Alex's story about like I hired my friend to come kill me. Yeah,
SYD: 14:41
first of all, let's go over Alex's story one more time. Yeah. Alex story is like I took this dirt road that no one takes to the location I said I was going to called Curtis Smith and I told him to come shoot me make it look like a murder. Yeah. Now Eddie Curtis Smith says none of this is what happened. No, he says he went to meet Alex on the road
OLIVIA: 15:01
because Alex
OLIVIA: 15:01
called him and Alex was in distress and cousin Eddie as Curtis is called for some reason, was like oh no, I have to help him.
SYD: 15:08
So he arrives and Alex was all heated up and had a gun like
OLIVIA: 15:12
he was waving around a gun and they like tussled over the gun and which
SYD: 15:16
accidentally and off and grazed Alex's head. But Ales was fine enough
to drive off to drive away. None of this.
OLIVIA: 15:25
I don't really understand any thing that went down, because maybe nobody does.
SYD: 15:31
Yeah. So basically, cousin Eddie is saying, Oh, no, I was never gonna shoot Alex, I was gonna save Alex. He's my friend. Yeah, what are you talking about
OLIVIA: 15:40
He's like, he's my friend. I wanted to help the guy that guy was in distress. I never ever would have intended to shoot him.
SYD: 15:46
Now, both
SYD: 15:47
versions of this are so odd. And like definitely not normal ways to get shot in the head. No, but the government is like, assisted suicide makes a little bit more sense. Especially timeline wise, it makes sense.
OLIVIA: 15:57
And you
OLIVIA: 15:58
know, obviously, assisted suicide is it is a crime in most states. But if suicide or homicide, if you are going to take out a hit on someone. Yeah, there are some basic rules you should follow or not follow. Sure. So following Alex Murdaugh's attempt at this fake murder, we are going to go into a segment called
SYD: 16:23
Top Five Ways to Ruin a Hit. So these are a bunch of different ways that you would absolutely ruin a hit on yourself. Yeah. So the first one is pick a really suspicious date.
OLIVIA: 16:41
Like for example, the day after you're fired from your family's company.
SYD: 16:45
Yeah, and like just right around the time when you and
OLIVIA: 16:49
your your family members have been killed mysteriously. SYD: 16:52
Yeah, and you're getting in trouble for a bunch of old stuff. You know, just pick that
OLIVIA: 16:57
Okay, number two,
OLIVIA: 16:58
take the most suspicious road you can possibly take.
SYD: 17:02
Oh, yeah, that's sorry. It was described as the road that no local would ever take to the location he said he was going to a perfect place to do it to make it seem really suspicious. Here's another one be a moving target. Oh yeah. Whether you're driving or running around outside of a car waving a gun perhaps if you're not
OLIVIA: 17:19
if you're trying to get a hit out on yourself. Being a moving target is a great way to ruin that hit.
SYD: 17:25
Yeah, it's a really good way to have said Hitman not hit you or only graze you that works too.
OLIVIA: 17:33
Yeah, another good way to ruin a hit is once the hit has been attempted just call 911
SYD: 17:38
Yeah, here's that's a really confusing one. Alex says
OLIVIA: 17:41
he gave up he was like nah
SYD: 17:43
Alex says you know I got this guy to come kill me. Why do you call 911 Buddy? Why did it when it started you call 911 instead of just letting him try again if that's what you're trying to do
OLIVIA: 17:55
that you know what, though? That leads us to number five and oh, I always turn a hit what's actually number one? Yeah, number one way Don't ruin a hit.
SYD: 18:02
Don't tell the hitman. It's a hit
OLIVIA: 18:05
a nonconsensual Hitman is the best way for your hit to go badly. If you're a hitman hasn't consented to being a hitman and doesn't know
they're a hitman? There's a I would say almost a 98% chance your hit will go badly.
SYD: 18:19
Yeah, I would say it's it's pretty. It's pretty likely. You know, cousin Eddie was like no, oh my god, I would never kill you. You're my friend. I would say hiring or like having the person who's your friend tried to kill you when they don't know they're supposed to. Yeah, this is very confused.
OLIVIA: 18:34
I would even hire an enemy. If that's your goal. Sure.
SYD: 18:37
Yeah. I mean, we would have to hire someone you have to tell them that you're going to do it
OLIVIA: 18:41
that's just a basic courtesy and any human interaction is just like being aware informed consent. Yeah, that whether or not you're a hitman, maybe write up some paperwork. Absolutely have set some boundaries set a safe word.
SYD: 18:51
So that was the top five ways
OLIVIA: 18:53
to ruin
SYD: 18:54
a hit.
SYD: 19:00
Now, let's go to court. Okay.
OLIVIA: 19:03
Right now. Yeah, let's go. We're shutting this podcast down. We're gonna go to court.
SYD: 19:07
So Alex's first appearance in court happens pretty quickly after this in mid September. He goes to the Hampton County Courthouse, which is crazy. Yeah. Talked about the Hampton County Courthouse before, you know, because Alex's long line of DA is in this town. Yeah.
OLIVIA: 19:22
All his family members and relatives and ancestors have portraits of them in this courthouse that he is now like, handcuffed in Yeah, perfect. And
SYD: 19:31
so he's there to face charges related to the insurance fraud and the assisted suicide attempt.
OLIVIA: 19:36
Now Yeah, weird. Weird. The weird thing. Yeah. I don't even know what this would mean.
SYD: 19:41
Okay. We saw the footage of him in the courthouse and a lot of people pointed this out. It's not just us. We didn't see a gunshot wound
OLIVIA: 19:41
We can't find
OLIVIA: 19:43
the gunshot wound on his head.
