Alex Murdaugh sobs as prosecution plays chilling video from murder scene

A close friend of the Murdaughs today told the jury he is 100% positive that Alex, Paul and Maggie’s voices were in a cell phone video taken at the crime scene minutes before the murders.

Rogan Gibson, who described the Murdaughs as his ‘second family’, listened to a video taken by Paul at 8.44pm at the dog kennels where the 22-year-old was shot dead with his mother Maggie shortly after 8.49pm on June 7, 2021.

Gibson told jurors he was positive he could hear Paul, Maggie and Alex in the footage. Paul had promised to send Gibson the video of his dog who he was looking after – but it was never sent despite the pair talking on the phone moments before.

Prosecutors say Paul couldn’t send the video as promised because Murdaugh had shot him dead with a shotgun before turning a rifle on his mother. 

Gibson’s testimony contradicts Murdaugh’s claim that the last time he saw Maggie, 52, and Paul alive was when they were having supper at the house on the estate in Islandton, South Carolina. The disgraced attorney, 54, told cops he only saw them at the kennels when he arrived back from his mother’s home to find them dead. 

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Gibson told the court that he learned of the murders early the following morning. He drove down to Moselle, as the Murdaugh’s estate is known, to pick up his dog and then met with detectives.

They asked to see his phone and he described having a phone conversation with Paul about a problem with his dog’s tail the night before at 8.40pm.

Gibson told the cops he was ‘99% sure’ that he could hear Murdaugh’s voice in the background during that call.

Gibson told jurors he met police again in November 22 and they showed him the video Paul took of his dogs at the kennels.

Lead prosecutor Creighton Waters asked: ‘Did you recognize the voices of your second family?’

Gibson said: ‘I did.’ 

Earlier, Maggie’s iPhone records showed how her husband of 28 years made a series of calls and texts to her in the frantic minutes after her death.

Murdaugh called Maggie three times between 9.04pm and 9.06pm, and then twice more at 9.45pm and 10.03pm. Prosecutors suggest the calls were an effort ‘to manufacture an alibi.’

Paul’s phone locked at 8.49pm and 35 seconds and Maggie’s locked at 8.49pm and 31 seconds. Neither victim read another text or picked up another call ever again. 

However, after Maggie’s phone locked, it recorded steps during the time prosecutors say she was dead.

Jurors heard that the iPhone’s sensors proved the device was picked up by somebody at 9.06pm. Just two seconds later the device received a call from Murdaugh.

But the defense later attacked the theory that Murdaugh was holding his wife’s phone at the murder scene. 

Defense attorney Phillip Barber said that the steps recorded on Alex’s phone did not match up, as would be expected if they were both being held by the defendant.

Lt. Dove agreed with Barber, saying: ‘I would expect to see steps on both phones, yes sir.’ 

The prosecution had Dove confirm that between 8.09pm and 9.02pm, Murdaugh’s phone stopped recording steps. Prior to this, the device had recorded regular movement.

Prosecutor John Conrad paused testimony to note this hour-long break. The state alleges Murdaugh killed his wife and son at 8.50pm.

Maggie’s cell data 

At 8.49pm, Maggie received a text from Alex’s sister as part of a group chat about the family patriarch Randolph III’s failing health. This was the final message marked as ‘read’ on Maggie’s iPhone. 

A text at 9.08pm from Alex to Maggie was never read. At 9.47pm Alex texted her, saying: ‘Call me babe.’

After Maggie’s iPhone locked and went silent forever, sensors on the phone picked up movement. It recorded 59 steps from 8.53pm to 8.55pm.

Lt Dove, who assessed the cell phone, told jurors Tuesday how the phone orientation changed at 8.53pm, waking the screen and activating its camera for Face ID.

Dove told jurors that, based on this evidence, it appeared that someone who was not Maggie picked up the phone. The camera activated and scanned their face, but the phone did not unlock.

Maggie’s phone orientation shifted again to portrait at 9.06pm, indicating that it was held in someone’s hand.

Two seconds later, the phone gets an incoming call from Murdaugh.

Maggie’s phone was discovered on a roadside about a quarter mile from the crime scene the following afternoon. 

The defense suggested to Dove that the orientation change logged at 9.06pm could indicate the phone being tossed out of a window of a getaway car.

