COLUMBIA, S.C. — The attorneys representing embattled Hampton lawyer Alex Murdaugh have asked the presiding judge of the South Carolina State Grand Jury to reduce their client’s $7 million bond, according to a motion filed Tuesday in the state grand jury system.
Murdaugh, 53, sits in the Richland County Jail on dozens of alleged financial crimes that involved stealing millions from clients. Attorneys Dick Harpootlian and Jim Griffin claimed in the motion that Murdaugh has less than $10,000 in his bank accounts and cannot pay the bond amount.
“Mr. Murdaugh does not have seven million dollars or anything close to that amount,” the motion said. “Mr. Murdaugh is a man who cannot pay his phone bill.”
Harpootlian, reached by phone Wednesday, said he did not know when a new bond hearing would be scheduled. He said it was up to the judge.
The attorneys’ motion comes three weeks after Murdaugh’s bond hearing, where S.C. Judge Alison Renee Lee set a $7 million surety bond — one of the highest in state history.
He has been jailed in Columbia since Oct. 16 and had been denied bond twice before in Richland County. That bond was related to insurance fraud charges stemming from when he allegedly asked a former client to kill him so his son could collect a $10 million life insurance policy.
Murdaugh’s attorneys, in their motion, argued that the $7 million bond was “tantamount to no bond at all.”
The attorneys said that the indictments against Murdaugh are not for violent crimes and that he has a constitutional right to be released on bail in an “amount no higher than necessary. ...”
Because Murdaugh’s assets have been placed into a receivership and are under the control of court-appointed financial overseers, he cannot deposit money or pledge assets for the bond, Griffin and Harpootlian have said.
On top of his alleged financial crimes, Murdaugh is a person of interest in the June murders of his wife and son on the family’s 1,700-acre hunting property that straddles Hampton and Colleton counties.
Police have announced no arrests or suspects in the murders of Maggie Murdaugh, 52, and Paul Murdaugh, 22.
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