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Murdaugh Murders, Part 5
32 Plays5 days ago
We have a Joy-solo minisode today! We wanted to give a layout of Moselle, Alex Murdaugh's property, before we walk through the events of the murders and following. Joy is way better at spacial awareness than Nikki, so she took the wheel!
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Transcript
Introduction and Case Overview
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome to Fixate Today, Gone Tomorrow. This week's episode is going to be shorter than usual, and you'll just be hearing from me, Joy. I'm passionate about theorizing and adding to the basic narrative of the Murdoch deaths, primarily by picking up on subtle clues that may have been overlooked in the past, but now with the advantage of hindsight and and additional background research allow us the chance to re-examine the case and work through new theories of what really happened and maybe even more importantly, we can consider was even further corruption at play on a much larger scale that directly or indirectly led to these tragedies.
00:00:46
Speaker
Personally, I think there was, and I think Alex's drug use and even potential involvement with larger drug smuggling activities in the area played a bigger role than investigators and the trials originally exposed.
00:01:04
Speaker
So far, we've talked about a general overview of the various tragic events that have occurred in the Murdoch family's orbit, including the boat crash,
00:01:16
Speaker
that Paul was involved with and led to the untimely death of Mallory Beach, the unexpected death of their former housekeeper, Gloria Satterfield, the mysterious hit-and-run accident of a local high school classmate, Stephen Smith,
00:01:36
Speaker
Alex Murdaugh's deep web of financial crimes, and of course, the horrific murder of Paul and Maggie Murdaugh on June 7th, 2021, and all the mayhem that spiraled in the aftermath.
00:01:53
Speaker
The case seems to be never-ending, and new evidence is exposed regularly. Personally, I feel like Alec's drug use and even his potential involvement with a larger drug smuggling activities in the area played a much larger role than initial investigations and the trials exposed.
00:02:21
Speaker
So let me try to explain my rationale.
Significance of Moselle Property
00:02:26
Speaker
As we build out the full picture of exactly what happened with the Murdoch family, we need to understand the property often referred to by them as Moselle, which is where Paul and Maggie were murdered um and where the family's former housekeeper, Gloria Satterfield, fell to her death.
00:02:46
Speaker
The property is located at 4147 Moselle Road in Eilington, South Carolina, hence the reason the family refers to it as just Moselle.
00:02:58
Speaker
It's important to understand the layout going forward as we walk through Maggie and Paul and Alex's movements on the day of the murder.
00:03:09
Speaker
It's my contention that the property itself may have played an even larger role in the history leading up to this whole case, but we'll have to circle back to that in future episodes.
00:03:21
Speaker
So when the Murdaugh's owned it the entire Moselle property was approximately 1,772 acres. That's a chunk land. It included 5,275 square foot acres big chunk of land it included a five thousand two hundred and seventy five square foot four-bedroom, three-and-a-half-bathroom main house, which was built in 2011.
00:03:47
Speaker
It was on the front steps to this house where their housekeeper, Gloria Satterfield, fell under questionable circumstances to her death. You may remember that there was a question about whether the Murdoch's dogs caused the fall and thereby liability issues with sewing the insurance company.
00:04:10
Speaker
Insurance claims, of course, handled by Alex, which he ultimately fraudulently stole from her next of kin. But back to the property.
00:04:21
Speaker
So the property also includes a guest house, dog kennels, an airplane hangar, tractor storage building, barn, a landing strip, and extensive hunting grounds, all of which are relevant to understanding what happened on the day of the murders, but also might play a role in the bigger picture that has been coming into view more clearly as the tragedy has come to light.
00:04:52
Speaker
So the property was previously owned by a gentleman named Barrett Bulwar. He was a fisherman, um a longtime friend, and business partner of Alex.
00:05:07
Speaker
They co-owned multiple land holdings, including some small islands right off of the coast of South Carolina.