SYD: 19:44
Yeah, and this was pretty
SYD: 19:48
quickly after that happened. And there's no visible gunshot wound and they keep referring to this gunshot wound.
OLIVIA: 20:00
yeah and I don't know if it was just like really strangely placed or something. Yeah, I don't want to like gaslight someone about getting shot in the head. But this guy's a pretty bad guy.
SYD: 20:07
It's just kind of odd. Yeah, we just don't see it. It's odd. Yeah. So Alex is released on bail. And he goes to rehab in Florida because Sure. So
OLIVIA: 20:18
while he's in rehab in Florida, the police and the prosecutors are like, you know, lining up all this other evidence against him about Gloria Satterfield's estate to
SYD: 20:26
Yeah, and it's not just about the the money
OLIVIA: 20:30
Yeah, it's about investigating her
SYD: 20:32
death. Yeah. Which you know, should have been done a while ago. But here we go.
OLIVIA: 20:36
Yeah. So they pick him up from rehab. That's right.
SYD: 20:38
When he leaves rehab in Florida. The police are there waiting to escort him back to South Carolina for his second hearing.
OLIVIA: 20:45
That's kind of a callback. This story starts with his son having to be escorted from a boat crash to an ambulance by police and and towards the end he has to be escorted from rehab
SYD: 20:57
this story loves a police escort
OLIVIA: 20:59
love a police escort. He's back in court, the Gloria Satterfield charges are added and the Satterfield brothers, right. They have a new lawyer who's actually trying to help them this time, instead of trying to scam them out of hundreds of 1000s of dollars. Thank God they deserve it. They deserve some help. So this guy helps them and he just kills it. He's epic.
SYD: 21:18
But this is what's crazy. Yeah. Then SLED which is the state law enforcement division. Yes. testifies that they're investigating him for a lot more crimes that they can't even talk about.
OLIVIA: 21:30
Yeah, they basically come up and they're like, Hey, listen, this guy's done even more crimes, we think. Yeah, we're still investigating it. We can't say a lot. But oh, boy. It's kind of like their vibe, which is wild. Yeah, that's crazy. So he gets no bond, which is shocking. Okay, this, here's
SYD: 21:48
why it's shocking. Yeah. Usually in stories like this, if somebody is wealthy or powerful or rich or the law, they don't spend time in jail before trial; it doesn't usually happen. They get out on bail. Yeah. But by his next hearing in December, he's racked up 27 more charges for financial crime. So
OLIVIA: 21:48
the first time he gets no bond, right, and then when he goes back, he does get a bond set.
SYD: 21:57
Yeah, this time he gets a bond set over.
OLIVIA: 22:10
So to bail him out. What would it cost? What's his bail cost?
SYD: 22:21
Oh, $7 million dollars, that that's a lot. Okay. So supposedly, that's the amount of money that he's alleged to have stolen from his various victims. So
OLIVIA: 22:33
is that $7 million bond for decoration? Or do they expect anyone to pay that or is that just like a statement?
SYD: 22:41
I don't know. I mean, it kind of feels like a statement. Yeah. You know, it kind of
OLIVIA: 22:45
a baller statement. If it is a statement. Yeah. I
SYD: 22:47
mean, you know, it's pretty wild. He
OLIVIA: 22:49
has a $7 million bond set. I guess he's a flight risk.
SYD: 22:54
It's crazy. And here's the craziest thing. Yes. The answers for all of this are not public yet. No,
OLIVIA: 23:00
because it's still going on. It's still being investigated.
SYD: 23:03
This is very recent, their murders of Paul Murdaugh and his mother Maggie still haven't been solved. The death of Gloria Satterfield is still being investigated. The death of Steven Smith is still being investigated. Mallory Beech's parents are still suing Alex Murdaugh. And Alex Murdaugh is in jail. Yeah. And he's charged with Are you ready? Yeah. 75 felony counts - that adds up to 731 years in prison. That is a crazy amount of time in prison. No one lives that long. No, but I mean, I don't think anybody so I don't think so.
OLIVIA: 23:39
I know. No one I've met. No, that's so that's crazy. So he is, it's all still going on. And that's kind of the craziest part of this.
SYD: 23:48
And it's not until this boat accident that we've even found out about so many things that had been covered up from before
OLIVIA: 23:55
exactly that accident unleashed everything else that had been covered up or forgotten about or,
SYD: 24:02
and a lot of people suspect that we haven't heard the last of the Murdaugh family. And there might be more things that still come out.
OLIVIA: 24:08
Well. Yeah. I mean, if they as a as a dynasty have been in charge of this one town for 100 years. I'm sure there's a shocking amount of stuff that has been covered up that we don't even know about yet. Yeah.
SYD: 24:21
So this was the story of of the Murdaughs.
OLIVIA: 24:25
Yeah, this is the current end to our story on the Murdaughs. Yeah. You know, if anything else comes out that we have to add to
SYD: 24:33
Yeah, if something is updated, man. Yeah. So basically, this was the downfall of the Murdaugh dynasty. Yeah. So we'll be waiting. Yeah. We'll be glued to this case. I'm still listening to hear what the updates are. And
OLIVIA: 24:47
for now, this is our last episode on the Murdaugh family, but that's truly just for now.
SYD: 24:52
I'm Syd.
OLIVIA: 24:53
I'm Olivia.
SYD: 24:54
And thank you for listening to Dark Dynasties. We'll see you next time.