The Put up travels to South Carolina for an inside have a look at the most recent twists and turns within the Murdaugh homicide case.
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WALTERBORO, SC — Two males who're “cousins” to a few of the Walterboro Cowboys, a violent Bloods-affiliated road gang that originated within the so-called “Eastside” of this small metropolis proper off I-95, are the most recent characters dragged into the infamous Murdaugh homicide thriller — and one mentioned he's being “railroaded.”
In the meantime, one member of the gang advised The Put up that “Alex Murdaugh runs half the medication on this county.”
Final month, the state grand jury indicted two native males — who a number of Cowboy gang members advised The Put up are their “cousins,” or shut associates — on the identical day it levied one more indictment as Murdaugh, who was arrested in July for the murders of his spouse and son on the household’s searching lodge in June 2021.
Cowboy “cousins” Jerry Rivers, 39, and his buddy Spencer Anwan Roberts, 34, had been indicted Aug. 19 on prices that prosecutors say contain presumably being a part of Murdaugh’s alleged drug and cash laundering pipeline within the Low Nation.
Murdaugh now faces a complete of 90 prices of monetary wrongdoing, together with current allegations that he was concerned in drug distribution and cash laundering throughout a number of counties right here.
Locals speculate that Murdaugh’s alleged drug operation was larger than anybody realizes.
A Charleston legislation enforcement supply accustomed to the case mentioned the Cowboys gang and different native criminals, with their proximity to I-95 — lengthy a conduit for medication and weapons run from Miami to New York — could play a much bigger function than anybody on the South Carolina coast.
“There’s nonetheless much more to return out and much more surprises, I’d wager my life on it,” the supply mentioned.
South Carolina Assistant Lawyer Basic Creighton Waters mentioned in court docket that cash “misappropriated” by Murdaugh went via his alleged confederate, Walterboro resident Curtis “Cousin Eddie” Smith, 62, who’s in jail after being indicted with Murdaugh in late June on sweeping drug and conspiracy prices. From Smith, the AG mentioned, the cash “continued downstream” to Rivers and Roberts.
“I ain’t completed nothing,” Rivers advised The Put up final week whereas sitting on his porch carrying an ankle monitor after having needed to submit $150,000 bond. “I’ve been railroaded.”
Spencer Roberts’ lawyer, Mark Peper, mentioned the fees in opposition to the 2 seemed to be trumped up by prosecutors who're “greedy at straws.”
“They don’t have sufficient to get Murdaugh on the murders,” he mentioned. “They’re determined. That is making an attempt to get ‘Cousin Eddie’ to speak extra or for Alex to speak extra. They’re making an attempt to ship a message however it’s ridiculous.”
Rivers — who lives throughout the road from Khiry Broughton, the chief of the Walterboro Cowboys who was sentenced to jail in 2017 with seven associates — served time on the federal jail in close by Estill on 2012 cocaine trafficking prices, however claims he’s gone straight. He was first subpoenaed in November and was arrested together with Roberts, who additionally has a legal report, at a close-by playing joint final month. Roberts was not at house when The Put up went to his handle final week.
Rivers was nailed on an obstruction of justice cost for taking Roberts’ cellphone throughout the arrest and when requested to return it, admittedly gave the cops a pretend cellphone.
“It’s bull—t!” one Cowboys gang member with the letters COW (for Cowboys) tattooed throughout his throat advised The Put up on the run-down deck of a modular house, a block from Rivers’ home. He mentioned he didn't need his identify printed as he was not too long ago launched from jail.
“They (the cops) need to get the Cowboys identify in there to muddy the water [of the Murdaugh case] and get everybody to suppose we completed killed these folks,” the person mentioned. “Perhaps have a look at a few of the corrupt white sheriffs right here as an alternative.”
Former Colleton County Sheriff Andy Strickland was in cost on the time Broughton and 7 different Cowboys had been arrested and sentenced to jail — however three years later Strickland himself was accused of promoting unlawful medication. Prosecutors agreed to a plea deal that meant Strickland acquired 5 years’ probation.
“I’m going to inform you one thing,” one other man on the gang member’s home advised The Put up. “Alex Murdaugh is operating half the medication on this county.”
The introduction of the Walterboro Cowboys “cousins” is barely the most recent twist in a drama that kicked off on June 21, 2021, when Murdaugh, the scion of one of the crucial distinguished authorized households within the state, known as 911 to say his spouse, Maggie, 52, and son, Paul, 22, had been murdered on the household’s 1,700-acre searching lodge in Islandton, SC.
Smith — aka “Cousin Eddie,” a distant cousin of Murdaugh’s — entered the image on Labor Day final yr when he was arrested for supposedly making an attempt to shoot Murdaugh on a rural highway in Hampton County in a convoluted insurance coverage fraud/suicide-for-hire rip-off. Murdaugh’s lawyer later claimed his shopper had a 20-year opioid habit and that Smith was his seller.
However Murdaugh and Smith had been allegedly a part of a much bigger operation.
In June, Murdaugh and Smith had been indicted on conspiracy and drug prices that allege Smith acquired not less than 437 checks totaling $2,413,754.79 from Murdaugh, between 2013 and 2021. It’s alleged that Smith transformed them into money in a scheme to learn Murdaugh as a part of “myriad illegal actions.”