Barrett Boulware's Connection
00:05:16
Speaker
Barrett and his father were arrested on drug smuggling charges in the 80s when investigators seized 15 tons of marijuana from a shrimp boat in the Bahamas.
00:05:28
Speaker
The charges were later dropped when a key government witness died. Boulware ultimately died of colon cancer in 2018. Alex bought Moselle back in 2013 from Boulware's wife, Janine Morris Boulware, according to property records.
00:05:48
Speaker
He allegedly bought the entire property for just $5, a move that's sometimes used so that a seller can abolish avoid paying capital gains tax, as well as a practice used in money laundering.
00:06:04
Speaker
Just something sounds a little suspicious to me about that. Bulwer's name cropped up during the murder trial when jurors heard that Murdoch had stolen $750,000 insurance money from his friend when he was dying of colon cancer.
00:06:22
Speaker
shocker I do not think it is coincidence that the previous owner of the property was a known drug smuggler. And I believe understanding the layout and other structures offer a clue to how this property may have been utilized as part of a drug smuggling scheme of the past?
00:06:44
Speaker
And if so, could Alex have been somehow caught up in it? Could that tell us more about this tragedy and the corruption surrounding Alex? Spoiler alert, I think it does.
00:06:58
Speaker
There's just something about having a landing strip and an airplane hangar in the middle of a dense, rural South Carolina swampland that just seems odd.
00:07:11
Speaker
Not to mention the stash house. I mean, the bunkhouse. I think a key to this is also to know that Moselle is located on the banks of the Salcahatchee River.
00:07:25
Speaker
In fact, it it includes two and a half mile stretch of riverfront along the river. And as a side note, the Salcahatchee River twists and turns, but ultimately leads to the Atlantic Ocean.
00:07:42
Speaker
You know, that big ocean where we constantly hear about boats smuggling drugs up from Central America? Yeah, that one. As I mentioned previously, when the Murdaus owned Moselle, it consisted of over 1,700 acres of land with dove fields, duck ponds, deer stands, and again, a two and a half mile stretch of river.
00:08:10
Speaker
Much of the land consists of dense forests and swampy areas and was largely inaccessible. They did have some back roads, um,
00:08:22
Speaker
in and out of ah some of the lands, though, that um headed back to where the river stood. Basically, Moselle was a hunter's paradise.
00:08:35
Speaker
Alex, Paul, Buster, as well as their friends, would spend a lot of time riding the estate, hunting deer, duck, quail, doves, and hogs.
00:08:47
Speaker
In particular, during the Murdaugh murder trial, we heard a lot about hunting of wild hogs, from the time of day to hunt to the type of guns used. Several witnesses testified that the wild hogs roamed the property and were a nuisance, and that the family and their friends would shoot them whenever they got a chance. Hence the reasoning behind having guns on hand and vehicles and golf carts, etc. all the time.
00:09:19
Speaker
There is brick and iron main entrance to the property with a about of a quarter mile long live oak lined driveway.
00:09:31
Speaker
I drove about the property. i drove by it about a year ago can attest that the description sounds much grander than it looks in person. I was quite underwhelmed. It looked like a property trying too hard to impress, but hey, I'm no realtor. So um about a quarter of mile from the house are dog kennels where Paul and Maggie were where Paul and Maggie's bodies were ultimately found.
00:10:05
Speaker
Paul's body was
Trial Insights and Juror Visit
00:10:06
Speaker
found in a small feed room at the end of a line of individual dog kettles, and Maggie's was found about 100 yards away in an open area.
00:10:19
Speaker
Trial evidence revealed that Paul and Maggie were shot by two different guns, both owned by the Murdaugh's. The theory put forward was that these guns were in the back of a golf cart, which Alex st drove down to the kennels in on the night of the murders.
00:10:38
Speaker
Testimonies showed that it would not have been unusual for the family to have two loaded guns casually stowed in that way to be used for shooting those unwanted hogs at any moment. As crazy as that sounds, I do believe that is the case.
