Alex Murdaugh’s former SC law firm sues him, alleges he stole funds for years. What to know
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Alex Murdaugh Coverage
The Murdaugh family saga has dominated the news after another shooting, a resignation and criminal accusations — with Alex Murdaugh at the center of it all. Here are the latest updates on Alex Murdaugh.
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Alex Murdaugh’s former law firm, founded by his great-grandfather in 1910, filed a lawsuit claiming that Murdaugh funneled stolen money from clients and the law firm into a fake bank account for years.
Peters, Murdaugh, Parker, Eltzroth and Detrick filed the suit Wednesday in Colleton County court, alleging its former employee “was able to covertly steal these funds by disguising disbursements from settlements as payments” to Murdaugh’s fraudulent account, the firm alleges.
PMPED’s lawsuit against Murdaugh comes one day after court documents indicated the firm could be implicated in Murdaugh’s scheme to divert a multimillion-dollar settlement away from the heirs of his former housekeeper.
In a statement about the lawsuit, PMPED said Murdaugh submitted to the firm and clients false documentation that allowed him to funnel stolen money into “fraudulent bank accounts.”
Murdaugh, the statement said, used firm assets “in an unauthorized manner and without the consent or knowledge of his former partners to further his scheme to defraud.”
The firm’s lawsuit seeks to find out where Murdaugh’s alleged stolen money went and “if any of it is hidden away,” the statement said.
PMPED also wants to know whether Murdaugh has signed any agreements that would allow him to make money from books, interviews or other publicity, the statement said.
The Hampton law firm is represented by Columbia lawyers Jamie L. Walters and John Koon of Koon, Cook & Walters LLC.
Jim Griffin, a lawyer for Alex Murdaugh, said Wednesday he had not seen the lawsuit and could not comment at this time.
“I know it is is a very sad day for all the members of that firm and whom Alex holds in highest esteem,” Griffin said. “He has pledged his full cooperation to get these issues resolved.”
Stolen funds?
PMPED was unaware of Murdaugh’s “scheme” until Friday, Sept. 2, when the firm was trying to track down an unpaid fee to the firm in a case Murdaugh was handling with another law firm, according to the lawsuit.
Questions about the unpaid fee “failed to produce a satisfactory explanation.” A check was found on Murdaugh’s desk from the other law firm involved in the case, but it was made out to a personal account for Murdaugh and not the firm.
“This discovery prompted a review of prior settlements of cases Alex Murdaugh resolved,” according to the lawsuit. “This review showed numerous checks made payable to ‘Forge’ or ‘Forge Consulting, LLC’.”
Forge Consulting, an Atlanta-based company, helps structure settlements to stretch over a period of time and has worked often with PMPED clients, the filing says.
Forge told PMPED that it had not worked with Murdaugh on that case, nor ever structured any attorney’s fees for him.
On the morning of Sept. 3, the law firm confronted Murdaugh, the suit said, and he “admitted to converting monies owed to PMPED and its clients to his own personal use.”
The firm said it immediately demanded his resignation.
In the days after, PMPED said it notified the Hampton County Sheriff’s Office and the S.C. Law Enforcement Division. A criminal investigation by SLED is underway.
The firm also told the S.C. Supreme Court Office of Disciplinary Counsel. An investigation is underway, and Murdaugh’s law license has been suspended.
PMPED has also employed a forensic accounting firm to review all of Murdaugh’s financial activities. It has reimbursed clients, as well.
However, the lawsuit indicated that PMPED does not know the extent of the money taken. “It is anticipated that additional information may become known that could lead to more losses to PMPED as it protects its clients’ interests,” the lawsuit said.
A representative from PMPED did not respond to an email asking the total amount of money Murdaugh is accused of taking.
PMPED’s lawsuit states that Murdaugh was able to get away with this for years through a personal Bank of America account titled “‘Alexander Murdaugh d/b/a Forge’, a [fictitious] entity that provides no services and makes no products for sale.“
He used “Forge” on the checks to evade detection, the lawsuit said.
Forge released a statement earlier this month claiming it had “no involvement in or knowledge of the alleged inappropriate conduct of Alex Murdaugh.”
In a filing in a separate lawsuit on Tuesday, a similar tactic of naming checks with “Forge” and diverting money was described by attorneys for the sons of Murdaugh’s former housekeeper, who died after an alleged fall on the Murdaugh property in 2018. The attorneys are seeking answers for missing death settlement funds in the housekeeper’s death.
Alleged suicide insurance plot
Wednesday’s lawsuit paints a clearer picture of what happened in the days before Sept. 4, when Alex Murdaugh was allegedly shot in the head for an intended $10 million life insurance payout.
Police reported Murdaugh was shot in the head in Hampton County, setting ablaze public interest and speculation in what occurred. Initially, Murdaugh’s lawyers told reporters that Murdaugh said a man in a blue pickup truck shot him in the head after he was experiencing car trouble.
The lawyers said his injuries amounted to a brain bleed, a fractured skull, and an entry and exit wound from the shooting.
Later, the law firm made clear that Murdaugh was forced to resign from the firm a day before the shooting due to allegations of misappropriated money.
On Sept. 15, a Colleton County man was charged with assisting in a scheme to kill Murdaugh for a $10 million insurance payout for his surviving son, Buster. The following day, Murdaugh was charged as part of the same alleged scheme.
At Murdaugh’s bond hearing, his attorneys said the suspended Hampton lawyer was experiencing a fall from grace, spiraling out due to a 20-year opioid addiction and still reeling from the deaths of his wife and son on June 7.
Murdaugh did not appear at the hearing with any bandages or a visible wound on his head.
A lawyer for Curtis Smith, the Colleton County man charged, told The Island Packet and Beaufort Gazette that the charges against Smith seem to be based on Murdaugh’s account to SLED and that Smith is being made out as the “fall guy.”
How the Sept. 4 shooting ties in with the alleged misappropriated funds is not clear and is the subject of two criminal investigations by SLED, one into the shooting and the other into the missing money.
This story was originally published October 6, 2021 at 3:02 PM with the headline "Alex Murdaugh’s former SC law firm sues him, alleges he stole funds for years. What to know."
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