The defense theory is that Paul and Maggie were killed in revenge for the fatal boating accident in which the 22-year-old youngest Murdaugh son was driving under the influence. The crash killed 19-year-old Mallory Beach.

Barber floated the idea that the killer or killers had thrown Maggie’s phone out of their vehicle after becoming freaked out when Alex made the call.

Paul’s cell data

Paul’s phone was found lying on top of his back after Murdaugh told cops he placed it there after it fell out of his son’s pocket while he was checking his body.

The 22-year-old’s call logs showed he rang his friend Rogan Gibson from the kennels at 8.44pm. The pair were discussing Gibson’s dog, which Paul was looking after.

This is the Labrador which Paul was trying to film in the video, which the prosecution says proves Alex was at the murder scene. 

Five minutes later, at 8.49pm, Gibson messaged Paul: ‘See if you can get a good picture of it. Marion wants to send it to a girl we know that’s a vet. Get him to sit and stay. He shouldn’t move around too much.’ 

That message went unanswered.

Dove told jurors that the last text Paul read was at 8.48pm. This is also the same time as the last text Paul ever sent, a movie recommendation for a girl he was chatting to. He suggested A Star Is Born.

Gibson tried calling Paul five times between 9.10pm and 10.08pm.

At 9.34pm, Gibson sent a message to Paul’s mother Maggie, saying: ‘Tell Paul to call me.’ But she didn’t respond. 

He sent a final follow-up text to Paul at 9.58pm, which simply said: ‘Yo.’

Paul’s phone logged regular steps throughout the evening, but after 283 steps between 8.32pm and 8.42pm, his phone recorded no more movement. A few steps here and there are not necessarily recorded by an iPhone.

Murdaugh’s narrative 

Murdaugh claims that the last time he saw his wife and son was when they had supper together around 8.15pm. 

He said he fell asleep in front of the TV while Maggie and Paul went down to the kennels.

The alleged killer said he tried calling Maggie before going to visit his mother, who is in the late stages of Alzheimer’s disease. Call logs show Murdaugh tried ringing Maggie three times between 9.04pm and 9.06pm. She did not pick up.

He fired up his Chevrolet Suburban at 9.06pm and he texted Maggie that he would be right back and was going to check on his mother, who lives around 15 minutes away.

Murdaugh called his wife twice more – apparently on his way back home – at 9.45pm and 10.03pm. She did not answer.

Waters told jurors last week, it is ‘up to you to decide whether he’s trying to create an alibi.’

Murdaugh claims that when he arrived back at the house, he found Maggie and Paul lying dead at the kennels. He called 911 at 10.07pm.

However, the prosecution allege that Murdaugh was with Maggie and Paul at the kennels.

Citing the video, Waters told jurors last week: ‘The evidence will show that he was there. He was at the murder scene with the two victims.

‘More than that, just over three minutes later, 8.49pm and one second, Paul’s phone locks forever. Never reads another text, he never sends another text, he doesn’t answer calls.

‘Three minutes after that video has the defendant at the murder scene with the two victims, Paul’s cell phone goes silent forever.’ 

The coroner estimates that Paul and Maggie died between 9pm and 9.30pm.

The trial is taking place at the Colleton County Courthouse in Walterboro, a sleepy, rural town 50 miles west of Charleston in a low-lying region of South Carolina over which the Murdaugh family has wielded immense judicial and political power.

Indeed, in the courtroom where Murdaugh faces judgment, a portrait of his late grandfather – legendary longtime 14th Circuit Solicitor Buster Murdaugh Jr. – had hung on the wall before it was removed ahead of the trial.

Prosecutors have said Murdaugh killed his wife and child to generate sympathy and distract from his financial crimes, an alleged motive that Murdaugh’s lawyers have argued doesn’t make sense.

But he has adamantly insisted from the moment he found the bodies of his wife and youngest son shot multiple times that he was not the killer. 

Following the murder trial, Murdaugh will have to face more than 100 additional criminal charges, ranging from drug trafficking to allegations that he stole nearly $9million from clients and other attorneys. 

Prosecutors say Murdaugh lured his wife and son to their 1,700-acre hunting lodge and shot them dead.

The state also claims that his life was spiraling out of control amid years of opioid addiction and ballooning debts.

Murdaugh pleaded not guilty in June, and the blockbuster trial is expected to include wild allegations of dark family secrets, financial ruin and hedonistic excess.  

In total, over 220 people could testify against Murdaugh in the trial.