00:10:56
Speaker
So I mentioned the property included ah guest or bunkhouse. It was several hundred feet beyond the dog kennels. I think there was a tiny but key piece of evidence revealed at trial that seemed unsubstantial.
00:11:15
Speaker
But something about it just struck me. One of the FBI location data experts testified that on the evening prior to the murders,
00:11:26
Speaker
At some point, Paul went over to that bunkhouse by himself. We can put a pin in that detail, but I think it may have been significant as we try to theorize what could have actually transpired that night.
00:11:43
Speaker
Don't forget about it. Understanding the geographical layout in which all of these tragedies occurred is integral to conceptualizing everything going on.
00:11:55
Speaker
If we consider the town of Hampton, South Carolina, the epicenter around all of which this unfolded, it's a town of about 2,500 people in rural South Carolina. Moselle itself is about 14 miles outside of the main town.
00:12:15
Speaker
Hampton is the town of which Alex Murdaugh Old law office is located. Again, when I visited, I was struck by the stark difference of the one large multi-storied red brick colonial style building surrounded by small dilapidated homes and a singular main street only half filled with local shops and restaurants, many standing vacant.
00:12:41
Speaker
I'm sure this was once a very cute small town in southern South Carolina, but at this point, it looked like it had seen better days.
00:12:53
Speaker
Apparently, the judge in the Murda Murda trial must have also recognized that the location and layout of the Moselle property was integral to understanding the case and how it unfolded.
00:13:06
Speaker
Judge Newman agreed to a jury visit on February 27th following a request from Mr. Murdoch's defense attorney. Prosecutor Creighton Waters raised an objection that the property had changed in the last 20 months, with the trees between the family home and the kennels having grown significantly.
00:13:28
Speaker
Judge Newman gave the defense a rare win and agreed to arrange the field trip to Moselle. Under tight security, Judge Clifton Newman allowed the jurors to visit the property, telling them that they could not ask anyone any questions while there, including law enforcement, and that they could not discuss the case with each other during the trip.
00:13:52
Speaker
The pool then briefly visited the dog kennels, noting that it was a heavy place to visit, with the feed room feeling like a haunted place.
00:14:03
Speaker
While standing in the center of the small room, one juror said that she could not see to the left side of the doorway where the prosecution's expert witness said the shooter was standing.
00:14:16
Speaker
The place where Paul's body fell, outside the feed room, was within eyesight of and just 12 steps away from where Maggie's body was found, she reported.
Post-Trial Property Sale
00:14:27
Speaker
As a follow-up, I will let you know that after the Murdaugh trial, Alex Murdaugh's infamous Moselle estate underwent a split sale with the main house on 21 acres selling for a million dollars in February of 2024 to an Alex Blair who renovated it and relisted it for $2.75 million, um intending it to be used as a horse farm.
00:14:55
Speaker
But it is back on the market as of late 2025, while the larger 1,700-acre parcel was sold separately to a local farmer for $3.9 million in early 2023.
00:15:09
Speaker
twenty twenty three The property remains a focal point in the true crime discussions, now a renovated estate with a notorious history.
00:15:21
Speaker
Okay, so I think I'll stop here for today. i could easily geek out discussing the whole geography of the area And how I believe in the past drugs were smuggled into South Carolina up from Central America and offloaded onto some of those mostly uninhabited small islands off the coast, like the ones co-owned by Alex Murdaugh and known drug smuggler, business associate and friend, Barrett Boulware.
00:15:54
Speaker
From there, I theorized that the drugs were smuggled up the dark, dense, unaccessible back river ways that led to places like Moselle, where they could be offloaded in seclusion, stored in stash slash bunkhouses, to be loaded onto planes and flown out or driven on the back roads to the I-95 drug corridor to continue the journey up the eastern seaboard.
00:16:26
Speaker
But I don't want to get too far ahead of myself. So tune in next week when we will continue to look more at the Murda on Murders. Thank you.