Former Palmetto State Bank CEO and notorious accomplice to convicted murderer Alex Murdaugh, 54, has filed a new bid for a new trial, citing his murderous friend’s court testimony confirming the 51-year-old’s crimes.
Russell Laffitte, 51, was convicted in November 2022 of six financial crime charges related to a decades-long corruption scheme led by Murdaugh that laundered hundreds of thousands of dollars from clients.
The 51-year-old was denied a new trial by a South Carolina judge on March 6, but said testimony from Murdaugh’s trial – in which he was charged with the brutal murder of his wife Maggie, 52, and son Paul, 22, was convicted – should be taken into account.
The appeal follows Murdaugh’s six-week trial beginning January 25, in which the father-of-two was found guilty of the double murder – which took place on June 7, 2021 at his Moselle hunting estate in Islandton.
Former Palmetto State Bank CEO Russell Laffitte and notorious accomplice to convicted murderer Alex Murdaugh, 54, has filed a new bid for a new trial, citing his murderous friend’s court testimony in which the 51-year-old acknowledges his crimes became
“On February 23, 2023, Mr. Murdaugh expressly stated for the first time in affidavit that he did not participate in any conspiracy with Mr. Lafitte because Mr. Lafitte was not involved in the financial crimes,” the new filing reads.
‘Mister. Murdaugh accepted full responsibility for his own actions and testified that Mr. Laffitte had done nothing wrong and had no knowledge of Mr. Murdaugh’s criminal activities.’
Prosecutors said Murdaugh killed his wife and son to divert attention from his 99 financial crime charges, which stem from 19 separate indictments and total nearly $9 million.
He was accused of embezzling money from his family’s generations-old personal injury law firm and its clients – while Laffitte allegedly stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from the former attorney’s six clients, federal prosecutors said.
The original indictment did not mention Murdaugh by name but said Laffitte collected nearly $392,000 in fees for those six clients of a “personal injury attorney at a law firm in Hampton, South Carolina,” according to a July press release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of South Carolina.
Laffitte then remitted personal loans from her accounts to herself and Murdaugh and used the funds for personal expenses, prosecutors said during last year’s trial.
The 51-year-old’s new request for a new trial cites Murdaugh’s testimony when he took the stand in court when testifying in connection with the murder of his wife and son.
“I’m not denying that I took money that wasn’t mine, that I misled people … who trusted me to do it, and that what I did was horrible. I don’t deny that,’ said Murdaugh.
“You keep talking about stuff I did with Russell Laffitte, but what I want you to know is that I did that and I’m the one who took people’s money that I shouldn’t have taken.
“Russell Laffitte was not involved in knowingly helping me with this. If he did it, he did it without knowing it.’
Laffitte, who was on trial in November 2022 on multiple fraud charges, was found guilty after more than 11 hours of deliberation and the release of two jurors in a Charleston courtroom.
The charges included conspiracy to commit wire fraud and bank fraud, bank fraud, wire fraud and three counts of misappropriation of bank funds.
Murdaugh took the stand at his own trial when he admitted stealing millions of dollars from the family business and customers, saying he needed the money to fund his drug habit
Alex Murdaugh with wife Maggie and their sons Buster (left) and Paul (right)
Pictured is the hunting lodge where Maggie and Paul Murdaugh were killed in Hampton, South Carolina
Murdaugh – who was reportedly struggling with a debilitating opioid addiction in the months leading up to the murder – was found guilty on March 3 and sentenced to two consecutive life sentences.
The disgraced South Carolina successor filed an appeal last week against his conviction in the murders of his wife and son.
His attorneys filed a motion to appeal his conviction and conviction when a new mugshot was released showing Murdaugh with a shaved head and smiling in yellow jail jumpsuits.
He is now being held in his own cell at Kirkland’s Reception and Evaluation Center, where he will undergo 45 days of tests that the South Carolina Department of Justice performs on every prisoner to determine where he should be kept permanently.
As a convicted double murderer, Murdaugh is housed with the most brutal and violent inmates in the state.
Murdaugh’s attorneys, Dick Harpootlian and Jim Griffin, previously indicated they would appeal within 10 days of his conviction.
During the trial, the jury heard more than 75 witnesses and reviewed nearly 800 pieces of evidence.
They also heard about Murdaugh’s betrayed friends and clients, his failed attempt to stage his own death in an insurance scam, a fatal accident involving his son, the housekeeper who died in a fall at Murdaugh’s home, and the grisly Scene from the murders.
Eventually, the attorney took the witness stand and admitted stealing millions of dollars from the family business and customers, saying he needed the money to fund his drug addiction.
He also admitted he lied to investigators about being in the kennels where Maggie and Paul died and said he was paranoid about law enforcement because he was addicted to opioids and had pills in his pocket on the night of the murders had.
Prosecutors did not have the weapons used to kill the Murdaughs, nor other direct evidence such as confessions or blood spatter.
A new mugshot released on Thursday shows Alex Murdaugh with his head shaved and smiling in a yellow prison jumpsuit
Buster Murdaugh is hugged in the rain during the funeral service for his brother Paul and mother Maggie in 2021
But they had a mountain of circumstantial evidence, including the video that showed Murdaugh at the scene of the murders five minutes before his wife and son stopped using their cell phones forever.
Testifying last week, Murdaugh appeared to weep as he repeatedly denied killing his wife.
But juror Craig Moyer said he saw through another lie.
“He never cried. He was just blowing snot,’ Moyer said. ‘No tears. I saw his eyes. I was so close to him.’
It took the jury just a few hours to convict him.
At his sentencing last week, Judge Clifton Newman described Murdaugh as a “monster” who continued to lie even when the evidence was damning.
“This case falls under our Statute of Death Penalty due to the statutory aggravating circumstances that two or more people are murdered by the defendant by an act or pursuant to a plan or conduct. I do not question the state’s decision not to pursue the death penalty at all.
“But as I sit here in this courtroom and look at the many portraits of judges and other court officials and reflect on the fact that your family, including you, have been prosecuting people here in this courtroom for the past century, and many have received the death penalty, probably for minor conduct.
‘Remind me of your expression on the witness stand. Oh what a tangled web we weave. What did you mean by that?’
“I mean, if I lied, I kept lying,” Murdaugh replied.
“And the question is, when will it end? when will it end And it’s already over for the jury because they have concluded that you have continued to lie and lie throughout your testimony.
“And maybe with all this crowd here, for the most part, or 80, 90, and/or 99 percent believe that you continue to lie now that you are going to court your denial statement.”
The life Murdaugh now faces is a far cry from the privileged world of the million-dollar homes from the coast to the hunting grounds of the Lowcountry to which he is accustomed.
“As part of the admissions process, like all inmates, [Murdaugh] will undergo medical testing, mental health and educational assessments, and the South Carolina Department of Corrections will continue to gather additional background information,” the South Carolina Department of Corrections said in a statement last week.
Kirkland Correctional Center will be Murdaugh’s grim new home for the next few weeks while he undergoes an evaluation of where he should be sent permanently
This undated file photo provided by the South Carolina Department of Corrections on July 11, 2019 shows the new death row at Broad River Correctional Institution in Columbia, SC
After the investigation, Murdaugh is sent to one of the state’s maximum security prisons to spend the rest of his life behind bars.
Kirkland is home to more than 1,700 of the state’s most violent criminals and processes more than 8,000 prisoners for investigation each year.
Not only does it serve as a processing facility for all of the state’s convicts, but it also houses a specialized high-security prison for the most dangerous and violent offenders.
Adjacent to the prison is Broad River Correctional Institution, which houses both high and medium security inmates.