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Alex Murdaugh life sentence: Juror reveals why it took less than an hour to reach verdict

One of the most disturbing factors the jurors had to struggle with was the sheer savagery of the crime

WALTERBORO, SOUTH CAROLINA: After six weeks of testimony and a swell of evidence from over 70 witnesses, a juror on the Alex Murdaugh case revealed it took less than an hour to reach a verdict in the high-profile murder trial. Alex Murdaugh, 54, was found guilty of the double homicide of his wife and son Maggie Murdaugh, 52, and Paul Murdaugh, 22, respectively on Thursday, March 2.

“[Murdaugh is] a good liar, but not good enough,” juror Craig Moyer told Good Morning America early Friday, less than 24 hours after Murdaugh was convicted. The victims were found fatally shot several times in cold blood at the kennels of the family’s hunting estate in South Carolina’s Lowcountry on the night of June 7, 2021. Moyer said that despite Murdaugh's emotional display on the stand all the evidence clearly pointed out, "He was guilty." 

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'I didn’t see any true remorse!'

“You start deliberating, going through the evidence and everybody was pretty much talking,” Moyer said of the initial deliberations, at which point two jurors voted not guilty and a third was still undecided. “About 45 minutes later, after all our deliberating, we figured it out. The evidence was clear [that he was guilty],” reported New York Post. Moyer added he was unmoved by Murdaugh’s emotional testimony. “I didn’t think much of him,” Moyer scoffed. “All he did was blow snot, [there were] no tears. I saw his eyes. “I didn’t see any true remorse or compassion or anything.”

Subsequently, Moyer claimed a Snapchat video with Murdaugh’s voice in the background which Paul took moments before he was killed was the key evidence that convinced him that the patriarch was guilty. “You can hear his voice clearly,” Moyer said, though he added that he was “very surprised” when Murdaugh finally reversed his lies over the years and admitted he was at the kennels before the shots rang. South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson echoed Moyers's sentiment and said the Snapchat video was Paul “speaking from beyond the grave.” “That was a major piece of the state’s case,” Wilson said.

'People just had a hard time making that leap!'

However, one of the most disturbing factors the jurors had to struggle with was the sheer savagery of the crime. Maggie was shot five times with a rifle and Paul’s brain was detached from his skull by an up-close shotgun blast, the source reported. “One of the things that I would get from people in the street … people can understand a spouse killing another spouse, but the way that Paul and Maggie were murdered, his son, the brutality of it, people just had a hard time making that leap,” Wilson explained.

Wilson speculated that Murdaugh’s family legacy and “lifestyle of privilege” sheered and detached him from his callous actions. “I believe he probably loved [his wife and son] in his own way, but he loved himself more. Killing them was the price he was willing to pay to preserve his way of life,” said Wilson.