Murdaugh Retrial: What a Defense Attorney Sees That Nobody Else Does

**Todd** (0:01)
This is Hidden Killers Live with Tony Brueski and Robin Dreeke.

**Tony Brueski** (0:09)
Alec Murdaugh is going back to trial at some point, probably next year, maybe the next, who really knows. But there's a lot of things happening in Alec Murdaugh Trial Part 2 that probably didn't happen in Alec Murdaugh Trial Part 1 We're going to discuss all of it from what the defense is building, what the prosecution is up against and the third bonus lawsuit that's currently in progress, the civil suit against Becky Hill from Alec Murdaugh. We're going to get into all of it today. Bob Motta, defense attorney, host of the podcast Defense Diaries, is with myself and Robin Dreeke to break all of it down.
Recently, Dick Harputalin went on TV, basically announced his playbook, that his team is a strategy for the Kennel video, the one piece of evidence that really destroyed Alec Murdaugh's alibi the first time. Jim Griffin pointed to unknown male DNA under Maggie Murdaugh's fingernails that was never run through CODIS. They're hiring a new forensic cell phone expert, pushing for venue changes, and they filed that federal lawsuit against Becky Hill. Does it all matter? Is it posturing by the defense to make old news seem new again or are we truly going to find some new investigative details? Let's dig in here to today. We're going to start with the defense of Alex Murdaugh before we go over to the prosecution and the Becky Hill suit. Let's start with Dick's statement going on national TV. He said his team is a strategy for the Kennel video. That's the one piece of evidence that shattered Alex's alibi the first time. Said he wasn't down there and then there he is talking on camera.
Talking to the dog about the guinea fowl that the dog ate. And oh, what a tangled web we weave as Alec would say. Bob, how are they going to repackage and re-present this to a jury that's going to read differently round two?

**Bob Motta** (2:15)
Just when I thought I was out.
Yeah, man, look, here's the deal. It's, I'm actually super fascinated about this trial.

**Tony Brueski** (2:28)
I am too, yeah.

**Bob Motta** (2:29)
Oddly enough, it's going to be tough. I mean, look, the Kennel video is a thing that you don't beat it, right? I mean, it exists. There's no turning back the hands of time. There's no undoing what was said during the first trial, transcripts of every single word that was uttered. So that's all there. And you have Alex admitting that he lied about it. What you do is you reframe what it proves. All right? So simply put, you're not going to beat the Kennel video. You reframe it in a way that you're saying presence isn't a trigger pull.
You know, just because he was there doesn't mean he's the guy who shot them. That's all you can do with it. There is no getting rid of it. It's there.
It does what it does. You can hear who you hear. There's no that wasn't me. You know, like none of that exists. So that's all you can hope to do with it is reframe it in a way that says, okay, well, you know, there's an axiom in the law, mere presence is not enough. You need more. And that holds true.

**Todd** (3:39)
So we'll see what they do with it.

**Tony Brueski** (3:41)
And that's true. But just saying that, you know, it doesn't, it's not going to weigh very well for a jury of it. Doesn't prove that he did it. True. It doesn't. I can agree. But they're going to want more. They're going to want a story. They're going to want, you know, something beyond, well, you can't prove he pulled the trigger on video. Okay. Well, then who did?
And if he was there, how do we get there? Are we going to get into a third party culprit type situation, you think?

**Bob Motta** (4:08)
That's what I was just going to say. You got to start digging. You better start digging. I mean, look, there's one fact that is absolute gospel. There are a lot of people that had beef with that guy.
The question is, can you narrow it down to the people that he had wronged that were aware of it? That's the key in the whole thing because a lot of like your typical lawyer that's funneling their client's funds are constantly coming up with bullshit excuses as to why they haven't dispersed the money, right? I mean, there's always some excuse. So you need to figure out which of his clients, if you're gonna start there as a possible third party culprit, knew, knew, knew that he had the money and he hadn't turned it over, you know, because if they've been fed excuses, most people, you know, they may be suspicious, but they tend to believe what their lawyer is saying to them.