The investigation into Murdaugh to this point totals 18 indictments containing 90 prices in opposition to him that contain schemes to defraud victims of $8,789,447.77.
Among the many many locals that Murdaugh allegedly swindled in insurance coverage settlement scams had been the sons of Gloria Satterfield, his household’s housekeeper who died in a mysterious fall in 2018 on the Murdaugh house, and a deaf black man who ended up a quadriplegic after a automotive accident.
The homicide trial gained’t begin till January on the earliest however courtroom mudslinging has already began, together with his attorneys complaining they’ve been “ambushed” by leaks to the media, together with allegations that video from Paul Murdaugh’s cellular phone reveals his father current with him and Maggie not lengthy earlier than the murders.
Murdaugh could also be discovered responsible of the murders, however quite a lot of his associates and enterprise associates might go down with him for monetary misdeeds — even when many didn’t totally perceive what they had been entering into.
“Plenty of good persons are going to go down with Alex Murdaugh,” mentioned a Hampton County supply accustomed to sure features of the investigation. “Plenty of them had no thought what he was actually into and so they acquired concerned with him in small ways in which might find yourself actually hurting them.”
Lisa Smith of Walterboro, who was once married to Smith’s brother, Invoice Ray, mentioned “Cousin Eddie” was a hard-working logger and good man till he was injured on the job and developed a painkiller habit.
“Then he began altering,” Lisa mentioned. “We additionally thought it was actually unusual when Eddie confirmed up at a relative’s funeral some years in the past with Alex Murdaugh. We had been like, what’s that about? What are these two doing collectively? Now we all know.”
However Lisa mentioned she knew one thing was occurring with Smith when he started coming to the financial institution the place she labored in Walterboro to money large checks that he by no means deposited into his account.
“I couldn’t money them as a result of I used to be kin,” she mentioned. “However I requested him, ‘What are you doing, the place is that this cash coming from?’ and he by no means answered. I believe Murdaugh took benefit of the truth that [Smith] acquired damage and couldn’t work and acquired him concerned in all this.”
She, like quite a lot of different residents of Colleton and Hampton counties interviewed by The Put up final week, marvel if Murdaugh’s alleged drug-running might contain smuggling by sea as nicely.
That concept comes from intel that first surfaced on internet sleuth boards within the weeks following the murders of Maggie and Paul, indicating that Murdaugh had a decades-long friendship with a Beaufort-based fisherman, Barrett T. Boulware, who was arrested together with his father on drug smuggling prices in 1980. In that case, officers seized 15 tons of marijuana on a shrimp boat within the Bahamas.
The costs in opposition to the Boulwares had been dropped in 1983 “after a key authorities witness was killed when he stepped in entrance of a automotive in Florida,” the State newspaper reported on the time.
In January, state investigators probing Murdaugh’s monetary and authorized misconduct started trying into the connection between he and Boulware, who owned Moselle, the searching lodge the place Maggie and Paul had been killed, earlier than promoting it to Murdaugh in 2009.
Hypothesis concerning the pair’s relationship intensified after FitsNews combed via Beaufort County public information that confirmed Murdaugh and Boulware, who died in 2018, co-owned a number of odd properties alongside the waterways of St. Helena Island — together with tiny a lot of land ultimate for drug smuggling lookouts or offloading areas, the outlet steered.
It reminded some right here of the legendary “Operation Jackpot,” which concerned “gentleman smugglers” from South Carolina accused of smuggling 347,000 kilos of marijuana and 130,000 kilos of cannabis into the US — via the marshy channels and inlets of the coast — from 1983 to 1986.
‘Alex Murdaugh is operating half the medication on this county.’
Nameless supply in Colleton County, SC
However a number of St. Helena Island locals say that drug smuggling there's a factor of the previous.
Scott Sanders, 64, a former tomato farmer and shrimp-boat proprietor who’s been a real-estate agent on St. Helena’s Island for 23 years, lives on the finish of a protracted filth highway close to what’s known as “Land’s Finish” on the island. He mentioned knew Boulware, in addition to a few of the smugglers from Operation Jackpot.
Entry to the islands, that are generally known as “fish camps,” is barely doable by boat, he mentioned.
“I knew Barrett. He was an actual opportunist,” Sanders advised The Put up outdoors his house final week. “He was a fisherman and an entrepreneur, I suppose you may say. However I don’t suppose he and Murdaugh had been doing any drug smuggling. These days have been over for a very long time. You don’t must import bales of marijuana anymore — you'll be able to simply purchase it from Colorado.”
Sanders mentioned Murdaugh and Boulware had been probably amassing the land in hopes of at some point promoting it again to the federal government at a revenue.
The Charleston legislation enforcement supply mentioned he believes Murdaugh’s drug operation, if it does exist, is concentrated extra inland, in Hampton and Colleton counties.
Murdaugh is being held on a $7 million bond on the homicide prices within the Alvin S. Glenn Detention Middle outdoors Columbia. The whereabouts of his solely surviving son, Buster, 26, are unknown. An acquaintance of the household in Hampton advised The Put up Buster has been staying with associates in North Carolina and St. Croix.
“It will get extra like a season of ‘Ozark” on daily basis,” Sean Pool, Smith’s son-in-law, advised The Put up final week. “We attempt to keep the hell away from all of it.”
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