The continued media attention following his father’s conviction for a double murder has led Buster Murdo to ask the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office that he not be associated with future police reports.
As a result of the national media attention, Murdo and his girlfriend, Brooklyn White, filed police reports, complaining of being followed by paparazzi and even photographed through gaps in the blinds of their own home.
Richard “Buster” Alexander Murdo Jr., the oldest son of Alex and Maggie Murdo, was living in Hilton Head during his father’s trial for the murders of his brother and mother in June 2021. After the murders, the family, which was well known in the Lowcountry for its 100-year legal dynasty and previously held the office of the 14th District Attorney, has since been put under the microscope by national and international media.
In a report filed by Murdaugh and White Sunday, police assured the couple they would be doing extra patrols in the neighborhood. Those patrols have continued since Thursday, said Maj. Angela Wiens, spokeswoman for the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office.
In the latest report filed by White on Tuesday, she told police the media’s actions had become “increasingly disturbing and intimidating.” White said she noticed several photographers taking pictures while she was walking her dogs.
She also explained that reporters followed her and Buster Murdo on their way to the Colleton County Courthouse during Alex Murdo’s trial, which ended March 3 with Judge Clifton Newman handing down two life sentences for the murders. White said reporters also tried to talk to neighbors to get information about the couple.
White pointed to a particular reporter with a true-crime YouTube channel who she says was caught peeking into the couple’s car parked outside their home. Her “primary concern” was this reporter and his “conduct at her residence,” police said in the report.
In a recent video posted on the reporter’s channel, the YouTuber said he has no qualms about photographers taking photos of the couple while they’re out in public, but he doesn’t agree with photos inside their home. The YouTuber also posted a four-minute journey to the family’s hunting lodge, Moselle, where Paul and Maggie Murdo were killed.
“I don’t agree with the media taking pictures of someone while they’re in their home… in someone’s home,” the YouTuber said in a recent video. “I think one’s home is one’s refuge. I wouldn’t do that.”
In Tuesday’s report, police explained how White could obtain a restraining order against the YouTuber or other photographers if she is concerned.
As of Thursday, no such restraining order had been filed in Beaufort County Magistrate Court.
Media giants including CNN, HBO Max and Netflix have released several documentary episodes detailing the family’s history, the murders of Paul, 22, and Maggie Murdagh, 52, at the family’s hunting lodge, and Alex Murdo’s alleged financial crimes. The death of several people close to the family was also investigated.
Those deaths include that of Mallory Beach, a classmate of Paul Murdo, killed in a boating accident in 2019 while he was allegedly driving drunk; Gloria Satterfield, the family’s housekeeper, whose death settlement money was stolen by Alex Murdo while he was acting as her family’s lawyer, and Stephen Smith, Buster Murdo’s classmate, who was previously believed to have been killed in hit and run in 2015
The Beach family has filed a multi-million dollar wrongful death lawsuit against several members of the Murdo family. The trial in the case is scheduled to begin on August 14.
Alex Murdo has yet to face trial for around 100 alleged financial crimes, including millions taken from Satterfield’s sons, whom he represented after she died at the family home.
The SC Division of Law Enforcement reopened the investigation into Smith’s death two weeks after the murders of Paul and Maggie Murdo.
After his conviction, Alex Murdo was taken from Walterboro to the Department of Corrections prison in Columbia. After a 30-day evaluation period, he will be assigned to the correctional institute where he will serve his life sentences.
His attorneys, Dick Harpoutlian and Jim Griffin, said they would appeal his sentence.